During the mid-1800’s many freed or escaped slaves began seeking an outlet and putting their stories into print so that the world would know the truth about the institution of slavery. The few that could actually write authored their own stories, while others entrusted their stories to those who could write it down for them. As the biographies were published, Americans, especially those in the north, were horrified by the immoral acts and atrocities carried out by slave owners. These narratives were used by abolitionists to spread their message about the evils of slavery. The publishing of these stories is perhaps responsible for the anti-slave sentiment, especially among women, in the North. Hundreds of stories were published, covering a wide range of experiences from many different parts of the South. It is interesting however, that two women, from different walks of life would have very similar stories. Although Harriet Ann Jacobs and Louisa Piquet have different personal stories and situations, they manner in which they reacted to their situation and their actions upon becoming “free” are strikingly similar.
Harriet Jacobs was born in 1813 to slave parents in North Carolina. She begins her narrative by saying that she was born a slave but had such a happy childhood that she did not know it until she was six years old. Her mother was owned by the Horniblows with whom Harriet lived. Her father, who was a very skilled carpenter, was owned by Andrew Knox but basically lived the life of a free man because his carpentry services were in high demand. She lived in a happy home and was so sheltered that she simply was not aware of her station in life. Raised by her mother and later by her mother’s mistress, Margaret Horniblow, she was able to sew, read and write. In 1825 when Mrs. Horniblow passed away, she was given to Horniblow’s niece. Her new master, Dr. James Norcom sexually abused Jacobs and refused to allow her to marry. Although she had a lover, a white lawyer named Samuel Sawyer, Norcom held her captive with threats of selling her children.
Finally, when she was twenty-two, Harriet escaped from Norcom and hid in a tiny space in her grandmother’s attic for seven years, watching her children grow up without knowledge of who their mother was, as they had been sold to their father after her escape. After hiding for seven years, Harriet escaped by a boat to Philadelphia, and later moved to New York in the early 1840’s. For years after her escape, Harriet worked to free her children. In fact, much of her narrative focuses on her efforts to rescue her children from slavery. After succeeding in securing freedom for her children, she went on to become an ardent abolitionist and member of a feminist anti-slavery movement. She published her life story in 1861, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, after much apprehension about doing so. Jacobs later served as a nurse in the Civil War and lived the rest of her life with her daughter as a free woman in Washington, D.C..
Louisa Piquet was born in South Carolina around 1828. Her mother was a slave and her father was her mother’s owner, John Randolph. An octoroon, she had a fair skin and straight hair and could have easily passed for a white child. Randolph’s wife dismissed both Louisa and her mother and she was sold to Mr. Cook, who lived in Georgia. Cook, who beat Louisa often, ran out of money and was forced to flee to Alabama, where he hired out Louisa and her mother to earn money. While she was being hired out to a Mr. English, she fell in love with a young man, who was also nearly white, but she feared running away with him because they could not read or write.
Like many female slaves, Louisa was expected to provide sexual services to her master. Mr. Cook repeatedly ordered her to perform these services, but realizing that he would not kill her, she refused. Eventually, she was delivered from Mr. Cook by the police who came and took his slaves to be sold at auction. Her mother and brother were sold to a man from Texas and she was bought as a companion to Mr. Williams, who lived in New Orleans. Before he died, Louisa and Williams had children together, two survived. Upon his death, Williams advised that Louisa go to New York with the children and live as a free woman. Instead she fled to Cincinnati because she did not have the money to travel any farther. While living in Cincinnati, she married Mr. Piquet and they had three children together.
She then joined an anti-slavery church and began sending letters to her mother in Texas, who she had not seen since they were sold at the auction many years before. With much support, Louisa solicited the funds to free her mother, traveling as far as New York to ask people for money. She also visited the Oberlin “rescuers” and after much effort, was able to finally free her mother, though the master refused to sell her brother as well. Louisa’s memoirs evolved from an interview about her life in slavery by Reverend Hiram Mattison who had met Louisa in Buffalo, New York and published the interview into a book.
Although Harriet Jacobs and Louisa Piquet were two different women with two different lives, their memoirs of their lives in slavery are similar in a few very important ways. Some of their experiences with slavery, their reactions to their plight and their actions upon reaching freedom in the North are almost identical.
First, both women were born into slavery and experienced both physical and sexual abuse under their masters as young women. Harriet and Louisa both tried fiercely to evade their masters’ advances. Both of their tales of sexual exploitation were included in their narratives and were used to depict the evils of slavery. This abuse served to represent the immorality surrounding the issue of slavery and was used by abolitionists to further their cause.
Another aspect of the women’s narratives that are similar is the actions they took in response to their situation. Both women managed to escape from the South to the North. Harriet escaped to Philadelphia after hiding in a tiny space for seven years and Louisa fled to Cincinnati after her final master passed away. These women were among the lucky, who were able to flee the South and survive in the North without being captured as a result of the Fugitive Slave Law. Despite the fact that all the odds were against their success in escaping, these women both persevered until they were able to reach the freedom they had dreamed of. The fact that these women were both determined enough to make it to the North and live their lives as free women is interesting because while their situations were different, they were also the same.
Perhaps the most important similarity between the biographies Harriet Jacobs and Louisa Piquet is the fact that they both, upon reaching the North, made valiant efforts to bring their loved ones to freedom as well. It was not enough that they had reached freedom. It was not enough for Harriet Jacobs that her children were owned by their father. Further, it was unbearable to Louisa that her mother and brother, who she had not seen since she was fourteen, were still enslaved in the deep South. Both women toiled to bring freedom and peace to their families. Harriet worked hard to secure bright futures for her children and was eventually able to live out the remainder of her days with her daughter. Louisa traveled far and wide to collect $900 (nearly $20,000 by today’s standards) to buy her mother’s freedom. She was able to rely on the sympathy and compassion of abolitionists in the North to purchase her mother’s freedom.
The similarities between these two women’s lives after escaping slavery are very similar. It is important to note however that one glaring similarity is that they both had their stories published and their stories were used to spread the anti-slavery message throughout the North. The most significant similarity is what Harriet Jacobs and Louisa Piquet did once they reached safety in the North. They did not selfishly keep out of the spotlight from fear of getting caught and sent back to slavery in the South. Both women strived to bring their loved ones to the same peace and freedom that they had reached in their lives. These women risked their own freedom to better the lives of the ones they loved, making it the most significant similarity between them. References
Jacobs, Harriet Ann. Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl. 1861.
Mattison, Hiram. Louisa Piquet: A Tale of Southern Slave Life. 1861.
