Freedom by Trickery

In the Narrative of the Life of Fredrick Douglass written by Fredrick Douglass, he and the rest of the slaves in 1840 had to be tricky to survive. Douglass used trickery to his advantage and produced it into a positive action, freedom.

Douglass went through quite a few hardships and disturbing ordeals. He witnessed his younger brother get his head bashed in, that in it self is horrific sufficient. He overheard Mr. Auld, one of his masters, telling Mrs. Auld that it was unsafe to teach a slave to study (Douglass 42). Douglass took this as motivation and strove to find out to read and write.

Douglass’s next master was Edward Covey, a properly-identified slave breaker, for a year. Covey was quite tricky. He would pretend to ride into town, then walk back and sneak up on the slaves as to scare and deceive them. One day, following a serious beating by Covey, (Douglass 86) Douglass ran for refuge for one evening from a slave named Sandy Jenkins. Jenkins believed that a specific root had magical powers and told Douglass that if he wore it on his ideal side no white man could beat him (Douglass 90). He returned the next day wearing the root, and to his surprise, Covey did not beat him for a time. A handful of days later, Covey tried to tie him up for a beating. Douglass fought back and after a two-hour struggle, Covey gave up. Considering that Covey did not want to ruin his reputation as a slave breaker, he never ever sent Douglass to the authorities to be punished for hitting a white man. Douglass applied Covey’s personal reputation against him and tricked him into in no way crossing and punishing him again.

When Douglass’s year was over with Covey, he went to live with Mr. Freeland. Freeland became his new master and had two slaves. A little when right after Douglass came to reside there, he sparked interest in the other individuals and began to teach them to study and create in Sabbath school. “It was understood among all who came, that there ought to be as tiny show about it as doable.” (Douglass 103) Douglass managed to teach many, whom may possibly endure up to nine lashes for leaving their plantation (Douglass 104). The religious masters thought the slaves had been spending the Sabbath in wrestling, boxing or drinking whisky, when all along they have been studying to read and write. “I taught them simply because it…

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