21
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(SLAVERY AND ABOLITION.) Manuscript “Anecdote, Communicated by a
Sailor.
The Tyrant Reproved by His Slave.”
Single Small 4to leaf of laid paper, torn
from the end-paper of an early book.
No place, circa 1750-1800
[2,000/3,000]
An interesting anti-slavery sentiment, in the form of an anecdote, reportedly overheard by a
sailor in the West Indies: “A poor West Indian Negro, employed as a domestic in the house of
his master who had purchased him, having bought a trifling Article of a fellow Negro who had
procured it by Clandestine means, was detected with the property about him: & therefore,
ordered by his master to be very severely whipped. After he had received the punishment, he
said to the Officer who had inflicted it “Why you no flog White man?” “So we do” answered
the Officer “when they buy stolen goods knowing them to be stolen.” The Negro replied
“There stand my Massa; why you no flog him as you flog poor me: he buy me and he know
me stole.”
22
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(SLAVERY AND ABOLITION—NEW YORK STATE.) TEN EYCK, JOHN.
Indenture of a nine year old Negro girl named Nan for a period of nine years.
Single folio leaf, written on one side and docketed on the verso. Curiously, this document
is marked “Sealed and delivered in the presence of ” with the original seal intact, but no
signatures.
Town of Coeymans, Albany County, New York, 1806
[800/1,200]
John Ten Eyck of Coeymans New York, Albany County, a descendant of Coenradt Ten Eyck,
shoemaker and tanner of New Amsterdam, indentures a nine year Negro girl named Nan to
Mr. William Rupell of Bethlehem, New York. Under his care, Nan was to be fed and clothed
and taught to read. At the age of eighteen, it was implicit that she would become free. The Ten
Eyck family was prominent in upstate New York, the owners of vast amounts of land, and
numerous businesses.
20
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