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Uncle Tom's Cabin Thesis

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Diego F. Vincent

Uncle Tom’s Cabin
Living during the time of slavery in the United States was horrible for blacks. The majority of blacks were slaves that were overworked and lived tortured, beaten, separated from their families, and treated like animals. They were someone’s property. They were sold and traded like cattle in the South where the large plantations needed the workers. Many whites both in the South and North, like Harriet Beecher Stowe, opposed slavery and suffered watching the injustice of slavery. Harriet Beecher Stowe was a white woman growing up in Cincinnati during the time of slavery and she wrote her novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin to express her anger and opposition of the practice of slavery. When she wrote Uncle Tom’s …show more content…

Shelby was a slave owner, but like few slave owners in the South, he was caring and kind to his slaves that lived on his farm. Mr. Shelby was troubled by a big debt he needed to pay off and the only way to pay it was by selling two of his slaves to Haley, a southern slave trader. Mr. Shelby’s options were to give Tom, Harry, a boy son of Eliza, and another slave with a family on the farm. After Mr. Shelby convinced Haley to give him until the next day to decide which slaves he was going to give up, he went to speak with his wife about the situation. Earlier that day, Mrs. Shelby had promised her worried servant Eliza that no one would her boy away. Eliza later heard a conversation between the Shelbys and Uncle Tom and his wife. This convinced Eliza to flee north with Harry to try to find and reunite with her husband George. Haley the slave trader was informed that Eliza and her son had left Shelby’s farm and he decided to chase after her. Two slaves informed Eliza that Haley was after her, but she was able to cross the Ohio River. This forced Haley to send slave catchers to bring Eliza and her son back to him in Kentucky. Eliza reached a Quaker settlement where her husband George is at. The Quakers were against slavery and they decided to help Eliza and her family get to Canada. After a while, the slave catcher had lost motivation to go after the runaway slaves once he had gotten hurt and was healed by a Quaker. He gave up the chase for Eliza and her family …show more content…

Uncle Tom’s Cabin shows the audience how much she was against the ownership of slaves. She wrote the book to inform people about the terrible acts that were occurring in front of them, but many did not realize how bad it was or did not care at all. She felt that slaves were humans with the right to live life in peace not oppressed. She wanted the reader to know that mistreating slaves did not make them better workers but worse ones because they were suffering. She says it all in this quote: “Treat 'em like dogs, and you'll have dogs' works and dogs' actions. Treat 'em like men, and you'll have men's works.” Harriet Beecher Stowe wrote Uncle Tom’s Cabin to express her opinion and her feelings for what she thought was the truth –that slavery was wrong and should be

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