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How did Frederick Douglass attack slavery
Why was Frederick Douglass a slave
Why was Frederick Douglass a slave
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Frederick Douglass was born into slavery during the 1800s. It was when he lived in the Hugh’s residence, he learned how to read and write. Hugh’s wife
Hugh Auld thought that if a slave learned to read, he would learn enough to want to be free. Even though Sophia couldn’t teach him anymore, Douglass continued to learn.
He does not agree with Mrs. Auld teaching Douglass these new things, because he felt the education ruined slaves and ultimately would make them unhappy and unruly. Although Mr. Auld’s word were quite harsh, Douglass took it as words of enlightenment and vowed to win his freedom
While working on the plantation, Douglass was taught how to read by his slave master’s wife. However, the lessons stopped per the request of his slave master, yet, that did not stop him from continuing to learn how to read. At the age of sixteen, he was sold to a “slave breaker,” named Edward Covey, who was a very harsh slave master. After spending less than a year under Covey’s control, he tried to escape with a group of slaves, but was later caught by authorities and was
Frederick Douglass began his journey in the abolitionist movement when he was asked to tell his story in front of the Massachusetts Antislavery Society (MAS). Due to his great speaking abilities he was hired as an agent for MAS. He eventually wrote an autobiography known as "Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass" in 1845. Frederick Douglass described his experiences with slavery which contributed to the abolitionist movement. Douglass began his career as a speaker, traveling around the US and trying to gain subscribers to the Liberator.
Slavery started in the year of 1619 in the southern part of the United States. Maryland is on the South side of the United States where slavery was. Slavery was still a way of life when Frederick Douglass was born. Douglass was born into slavery, although the date of when he was born is not exact. Douglass was one of the slaves that is remembered well by a lot of people because he was a slave that became an abolitionist and wrote a book entitled Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass.
Douglass for example emphasized the importance of education for slaves. Douglass is a first had observer of the strategy of slave owners to keep their slaves ignorant. By keeping slave uneducated they are unable to express the horrible things that happen to them to the world. Hugh Auld forces his wife to stop teaching Douglass to read (auld stopping teaching quote) , so Douglass teaches himself. For him learning to read was a major turning point in his quest for freedom and it enabled him to put out his book, which would inspire many to turn against slavery.
In the text it is stated that "[teaching a slave] was unlawful, as well as unsafe" (824) in which Frederick Douglass later recounts as being true. Douglass recounts of the hatred he felt towards slaveoweners upon being enlightened of slavery as a whole. He further states "that at times [he] feels that learning to read had been a curse rather than a blessing. It had given me a view of my wretched condition, without the remedy." This being said, Douglass was distraught at the thought of being a slave forever in which there were very few possibilities of his freedom.
Auld felt that it would make him unfit for slavery. At the beginning of the passage, he recalls being sent to live with one of his slave master’s relatives, Hugh Auld. Hugh’s wife begins to teach Douglass to read and write, but he forbade her saying that “it will make Douglass unfit for slavery.” Despite
His mistress Sophia Auld, Hugh’s wife, was very kind with Douglass and even taught him to read and write because she has never had any slave before. However, Mr. Hugh then discovered this and ordered his wife to stop teaching Douglass. Not only Mr. Hugh but also other
Frederick Douglass was a slave whose goal was to learn to read and write. Even though Douglass knew that he, and the people helping him achieve this goal, could get in serious trouble. Douglass wanted to be treated as a human with all the same qualities. The narrative states, “It is Almost an unpardonable offense to teach slaves to read in this Christian country.”
Fredrick Douglass meets Hugh Auld’s wife Sophia and he is surprised about how nice she is. She does not really know how to treat slaves because she has never had them. A slave with education is said to be a dangerous slave so they are not supposed to be taught. However it seems like Mrs. Auld did not know that, and she began to teach Douglass the Alphabet which is a big turning point in Douglass’s life as a slave. Mr. Auld figures out that his wife has been teaching Douglass, and he puts an end to it, and he tells her how dangerous it is to teach a slave.
According to Mistress Hugh, “education and slavery were incompatible with each other” (Douglass, 33). Although Mistress Hugh had stopped teaching Douglass how to read, the seed of knowledge had already been planted. In the years that followed, his hunger for knowledge did not dissipate. Douglass devised various methods to learn to read and write in very clever ways.
Douglass states: “The more I read, the more I was led to abhor and detest my enslavers. I could regard them in no other light than a band of successful robbers, who had left their homes, and gone to Africa, and stolen us from our homes, and in a strange land reduced us to slavery” (Douglass 51). Reading and writing opened Frederick Douglass’s eyes to the cause of the abolitionist. He became knowledgeable about a topic that white slave owners tried to keep hidden from their slaves. Literacy would eventually impact his life in more ways than what he could see while he was a young slave under Master Hugh’s
With all the knowledge he was gaining, he began to comprehend everything around him. The things he was learning fascinated him, but the “more [he] read, the more [he] was led to abhor and detest [his] enslavers”(Douglass 35); however, that should not be viewed as a negative affect but a positive one. No one should want to be deceived for their entire life. This hatred that he built up motivated him to continue to further educate himself. As a result, he later motivated other slaves to earn an education by having “[availed] themselves to [an] opportunity to learn to read” (Douglass 69) by Douglass teaching them every Sunday.
