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Title: The broomstick wedding
Description: Illustration is included in Chapter XIV, "I am the Innocent Cause of a Fight -- Religious Services among the Slaves in 'Ole Virginny.'" It shows a "broomstick wedding" that the author recalls having seen. Standing to the left, the betrothed slaves Pompey and Susan hold hands as they wait to jump over the broomstick, which is held by two slaves who are bent at the waist. Uncle Aaron, an elderly slave know as a preacher and a conjuror, presides over the ceremony. According to the author's description, the bride and groom wore the cast-off clothes of their mistress and master: she in a half-worn, ill fitting, maroon-colored merino gown, and he in checked trousers, a white vest and a brown linen duster that was several sizes too big. Numerous wedding guests fill the cabin., Illustration in Mary Ashton Rice Livermore's The Story of my Life, or, The Sunshine and Shadow of Seventy Years (Hartford: A.D. Worthington & Co., 1897), p. 257., Caption underneath the image reads: "'Look squar' at de broomstick! All ready now! one-two-three-jump!'", Fels Afro-Americana Image Project, Scenes from Slave Life.
Date: [1897]
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Books & Other Texts | Rare Am 1897 Liv 29518.O p 257, https://digital.librarycompany.org/islandora/object/Islandora%3A2839

Title: A plantation "corn-shucking" -- social meeting of slaves
Description: Illustration is included in Chapter XIX, "The Slave-Trader's Purchase -- A Slave Gang Bound for the South -- Distressing Scenes at Parting -- 'We'll Shuck dis Cawn Befo' We Go!'" Image shows a large, festive, night-time corn-shucking in which slaves from several neighboring plantations were said to have participated. Sitting and standing around an enormous pile of husks, the slaves strip the ears of corn and throw them into buckets. According to the text, the slaves sang while they worked, and some tried to outdo each other in husking contests., Illustration in Mary Ashton Rice Livermore's The Story of my Life, or, The Sunshine and Shadow of Seventy Years (Hartford: A.D. Worthington & Co., 1897), p. 336., Caption underneath the image reads: "Costumed in every variety of nondescript gaments, with faces of every shade of black, as diverse in aspect as were their garments in fashion, they seated themselves in groups around the mounds of unhusked corn.", Fels Afro-Americana Image Project, Scenes from Slave Life.
Creator: Helmick, Howard, designer
Date: [1897]
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Books & Other Texts | Rare Am 1897 Liv 29518.O p 336, https://digital.librarycompany.org/islandora/object/Islandora%3A2840

Title: The runaway slaves, Anthony Burns and Thomas Sims
Description: Set in Boston, the image shows the consequences of the Fugitive Slave Law in the North. Despite public hostility to slave-hunting, Livermore explained that escaped slaves such as Burns and Sims were "returned at noon-day, military authority being called out to prevent the interference of the people, who were determined on their rescue.", Illustration in Mary Ashton Rice Livermore's The Story of my Life, or, The Sunshine and Shadow of Seventy Years (Hartford: A.D. Worthington & Co., 1897), p. 450., Caption underneath image reads: "With pinioned arms and manacled feet they marched between files of soldiers to a steamer bound for South Carolina from whence they had fled. Vast throngs of men and women watched the procession, many weeping as they gazed.", Fels Afro-Americana Image Project, Fugitives.
Creator: Garrett, Edmund Henry, 1853-1929, designer
Date: [1897]
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Books & Other Texts | Rare Am 1897 Liv 29518.O p 450, https://digital.librarycompany.org/islandora/object/Islandora%3A2841

Title: The brutal whipping of Matt
Description: Illustration is included in Chapter XII, "Negro Matt, the Cooper -- Savage Bryson -- the Negro Overseer - An Agonizing but Unavailing Plea for Mercy -- A Slave-Whipping and a Tragedy." According to Livermore, the print shows the cooper, Matt, being whipped by a "gigantic" man as his master watches at the left. Other slaves look on in horror. Matt offense was accidentally burning his master in the blacksmith's shop. For this, Livermore explained, a "rope was roughly tied around his wrists, and thrown over a beam projecting from the roof of the shop, by which he was drawn up with jerks, until his toes barely touched the ground." The overseer, she noted, "stood by urging on the terrible flagellation, in the most brutal and fiendish manner conceivable." (p. 217), Illustration in Mary Ashton Rice Livermore's The Story of my Life, or, The Sunshine and Shadow of Seventy Years (Hartford: A.D. Worthington & Co., 1897), p. 214., Caption underneath the image reads: "The swish of a long whip flashed through the air. The lash sank with a cutting sound into Matt's quivering flesh. Shrieks of torture pierced the skies as blow after blow fell upon the body of the suffering man. I stood immovable, sick and faint, and heard and saw it all, paralyzed with horror and fear.", Fels Afro-Americana Image Project, Punishment Scenes.
Creator: Helmick, Howard, designer
Date: [1897]
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Books & Other Texts | Rare Am 1897 Liv 29518.O p 214, https://digital.librarycompany.org/islandora/object/Islandora%3A2838

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