The Heroic Slave

THE HEROIC SLAVE

FREDERICK DOUGLASS

The Heroic Slave

A CULTURAL AND CRITICAL EDITION

Edited by

ROBERT S. LEVINE,

JOHN STAUFFER, AND

JOHN R. McKIVIGAN

Published with assistance from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission.

Published with assistance from the Louis Stern Memorial Fund.

Copyright © 2015 by Yale University. All rights reserved.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Douglass, Frederick, 1818–1895.
The heroic slave / Frederick Douglass ; a cultural and critical edition ; edited by Robert S. Levine, John Stauffer, and John R. McKivigan.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 978-0-300-18462-4 (pbk. : alk. paper)   1.  Washington, Madison—Fiction.   2.  Slaves—United States—Fiction.   3.  Creole (Brig)—Fiction.   4.  Slave insurrections—United States—History—19th century—Fiction.   5.  Mutiny—United States—History—19th century—Fiction   6.  Douglass, Frederick, 1818–1895 Heroic slave.   I.  Levine, Robert S. (Robert Steven), 1953– editor.   II.  Stauffer, John, 1965– editor.   III.  McKivigan, John R., 1949– editor.   IV.  Title.
PS1549.D66H47 2015
813'.3—dc23     2014029869

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

This paper meets the requirements of ANSI/NISO Z39.48–1992 (Permanence of Paper).

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Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction

PART 1: THE TEXT OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS’S THE HEROIC SLAVE

Frederick Douglass, The Heroic Slave

A Note on the Text

PART 2: CONTEMPORARY RESPONSES TO THE CREOLE REBELLION, 1841–1843

“Another Amistad Case—What Will Grow Out of It?”

“The Creole Mutiny”

Protest of the Officers and Crew of the American Brig Creole

“The Hero Mutineers”

Deposition of William H. Merritt

“Madison Washington: Another Chapter in His History”

Daniel Webster, Letter to Edward Everett

William Ellery Channing, from The Duty of the Free States, or Remarks Suggested by the Case of the Creole

Joshua R. Giddings, Resolutions

Henry Highland Garnet, from “An Address to the Slaves of the United States of America”

PART 3: DOUGLASS ON THE CREOLE AND BLACK REVOLUTION

Frederick Douglass, from “American Prejudice against Color”

Frederick Douglass, from “America’s Compromise with Slavery and the Abolitionists’ Work”

Frederick Douglass, from “American and Scottish Prejudice against the Slave”

Frederick Douglass, from “Meeting in Faneuil Hall”

Frederick Douglass, from “Address at the Great Anti-Colonization Meeting in New York”

Frederick Douglass, from “What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?”

Frederick Douglass, from “West India Emancipation”

Frederick Douglass, “A Black Hero”

PART 4: NARRATIVES OF THE CREOLE REBELLION, 1855–1901

William C. Nell, “Madison Washington”

Samuel Ringgold Ward, “Men and Women of Mark”

William Wells Brown, “Slave Revolt at Sea”

Lydia Maria Child, “Madison Washington”

Robert Purvis, “A Priceless Picture: History of Sinque, the Hero of the Amistad”

Pauline E. Hopkins, “A Dash for Liberty”

PART 5: CRITICISM

Robert B. Stepto, from “Storytelling in Early Afro-American Fiction”

William L. Andrews, from “The Novelization of Voice in Early African American Narrative”

Richard Yarborough, from “Race, Violence, and Manhood”

Maggie Montesinos Sale, from “The Heroic Slave”

Celeste-Marie Bernier, from “‘Arms like Polished Iron’”

Ivy G. Wilson, from “Transnationalism, Frederick Douglass, and ‘The Heroic Slave’”

Carrie Hyde, from “The Climates of Liberty”

Chronology of Frederick Douglass, Madison Washington, and Resistance to Slavery

Selected Bibliography

Acknowledgments

For their assistance with documents and images, we would like to thank the Harvard University librarians Emily Bell (in Government Documents), Gregory Eow (Widener Library), and Peter Accardo (Houghton Library); the University of Maryland librarian Patricia Herron; and the knowledgeable staff at the Library of Congress. For their helpful suggestions along the way, we are grateful to Celeste-Marie Bernier, Deborah Cunningham, David Brion Davis, Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Howard Jones, Jim Oakes, Robert Paquette, Manisha Sinha, Robert Stepto, and Zoe Trodd. Offering crucial assistance with the text of The Heroic Slave, which was developed at the Frederick Douglass Papers at Indiana University–Purdue University Indianapolis, were Eamonn Brandon, Kate Burzlaff, James A. Hanna, and Rebecca Pattillo. Their work was supported by the National Historical Publications and Records Commission and the Indiana University School of Liberal Arts at Indianapolis. Robert S. Levine did much of his work on the edition while a Guggenheim Fellow, and he is grateful for the support of the Guggenheim Foundation. For their encouragement and advice, we are pleased to thank Sarah Miller, Heather Gold, and Margaret Otzel, our editors at Yale University Press. Our thanks as well to the Press’s anonymous readers and to our skillful copy editor, Kip Keller.

Introduction

On 25 October 1841, the slave ship Creole left Richmond, Virginia, for New Orleans, the largest slave-trading market in North America. The brig carried 13 sailors and crew, 6 white passengers, numerous boxes of tobacco, and 135 slaves, worth about $100,000 (around $3 million in 2014 currency). Eight days later, as the Creole sailed through the northern Bahamas, 19 slaves rose up in revolt.