Narratives by the likes of Frederick Douglass
and others, as well Stowe’s smashingly successful novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin
(said by some to have started the Civil War) exposed the dirty secrets and
bringing them light, drawing a bead on tremendous cruelty and degradation at
the hands of slave owners.
And then along came Solomon Northup. He was a free Black man living in New York, a
talented musician and tradesman, even he was not immune to being kidnapped by
men who hoodwinked him and sold him into Southern slavery. Twelve years he labored, suffered and sweated
in bondage underneath the Louisiana sun (Louisiana slave holders were notorious
for an extreme level of cruelty), trying to find a way out. Eventually, he was freed, thanks to a
Canadian man by the name of Bass, who got word of where he was to Northup’s
friends and family in New York.
When he returned, he sued those who kidnapped him and lost
the case…12 years, stolen with no compensation…and so he wrote. The book was successful in its day, but it
faded from memory. Rediscovered in the
late 1960’s, it has gone on to become one of the premier prime source
narratives for the history of American Slavery.
What I find interesting is the debate over the authenticity of Northup’s
narrative. It was accused of being
false, made-up; a tool of anti-slavery abolitionist propaganda…
Whether or not there is anything to the claims of the book
being a hoax (which I believe are nothing more than attempts to discredit a
very truthful account), the book truly stands on its merit and is an honestly
written narrative…places in the book exist, and are not made up…like the
Washington D.C. slave markets and the sites they once occupied…found recently
by using Northup’s book…
First edition of Twelve Years a Slave
