Fredrick dpouglas
Frederick Douglass Paper “Fortunate my fortunate occurrence”(3), best describes the thoughts of a person after reading the Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass. Douglass not only tells an amazing story of slavery, he allows the readers to befriend him, and feel like they have been through the struggles together. In 1817 in Tuckahoe, Maryland, one of the most influential figures in African American History, Frederick Douglass, was born. Born into slavery, never knowing his real age, or who his father really was, Frederick Douglass overcame many obstacles in order to write his autobiography. Douglass wrote his narrative to inform the white people of the north about slavery in the south. In his narrative the readers learn all about the horrors of slavery and the conditions Douglass had to overcome. In 1841 Douglass met a man named William Lloyd Garrison at an anti slavery convention that was held in Nantucket. Garrison was a very prominent abolitionist of that time. After hearing Douglass speak, Garrison helped persuade him to write down his story of slavery and escape, to help promote the anti-slavery movement by showing how horrible slavery was. In order for his narrative to be credible because he was a escaped slave, and very intelligent, Garrison wrote a preface to the narrative stating that “I am confident that it is essentially true in all its statements; that nothing has been set down in malice, nothing exaggerated, nothing drawn from the imagination; that it comes short of reality, rather than overstates a single fact in regard to slavery as it is”(6). Douglass begins his narrative by explaining to the reader about where he grew up, and about his family life. He describes how most slaves did not know how old they are, even comparing them to horses, “the larger part of slaves know as little of the ages as horses know of theirs”(13). The reason most slaves did not know there ages was to “keep the slaves ignorant”(13). This comparison to slaves as animals not only was the thoughts of the masters but also the thoughts of the slaves themselves. The slaves being born into an environment that was carefully constructed by their masters, has the consequence of effecting the slaves own judgments of themselves. The closest knowledge that Douglass had of his age is that sometime in 1835 Douglass master said he is about seventeen years of age. Slavery destroys the mother and child relationship. When Douglass was an infant he was separated from his mother. Douglass states that “I never saw my mother, to know her as such, more than four or five times in my life”(13). He only saw his mother at night when she would travel by foot, for about 12 miles to see him.