Up from Slavery: An Autobiography

During the year that I spent in Washington, and for some little time before this, there had been considerable agitation in the state of West Virginia over the question of moving the capital of the state from Wheeling to some other central point.  As a result of this, the Legislature designated three cities to be voted upon by the citizens of the state as the permanent seat of government.  Among these cities was Charleston, only five miles from Malden, my home.  At the close of my school year in Washington I was very pleasantly surprised to receive, from a committee of three white people in Charleston, an invitation to canvass the state in the interests of that city.  This invitation I accepted, and spent nearly three months in speaking in various parts of the state.  Charleston was successful in winning the prize, and is now the permanent seat of government.

The reputation that I made as a speaker during this campaign induced a number of persons to make an earnest effort to get me to enter political life, but I refused, still believing that I could find other service which would prove of more permanent value to my race.  Even then I had a strong feeling that what our people most needed was to get a foundation in education, industry, and property, and for this I felt that they could better afford to strive than for political preferment.  As for my individual self, it appeared to me to be reasonably certain that I could succeed in political life, but I had a feeling that it would be a rather selfish kind of success—­individual success at the cost of failing to do my duty in assisting in laying a foundation for the masses.

At this period in the progress of our race a very large proportion of the young men who went to school or to college did so with the expressed determination to prepare themselves to be great lawyers, or Congressmen, and many of the women planned to become music teachers; but I had a reasonably fixed idea, even at that early period in my life, that there was a need for something to be done to prepare the way for successful lawyers, Congressmen, and music teachers.

I felt that the conditions were a good deal like those of an old coloured man, during the days of slavery, who wanted to learn how to play on the guitar.  In his desire to take guitar lessons he applied to one of his young masters to teach him, but the young man, not having much faith in the ability of the slave to master the guitar at his age, sought to discourage him by telling him:  “Uncle Jake, I will give you guitar lessons; but, Jake, I will have to charge you three dollars for the first lesson, two dollars for the second lesson, and one dollar for the third lesson.  But I will charge you only twenty-five cents for the last lesson.”

Uncle Jake answered:  “All right, boss, I hires you on dem terms.  But, boss!  I wants yer to be sure an’ give me dat las’ lesson first.”

Soon after my work in connection with the removal of the capital was finished, I received an invitation which gave me great joy and which at the same time was a very pleasant surprise.  This was a letter from General Armstrong, inviting me to return to Hampton at the next Commencement to deliver what was called the “post-graduate address.”  This was an honour which I had not dreamed of receiving.  With much care I prepared the best address that I was capable of.  I chose for my subject “The Force That Wins.”

As I returned to Hampton for the purpose of delivering this address, I went over much of the same ground—­now, however, covered entirely by railroad—­that I had traversed nearly six years before, when I first sought entrance into Hampton Institute as a student.  Now I was able to ride the whole distance in the train.  I was constantly contrasting this with my first journey to Hampton.  I think I may say, without seeming egotism, that it is seldom that five years have wrought such a change in the life and aspirations of an individual.

At Hampton I received a warm welcome from teachers and students.  I found that during my absence from Hampton the institute each year had been getting closer to the real needs and conditions of our people; that the industrial reaching, as well as that of the academic department, had greatly improved.  The plan of the school was not modelled after that of any other institution then in existence, but every improvement was made under the magnificent leadership of General Armstrong solely with the view of meeting and helping the needs of our people as they presented themselves at the time.  Too often, it seems to me, in missionary and educational work among underdeveloped races, people yield to the temptation of doing that which was done a hundred years before, or is being done in other communities a thousand miles away.  The temptation often is to run each individual through a certain educational mould, regardless of the condition of the subject or the end to be accomplished.  This was not so at Hampton Institute.

The address which I delivered on Commencement Day seems to have pleased every one, and many kind and encouraging words were spoken to me regarding it.  Soon after my return to my home in West Virginia, where I had planned to continue teaching, I was again surprised to receive a letter from General Armstrong, asking me to return to Hampton partly as a teacher and partly to pursue some supplementary studies.  This was in the summer of 1879.  Soon after I began my first teaching in West Virginia I had picked out four of the brightest and most promising of my pupils, in addition to my two brothers, to whom I have already referred, and had given them special attention, with the view of having them go to Hampton.  They had gone there, and in each case the teachers had found them so well prepared that they entered advanced classes.  This fact, it seems, led to my being called back to Hampton as a teacher.  One of the young men that I sent to Hampton in this way is now Dr. Samuel E. Courtney, a successful physician in Boston, and a member of the School Board of that city.

About this time the experiment was being tried for the first time, by General Armstrong, of education Indians at Hampton.  Few people then had any confidence in the ability of the Indians to receive education and to profit by it.  General Armstrong was anxious to try the experiment systematically on a large scale.  He secured from the reservations in the Western states over one hundred wild and for the most part perfectly ignorant Indians, the greater proportion of whom were young men.  The special work which the General desired me to do was be a sort of “house father” to the Indian young men—­that is, I was to live in the building with them and have the charge of their discipline, clothing, rooms, and so on.  This was a very tempting offer, but I had become so much absorbed in my work in West Virginia that I dreaded to give it up.  However, I tore myself away from it.  I did not know how to refuse to perform any service that General Armstrong desired of me.

On going to Hampton, I took up my residence in a building with about seventy-five Indian youths.  I was the only person in the building who was not a member of their race.  At first I had a good deal of doubt about my ability to succeed.  I knew that the average Indian felt himself above the white man, and, of course, he felt himself far above the Negro, largely on account of the fact of the Negro having submitted to slavery—­a thing which the Indian would never do.  The Indians, in the Indian Territory, owned a large number of slaves during the days of slavery.  Aside from this, there was a general feeling that the attempt to education and civilize the red men at Hampton would be a failure.  All this made me proceed very cautiously, for I felt keenly the great responsibility.  But I was determined to succeed.  It was not long before I had the complete confidence of the Indians, and not only this, but I think I am safe in saying that I had their love and respect.  I found that they were about like any other human beings; that they responded to kind treatment and resented ill-treatment.  They were continually planning to do something that would add to my happiness and comfort.  The things that they disliked most, I think, were to have their long hair cut, to give up wearing their blankets, and to cease smoking; but no white American ever thinks that any other race is wholly civilized until he wears the white man’s clothes, eats the white man’s food, speaks the white man’s language, and professes the white man’s religion.

When the difficulty of learning the English language was subtracted, I found that in the matter of learning trades and in mastering academic studies there was little difference between the coloured and Indian students.  It was a constant delight to me to note the interest which the coloured students took in trying to help the Indians in every way possible.  There were a few of the coloured students who felt that the Indians ought not to be admitted to Hampton, but these were in the minority.  Whenever they were asked to do so, the Negro students gladly took the Indians as room-mates, in order that they might teach them to speak English and to acquire civilized habits.

I have often wondered if there was a white institution in this country whose students would have welcomed the incoming of more than a hundred companions of another race in the cordial way that these black students at Hampton welcomed the red ones.  How often I have wanted to say to white students that they lift themselves up in proportion as they help to lift others, and the more unfortunate the race, and the lower in the scale of civilization, the more does one raise one’s self by giving the assistance.

This reminds me of a conversation which I once had with the Hon. Frederick Douglass.  At one time Mr. Douglass was travelling in the state of Pennsylvania, and was forced, on account of his colour, to ride in the baggage-car, in spite of the fact that he had paid the same price for his passage that the other passengers had paid.  When some of the white passengers went into the baggage-car to console Mr. Douglass, and one of them said to him:  “I am sorry, Mr. Douglass, that you have been degraded in this manner,” Mr. Douglass straightened himself up on the box upon which he was sitting, and replied:  “They cannot degrade Frederick Douglass.  The soul that is within me no man can degrade.  I am not the one that is being degraded on account of this treatment, but those who are inflicting it upon me.”

In one part of the country, where the law demands the separation of the races on the railroad trains, I saw at one time a rather amusing instance which showed how difficult it sometimes is to know where the black begins and the white ends.

There was a man who was well known in his community as a Negro, but who was so white that even an expert would have hard work to classify him as a black man.  This man was riding in the part of the train set aside for the coloured passengers.  When the train conductor reached him, he showed at once that he was perplexed.  If the man was a Negro, the conductor did not want to send him to the white people’s coach; at the same time, if he was a white man, the conductor did not want to insult him by asking him if he was a Negro.  The official looked him over carefully, examining his hair, eyes, nose, and hands, but still seemed puzzled.  Finally, to solve the difficulty, he stooped over and peeped at the man’s feet.  When I saw the conductor examining the feet of the man in question, I said to myself, “That will settle it;” and so it did, for the trainman promptly decided that the passenger was a Negro, and let him remain where he was.  I congratulated myself that my race was fortunate in not losing one of its members.

My experience has been that the time to test a true gentleman is to observe him when he is in contact with individuals of a race that is less fortunate than his own.  This is illustrated in no better way than by observing the conduct of the old-school type of Southern gentleman when he is in contact with his former slaves or their descendants.

An example of what I mean is shown in a story told of George Washington, who, meeting a coloured man in the road once, who politely lifted his hat, lifted his own in return.  Some of his white friends who saw the incident criticised Washington for his action.  In reply to their criticism George Washington said:  “Do you suppose that I am going to permit a poor, ignorant, coloured man to be more polite than I am?”

While I was in charge of the Indian boys at Hampton, I had one or two experiences which illustrate the curious workings of caste in America.  One of the Indian boys was taken ill, and it became my duty to take him to Washington, deliver him over to the Secretary of the Interior, and get a receipt for him, in order that he might be returned to his Western reservation.  At that time I was rather ignorant of the ways of the world.  During my journey to Washington, on a steamboat, when the bell rang for dinner, I was careful to wait and not enter the dining room until after the greater part of the passengers had finished their meal.  Then, with my charge, I went to the dining saloon.  The man in charge politely informed me that the Indian could be served, but that I could not.  I never could understand how he knew just where to draw the colour line, since the Indian and I were of about the same complexion.  The steward, however, seemed to be an expert in this manner.  I had been directed by the authorities at Hampton to stop at a certain hotel in Washington with my charge, but when I went to this hotel the clerk stated that he would be glad to receive the Indian into the house, but said that he could not accommodate me.

An illustration of something of this same feeling came under my observation afterward.  I happened to find myself in a town in which so much excitement and indignation were being expressed that it seemed likely for a time that there would be a lynching.  The occasion of the trouble was that a dark-skinned man had stopped at the local hotel.  Investigation, however, developed the fact that this individual was a citizen of Morocco, and that while travelling in this country he spoke the English language.  As soon as it was learned that he was not an American Negro, all the signs of indignation disappeared.  The man who was the innocent cause of the excitement, though, found it prudent after that not to speak English.

At the end of my first year with the Indians there came another opening for me at Hampton, which, as I look back over my life now, seems to have come providentially, to help to prepare me for my work at Tuskegee later.  General Armstrong had found out that there was quite a number of young coloured men and women who were intensely in earnest in wishing to get an education, but who were prevented from entering Hampton Institute because they were too poor to be able to pay any portion of the cost of their board, or even to supply themselves with books.  He conceived the idea of starting a night-school in connection with the Institute, into which a limited number of the most promising of these young men and women would be received, on condition that they were to work for ten hours during the day, and attend school for two hours at night.  They were to be paid something above the cost of their board for their work.  The greater part of their earnings was to be reserved in the school’s treasury as a fund to be drawn on to pay their board when they had become students in the day-school, after they had spent one or two years in the night-school.  In this way they would obtain a start in their books and a knowledge of some trade or industry, in addition to the other far-reaching benefits of the institution.

General Armstrong asked me to take charge of the night-school, and I did so.  At the beginning of this school there were about twelve strong, earnest men and women who entered the class.  During the day the greater part of the young men worked in the school’s sawmill, and the young men worked in the laundry.  The work was not easy in either place, but in all my teaching I never taught pupils who gave me much genuine satisfaction as these did.  They were good students, and mastered their work thoroughly.  They were so much in earnest that only the ringing of the retiring-bell would make them stop studying, and often they would urge me to continue the lessons after the usual hour for going to bed had come.

These students showed so much earnestness, both in their hard work during the day, as well as in their application to their studies at night, that I gave them the name of “The Plucky Class”—­a name which soon grew popular and spread throughout the institution.  After a student had been in the night-school long enough to prove what was in him, I gave him a printed certificate which read something like this:—­

“This is to certify that James Smith is a member of The Plucky Class of the Hampton Institute, and is in good and regular standing.”

The students prized these certificates highly, and they added greatly to the popularity of the night-school.  Within a few weeks this department had grown to such an extent that there were about twenty-five students in attendance.  I have followed the course of many of these twenty-five men and women ever since then, and they are now holding important and useful positions in nearly every part of the South.  The night-school at Hampton, which started with only twelve students, now numbers between three and four hundred, and is one of the permanent and most important features of the institution.