The following two letters had two different handwriting and syntax, grammar, etc. The first one, I believe, was actually written by Margaret Haws, whose level of literacy seems to have been the same as (or above) most antebellum Americans, black or white. The second letter, written with a more polished attention to calligraphy and even more attention to rhetoric, might have been penned by a sympathetic abolitionist writer/orator whose literary training was better than that of the first letter's scribe.

Pittsburgh   October 21, 1850

Respected Sir [William Preston*]

      I take this apetunity of riting to you to let you know that Charles and my self are well hoping that these lines may find you and your Dear wief the same. Mr Preston I feal verry bad and verry mutch grived and are lubbering under A grate menny disadvantage. Charles is afraid to gow out of the city on the account of the Slaiv bill,** and if you wood bea sow kind as to give Charles his free papers, I wood bea more satisfied not that I think that you wood disturb him but there is others that will doe it Charles says that he will never come to lewesvill if you will give them to him I hope you will bea sow kind to fullfill your promes and that is to let my Motherenlaw Come. please anser this as soon as you can nothing more at present but remain you friend and well wisher

Margaret Haws

* William Preston was a member of the Ky. House of Representatives from Louisville. He later was appointed ambassador to Spain by President Buchanan, and when Abraham Lincoln came to office he came back to Kentucky to further the interests of the Democratic Party. Soon after his return, he left with John C. Breckinridge, his cousin, to join the Confederate Army. Back to top

** The Fugitive Slave Bill of 1850 was passed as a part of the controversial Compromise of 1850 in which California was entered into the Union as a free state. This law was more rigorous than the Federal act of 1793: it required "all good citizens" to help execute it, heavily penalizing anyone aiding fugitive slaves, and denied the fugitive a jury trial and the right to give testimony. New personal-liberty laws of Northern states were passed as forms of civil disobedience (or were they following the example of the Kentucky Resolutions of 1789?); and Harriet Beecher Stowe was motivated to write Uncle Tom's Cabin which became a best-seller as soon as it was published in 1852. Back to top

Pittsburgh     April 7th / '51

Respected Sir

      The bearer of this letter is my mother, and I am the wife of Charles whom you saw at Buffalo last summer. The object that thus impels me to intrude upon you, is one of such vast importance to myself and family, that I hope youwill be kind enough to pardon my intrusion.

      Sir, I am his wife; and I love him. (God only knows how much.) I have also become a mother; and as I gaze in the face of my inocent child, this young pledge of our mutual affection, there is one dark cloud that over sreads my mind - one soul sickning thought that forces itself upon me, and annihilates in one instant every approach of joy within my bosom, and that is the fact that my dear husband is liable at any moment to be taken from me, and my helpless babe, and our longing eyes never perhaps behold him more, and what would be my fate? Long years of misery, of heart rending, soul torturing suspense, Worse, ten thousand times worse than death itself. Oh Sir, when I think of the possibility of such a state of things my heart lies within me. Can you then blame me for thus addressing myself to you, and soliciting Charles' freedom?

      Oh let me not ask in vain, deny not the boon that will infuse unspeakable pleasure into grateful hearts, nor contrain them to pray for your wellfare while life remains.

      I know sir you are a gentleman in every sense of the word. I have heard your character from other sources besides Charles who never ceases to speak in admiration of your goodness, and many virtues, and I remember also your half expressed promise to Charles in Buffalo. Presuming then on the high principles I know you to possess I feel that you will not spurn of the request of those who wait with intense anxiety those words from you that will remove our fears and make life desirable, or plunge us in the deepest misery. I dare not think of the latter alternative. Oh may the God of the fatherless and the widow, so direct your thoughts, feelings, and words, may you bind up the wounds of the broken hearted, give liberty to the captive exemplify the blessed principles of the "Golden rule" and may that glorious action live (as it will live) through all time and be the brightest gem in the radient coronet that will deck your brow, through the endless ages of eternity.

Your humble servant
Margaret

Wickliffe-Preston Family Papers, Box 46 and 47, University of Kentucky Special Collections and Archives

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Another letter from an escaped slave, from Jane Giles to Mrs. William Preston, February 1854

Posted August 25, 1997
email: Dolph@pop.uky.edu
http://www.bluegrass.kctcs.edu/LCC/HIS/scraps/haws.html