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Of both sexes and all ages, sleeping on those damp boards, like the horse, with a little straw and a blanket and she wonders not at the rheumatisms, and fever-sores, and palsies, that distorted the limbs and racked the bodies of those fellow-slaves in after-life. She shudders, even now, as she goes back in memory and revisits this cellar, and sees its inmates, She carries in her mind, to this day, a vivid picture of this dismal chamber its only lights consisting of a few panes of glass, through which she thinks the sun never shone, but with thrice reflected rays and the space between the loose boards of the floor, and the uneven earth below, was often filled with mud and water, the uncomfortable splashings of which were as annoying as its noxious vapors must have been chilling and fatal to health. A cellar, under this hotel, was assigned to his slaves, as their sleeping apartment-all the slaves he possessed of both sexes, sleeping (as is quite common in a state of slavery) in the same room. ACCOMMODATIONS.Īmong Isabella's earliest recollections was the removal of her master, Charles Ardinburgh, into his new house, which he had built for a hotel, soon after the decease of his father. She has no remembrance that Saturday afternoon was ever added to their own time, as it is by some masters in the Southern States. James and Betsey having, by their faithfulness, docility, and respectful behavior, won his particular regard, received from him particular favors-among which was a lot of land, lying back on the slope of a mountain, where, by improving the pleasant evenings and Sundays, they managed to raise a little tobacco, corn, or flax which they exchanged for extras, in the articles of food or clothing for themselves and children. Was the best of the family,-being, comparatively speaking, a kind master to his slaves. She distinctly remembers hearing her father and mother say, that their lot was a fortunate one, as Master Charles Of her first master, she can give no account, as she must have been a mere infant when he died and she, with her parents and some ten or twelve other fellow human chattels, became the legal property of his son, Charles Ardinburgh. She was the daughter of James and Betsey, slaves of one Colonel Ardinburgh, Hurley, Ulster County, New York.Ĭolonel Ardinburgh belonged to that class of people called Low Dutch. THE subject of this biography, SOJOURNER TRUTH, as she now calls herself-but whose name, originally, was lsabella-was born, as near as she can now calculate, between the years 17.