Anonymous - The memoirs of Dolly Morton

Meanwhile, he rarely left the plantation and he never gave any dinner parties. All his friends either had left the State or had joined the Confederate Army. He would have done so himself except that he was too old to go as a private soldier and he was unable to get a commission as an officer, owing to his having no knowledge of military affairs. But he had been elected member of Congress for the Southern Confederacy.

Since he would not leave Woodlands, my lover was obliged to fall back exclusively upon my company, and he seemed glad to have it. He seemed also to appreciate it. His manner became a little more tender, he did not speak to me so coarsely-as he often had been in the habit of doing-and he treated me with less indecency.

But with his slaves, both outdoor and indoor, he was more strict than ever. Since the breaking out of the war, several of the field hands had run away and had managed to get clear off, although the underground stations had been closed. Randolph had offered two-hundred dollars reward for the capture of each runaway, but not one of them had been brought back.

These losses had vexed him very much, the runaways having been some of his strongest and finest young men and women, each of whom was worth from fifteen-hundred to two-thousand dollars.

So far none of the house women had run away, but at last one of them did. One morning when Randolph and I were at breakfast, Dinah came in and told her master that one of the women named Sophie, who had been out the previous night, had not returned to the house, and that some other girls reported that she had taken away some of her clothes. Sophie was one of the kitchen-maids, a fine, big, healthy mulatto woman, twenty-six years of age and worth about eighteen-hundred dollars. There was no doubt that she had run Way, so Randolph at once wrote out copies of advertisements, describing the woman and offering the large reward of four-hundred dollars to anyone bringing her back to Woodlands or lodging her in a jail. He sent the advertisement to all the local newspapers, and he also ordered bills to be printed and posted up in various places.

Several days passed. The advertisements appeared in the papers and the bills were stuck up all about the neighborhood. But nothing was heard of the runaway. However, since all the white loafers were eager to secure the large reward, Randolph had high hopes that the woman would be caught sooner or later. And she was.

About five o’clock one evening, a couple of rough-looking white men drove up to the house in a ramshackle wagon, bringing with them the runaway, whom they had found concealed in the slave quarter of a plantation twenty miles from Woodlands. The woman, whose wrists were tied together with a piece of rope, evidently had not suffered any privations during the time she had been absent. Her frock was clean and she was in good condition bodily, although her face was looking very doleful, for she knew that there was a severe whipping awaiting her.

The men who had hunted her down received the four-hundred dollars bounty and drove off in their wagon, while Sophie was taken away to the servants’ quarters. After she had been given something to eat, she was locked up in a small bedroom by herself for the night.

Randolph was very much pleased at having got the woman back, consequently he was in a very good humor all through the evening. So, when we were in the drawing room after dinner, I ventured to ask him what he intended to do to Sophie.

Never you mind, Dolly, he replied, smiling. It’s no business of yours. I’ve not quite made up my mind what I shall do to her, but anyhow, I tend to make the hussy smart tomorrow, and, if you like, you can see the punishment.

I asked no more questions, and he told me to come and sit on his knee. I did so Then, as a matter of course, the usual toyings took place, and, in a very short time, I found myself impaled as I sat on his lap. Afterwards we talked about the war and I had carefully to conceal my real opinions. In due course we went to bed.

Next morning at breakfast, my hero told me that he had determined to make an example of Sophie. Therefore he intended to whip her with the paddle. The punishment would be meted out in the hall, before all the other women in the house.

I was sorry for Sophie-(I always was sorry when a woman was whipped)-but I dared not say a word. In fact, if I had said anything, it only would have irritated Randolph and made him harder on the women. Moreover, it would have brought his wrath upon me.

When he had finished his breakfast and had smoked a cigar, he left the room to make preparations for the punishment. In about twenty minutes he came back and said: Everything is ready now. You can come out to the hall if you would like to see a paddling.

I had seen many women switched. I had seen some whipped with the strap, and I had seen several spanked. But I had never seen one paddled, and I was rather curious as to how the punishment was inflicted.

Thus, I followed Randolph to the hall. I was sorry for the woman, as I have before said, but my curiosity overcame my pity. I had grown somewhat callous.

In the middle of the long, wide hall was a machine which I never had seen before, though I had heard of it. It was the whipping bench-a long, low, curved wooden structure about two feet broad, supported on four legs, each of which war furnished with buckled straps. On the floor beside the bench was the paddle, a round, flat piece of wood an eighth of an inch thick and eight inches in diameter, fixed to a handle two and a half feet long. It was very much dreaded by all the female slaves, for it caused great pain, bruising the flesh and blistering the skin so that, after a paddling, the sufferer’s bottom remained sore and tender longer than after a switching or a strapping.

All the women and grown-up girls in the house were present. They were twenty-one in number, ten of them in a row at one side of the bench and ten at the other, while Dinah stood by herself.

Randolph ordered Dinah and Milly-a strong black woman whom I have mentioned before-

to go for the culprit. They went, returning in a couple of minutes with Sophie, who, the moment she caught sight of the preparations for her paddling, burst into tears and hung back in such a fashion that the two women had to drag her up to the bench.

Sophie was not a bad-looking woman for a mulatto, and, on ordinary occasions, her yellow-tinted complexion was clear. But, at that moment, fear had turned her face a sort of dull-grey color. Oh, Massa, Massa! she cried, stretching out her arms appealingly, with the tears running down her cheeks. Don’t paddle me! Whip me with de switch or de strap, but don’t, oh don’t paddle me!

Put her on the bench, said Randolph.

Sophie, in a spasm of fear, threw herself upon the floor. Dinah and Milly lifted her up. Then she began to struggle and kick. But, in spite of her resistance, the two women soon had her stretched at full length on the bench, with her wrists and ankles securely fastened with the straps.

Dinah now stripped her, and, since her head and feet were lower than the middle of her body, which was raised by the curve of the bench, the part of her person to be operated upon was thrown well up. She would have had a good figure except that her bottom was out of all proportion. It was too big. But nevertheless it was fairly-well shaped, with well-rounded cheeks meeting each other closely. Her thighs were large, too, and she had a sturdy pair of legs. Her skin was smooth and of a clear yellow tint.

Randolph took up the paddle and, standing at the culprit’s left side, said: Now you bitch, I’ll make your fat bottom smart. You’ve cost me four-hundred dollars, and I intend to take the value out of your yellow hide.

He raised the paddle high in the air over the trembling, crying woman, who, in dread of the coming stroke, drew in the cheeks of her bottom till the division between them looked like a fine line.