5 Life in the North

Chapter 5 Life in the North When Frederick and Anna arrived in New Bedford, a free black couple named Mary and Nathan Johnson helped them get started. While in New York, Frederick had given up the last name Bailey in case the Aulds came looking for him. He took the name Johnson instead. But in New Bedford, there were already so many Johnsons. It was difficult to tell them apart! Nathan Johnson suggested the new last name Douglas, after a character in a poem he was reading. Frederick agreed but added an extra s at the end. Eager to find work, Frederick went to the wharves. The scene was quite different from the shipyards in Baltimore. Here the workers were quiet, focused, and cheerful. There was no whipping, no yelling of mean names, no loud songs.

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The white caulkers refused to work with a black man, so Frederick's first job was stocking a ship with oil. "It was new, hard, and dirty work," he wrote, "but I went at it with a glad heart and a willing hand. I was now my own master." Soon he and Anna had their first daughter, Rosetta. Four more children would follow: Lewis, Frederick Jr., Charles, and Annie.

In New Bedford, Frederick began reading a newspaper called The Liberator. Published by William Lloyd Garrison, the paper spoke out fiercely against slavery. "The paper became my

meat and my drink," Frederick said. Reading the paper inspired him to go to antislavery meetings. He listened, and he spoke about the evils of slavery to his friends and members of the black church he and Anna had joined. In 1841, Frederick attended a meeting of the American Anti-Slavery Society. He was asked if he would say a few words about his experience as a slave. There were hundreds, maybe a thousand people, in the audience. "I trembled in every limb," he remembered. WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON BORN IN 1805 IN NEWBURYPORT, MASSACHUSETTS, WILLIAM LLOYD

GARRISON WAS ONE OF THE MOST PASSIONATE AND FAMOUS LEADERS OF THE ANTISLAVERY MOVEMENT. IN 1831, HE BEGAN PUBLISHING THE LIBERATOR, A WEEKLY NEWSPAPER. IN THE FIRST EDITION, HE WROTE, "I DO NOT WISH TO THINK, OR SPEAK, OR WRITE, WITH MODERATION.... I AM IN EARNEST—I WILL NOT EQUIVOCATE—I WILL NOT EXCUSE—I WILL NOT RETREAT A SINGLE INCH—AND I WILL BE HEARD." GARRISON PUBLISHED THE PAPER FOR THIRTY-FIVE YEARS, NEVER MISSING AN ISSUE. GARRISON DID NOT BELIEVE IN VIOLENCE TO ACHIEVE HIS GOALS. INSTEAD, HE RELIED ON WRITING AND SPEAKING OUT ABOUT THE EVILS OF SLAVERY TO PERSUADE AMERICANS TO END THE PRACTICE. GARRISON WAS ALSO A STRONG SUPPORTER OF WOMEN'S RIGHTS AND WAS COMMITTED TO THAT CAUSE UNTIL HE DIED IN 1879. Later Frederick recalled little of what he said.