ABSTRACT
In the 12th month, 1804, about seven o’clock, P.M. I was called upon by several colored persons, who informed me that a free colored man, by the name of Samuel Johnson, had just been arrested as a slave. Without delay, I called upon Thomas Harrison, who accompanied me to the house where the arrest had been made. Here we learned that they had taken him to a tavern kept by Peter Fritz, in Sassafras street. We found him guarded by the landlord and two or three other persons. Upon inquiring, we discovered that Johnson was not claimed as a slave; but that they held him as a hostage, till he should produce his wife and children, who were slaves; and who had got information that they were pursued, barely in time to make their escape before the party in quest of them arrived at their dwelling. Finding the fugitives had fled, they became greatly exasperated, captured the husband, and conveyed him to the place above-mentioned; and because he refused to go with them voluntarily, they had severely beaten and forced him to accompany them; telling him if he would not inform them where they could find his wife and children, they would take him to the South and sell him. He informed them that they might make a slave of him, or murder him, if they pleased, but that no suffering they could inflict should ever induce him to betray his family. His hands were tied behind his back, and he placed in one corner of a back room, which was pointed out to us by a colored man, who had watched their movements.
