The weight of English settlement and the appetite for land led to two wars and shocking atrocities against Native people.
I belonged to Reverend Adam Rankin, a Presbyterian minister in Lexington Kentucky.”
– Lewis Hayden
”Lewis Hayden’s early life reflects the devastating effects of slavery on black families.
In his own words
Hayden was born into slavery in Kentucky around 1811. Unlike many who escaped on the Underground Railroad, he did not remain in the shadows. On a visit to Boston Harriet Beecher Stowe interviewed Lewis and other fugitive slaves. His story – in his own words – traces a history of cruel separation from parents and siblings.
The fate of Hayden’s parents
My mother was of mixed blood – white and Indian. She married my father when he was working in a bagging factory
near by. After a while my father’s owner moved off and took my father with him, which broke up the marriage.
A man made proposals of a base nature to {my mother}...She would not consent to live with this man...and he sent her
to prison, and had her fl ogged and punished in various ways, so that at last she began to have crazy turns.
The Hayden children sold by
Kentucky Minister Adam Rankin
When he was going to leave Kentucky for
Pennsylvania, he sold all my brothers and sisters at auction. I stood by and saw them sold.
When I was just going up on the block, he
swapped me off for a pair of carriage
horses...It was commonly reported that my
master had said in the pulpit that there was
no more harm in separating a family of slaves
than a litter of pigs...
Newspaper . . .
This newspaper ad for a carriage and pair of gray horses is possibly related to the sale of Lewis Hayden, February 9, 1826. Courtesy of the Kentucky Room,
- Lexington Public Library
Illustration of a . . .
Illustration of a Kentucky slave auction from the first edition of Uncle Tom’s Cabin
- Newberry Library Digital Collections
Harriet Beecher Stowe
- Library of Congress
A Key to Uncle Tom’s Cabin
Harriet Beecher Stowe’s book Uncle Tom’s Cabin included the
fictional story of Cassy, a slave who kills her son to save him
from slavery. To answer skeptics she included a similar,
real life story from Lewis Hayden in her book, A Key to
Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Remembering his mother he said “She
sprung and caught my arms, and seemed going to break
them, and then said ‘I’ll fix you so they’ll never get you.’ ”