C. Edwards Lester, Life and public services of Charles Sumner: Born Jan. 6, 1811. Died March 11, 1874.

[205] The Slavery to which they were reduced was simply a continuation of the violence by which they had been originally robbed of their rights, and was of course as indefensible. The fathers of the Republic, leaders of the war of Independence, were struck with the inconsistency of an appeal for their own liberties while holding in bondage fellow-men only ‘guilty of a skin not colored like their own.’ The same conviction animated the hearts of the people, whether at the North or South. Out of ample illustrations, I select one which specially reveals this conviction, and possesses a local interest in this community. It is a deed of manumission, made after our struggles had begun, and preserved in the Probate records of the County of Suffolk. Here it is:

Know all men by these presents, that I, Jonathan Jackson, of Newburyport, in the county of Essex, gentleman, in consideration of the impropriety I feel, and have long felt, in beholding any person in constant bondage—more especially at a time when my country is so warmly contending for the liberty every man ought to enjoy—and having some time since promised my negro man, Pomp, that I would give him his freedom, and in further consideration of five shillings, paid me by said Pomp, I do hereby liberate, manumit, and set him free; and I do hereby remise and release unto said Pomp, all demands of whatever nature I have against said Pomp.

In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and seal, this nineteenth June, 1776.

Jonathan Jackson. [Seal.]
Witness, Mary Coburn, William Noyes.

Such was the general spirit. Public opinion found free vent in every channel. By the literature of the time—by the voice of the Church, and by the solemn judgment of the College, Slavery was condemned, while all the grandest names of our history were arrayed openly against it. Of these I might dwell on many; but I am always pleased to mention an illustrious triumvirate from whose concurring testimony there can be no appeal. There was Washington, who at one time declared that ‘it was among his first wishes to see some plan adopted by which Slavery might be abolished by law,’ and then at another, that to this end ‘his suffrage should not be wanting.’ There also was Jefferson, who by early and precocious efforts for ‘total emancipation,’ placed himself foremost among the Abolitionists of the land—perpetually denouncing Slavery—exposing the pernicious influences upon the master, as well as the Slave—declaring that the love of justice and the love of country pleaded equally for the Slave, and that ‘the abolition of domestic Slavery was the greatest object of desire.’ There also was the