ith friend Lewis, at the old headquarters of the
fugitives.

[A letter may be found from Miss G.A. Lewis, on page thirty-nine,
throwing much light on this arrival]. After receiving friendly aid and
advice while there, they were forwarded to the Committee in
Philadelphia. Here further aid was afforded them, and as danger was
quite obvious, they were completely divided and disguised, so that the
Committee felt that they might safely be sent on to Canada in one of the
regular trains considered most private.

Considering the condition of the slave mother and her children and
friends, all concerned rejoiced, that they had had the courage to use
their master's horses and vehicles as they did.

EIGHT AND A HALF MONTHS SECRETED.

WASHINGTON SOMLOR, ALIAS JAMES MOORE.

But few could tell of having been eye-witnesses to outrages more
revolting and disgraceful than Washington Somlor. He arrived per steamer
Pennsylvania (secreted), directly from Norfolk, Virginia, in 1855. He
was thirty-two years of age--a man of medium size and quite intelligent.
A merchant by the name of Smith owned Washington.

Eight and a half months before escaping, Washington had been secreted in
order to shun both master and auction-block. Smith believed in selling,
flogging, cobbing, paddling, and all other kinds of torture, by which he
could inflict punishment in order to make the slaves feel his power. He
thus tyrannized over about twenty-five head.

Being naturally passionate, when in a brutal mood, he made his slaves
suffer unmercifully. Said Washington, "On one occasion, about two months
before I was secreted, he had five of the slaves (some of them women)
tied across a barrel, lashed with the cow-hide and then cobbed--this was
a common practice."

Such treatment was so inhuman and so incredible, that the Committee
hesitated at first to give credence to the statement, and only yielded
when facts and evidences were given which seemed incontestible.

The first effort to come away was made on the steamship City of
Richmond. Within sixty miles of Philadelphia, in consequence of the ice
obstruction in the river, the steamer had to go back. How sad Washington
felt at thus having his hopes broken to pieces may be imagined but
cannot be described. Great as was his danger, when the steamer returned
to Norfolk, he was safely gotten off the boat and under the eye of
officers walked away. Again he was secreted in his old doleful quarters,
where