Chapter 8

_A Chapter of Horrors_

AUSTIN GORE--A SKETCH OF HIS CHARACTER--OVERSEERS AS A CLASS--
THEIR PECULIAR CHARACTERISTICS--THE MARKED INDIVIDUALITY OF
AUSTIN GORE--HIS SENSE OF DUTY--HOW HE WHIPPED--MURDER OF POOR
DENBY--HOW IT OCCURRED--SENSATION--HOW GORE MADE PEACE WITH COL.
LLOYD--THE MURDER UNPUNISHED--ANOTHER DREADFUL MURDER NARRATED--
NO LAWS FOR THE PROTECTION OF SLAVES CAN BE ENFORCED IN THE
SOUTHERN STATES.

As I have already intimated elsewhere, the slaves on Col. Lloyd's
plantation, whose hard lot, under Mr. Sevier, the reader has
already noticed and deplored, were not permitted to enjoy the
comparatively moderate rule of Mr. Hopkins. The latter was
succeeded by a very different man. The name of the new overseer
was Austin Gore. Upon this individual I would fix particular
attention; for under his rule there was more suffering from
violence and bloodshed than had--according to the older slaves
ever been experienced before on this plantation. I confess, I
hardly know how to bring this man fitly before the reader. He
was, it is true, an overseer, and possessed, to a large extent,
the peculiar characteristics of his class; yet, to call him
merely an overseer, would not give the reader a fair notion of
the man. I speak of overseers as a class. They are such. They
are as distinct from the slaveholding gentry of the south, as are
the fishwomen of Paris, and the coal-heavers of London, distinct
from other members of society. They constitute a separate
fraternity at the south, not less marked than is the fraternity
of Park Lane bullies in New York. They have been arranged and
classified by that great law of attraction, which determines
the spheres and affinities of men; which ordains, that men, whose
malign and brutal propensities predominate over their moral and
intellectual endowments, shall, naturally, fall into those
employments which promise the largest gratification to those
predominating instincts or propensities. The office of overseer
takes this raw material of vulgarity and brutality, and stamps it
as a distinct class of southern society. But, in this class, as
in all other classes, there are characters of marked
individuality, even while they bear a general resemblance to the
mass. Mr. Gore was one of those, to whom a general
characterization would do no manner of justice. He was an
overseer; but he was something more. With the malign and
tyrannical qualities of an overseer, he combined something of the
lawful master. He had the artfulness and the mean ambition of
his class; but he was wholly free from the disgusting swagger and
noisy bravado of his fraternity. There was an easy air of
independence about him; a calm self-possession, and a sternness
of glance,