Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass (1845): Chapters 1, 2, 6, 10

Main characters:

Fredrick Douglas

• Doesn't know his age
• Doesn't know his birthday
• Knows his mother
• Harriet Bailey daughter of Isaac and Betsey Bailey
• Father was a white man
• Master may have been his father
• Was separated from his mother as an infant
• witnessed his aunt be beaten (aunt Hester)
• Slaveholder desired her presence
• woman of noble form
• graceful proportions
• January 1, 1833, first time being in the fields
• Douglas wrote him and a few others to freedom

New Mistress

• At first saved from slavery meaning she wasn't tainted
• women of the kindest heart
• never had slaves under her control
• Douglas's mistress
• weaver by trade
• she turned after owning slaves

Mr. Thomas Hamilton

• owned two slaves (Henrietta and mary)

Anthony 

• Captian Anthony 1st master
• owned 2-3 farms
• owned about 30 slaves
• overseer (Plummer)
• Cruel man hardened by slaveholding

Colone Lloyd's

• clerk and superintendent
• one of Fredrick's masters
• had two sons and one daughter
• the overseer of the overseers
• Douglas spent two years of his childhood with him
• Kept 3-400 slaves 

Mr. and Mrs. Auld

• Mrs. auld taught him his ABC's
• husband told her it was unlawful and unsafe to do so

Mr. covey

• was mean
• lived with covey for a year
• got into an altercation with Douglas
• Worked with hands
• called the snake
• he was a poor man
• He breeded slaves
• succeeded in breaking slaves

Symbols or traditions--rituals:

• Age
• The plantation
• Getting separated from parents
• Reading & writing
• Whipping
• monthly allowance of food
• yearly clothing
• Singing-represents sorrow of his heart
• common custom for children to be taken away from biological parents as an infant

Words or phrases that have a special meaning:

• Nigger
• Freedom

Discuss how the characters respond to their communities and/or change in their environment. What is the main character's flaw?

• The characters responded to their communities and/or change in their environment the best way they knew how. For example, Douglas did what it is he had to do in order to survive he wanted a better life for himself and he got that. The main characters flaw would probably be not knowing his age or when he was born also not truly knowing how to read and write or being taught like kids are taught today, not really being able to have a childhood.

Setting - country, tribe, city, state, time period:
Tuckahoe, twelve miles from Easton. Talbot county, Maryland

Bring a question.
Why is it important for someone to know their age? How did the slaveholders use this knowledge to keep a handle on the slaves?