Free Sarah's Ground (9781439115855) by Ann Rinaldi Page B

today, to all the Northern vice-regentsand to Miss Cunningham to have them respond to these falsehoods.
    But what hurts even more in the article is that it claims
that we employ slave labor here at Mount Vernon
.
    It says our Nigras are not paid. That they are not free.
    Upton advises we don’t respond to any of it. Isn’t that just like a man? My brothers would say the same thing. But I cannot abide such lies, when we are all working so hard to put this place to rights.
    â€œWe must free the Nigras,” I told him.
    He sighed. He scratched his head. He rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Do you know how to do this?” he asked.
    I was dumbfounded. The how of it had never occurred to me.
    I didn’t know how. And it came to me, for all my family’s abolitionist talk up North, that I never have known how. I thought for a moment.
    â€œI would think something like this should be done by President Lincoln,” he said.
    â€œWell, he isn’t here,” I said sharply. “And he isn’t likely to come.”
    Upton looked abashed. “Are there some kind of magic words that one says?” he asked. “Some ceremony?”
    And then I came to my senses.
    â€œI suppose it is sufficient to gather them together and tell them all that they are now free and may go and do as theyplease. Those words are magic in themselves. Aren’t those the words so many Nigras in the South are praying to hear?”
    â€œAnd suppose they do just that? Go and do as they please? What will we do without them?”
    â€œHire others! What is it about you Southerners that you think you can’t do without your Nigras?”
    He took the scolding in good cheer. “Who will make my mint julep if Jane goes?”
    â€œStop joking. We must do it. This very day.”
    And then he had a thought. “I think it involves free papers. I think that I’ll have to write it out and file it at the courthouse. Now that I think of it, my father did that once for one of his slaves when I was a child.”
    â€œAll right,” I said. “Then, you must do it.”
    So this very day we gathered them on the piazza, and Upton told them that they were free. They could leave us if they wished. They no longer had to stay in our employ. In his hands he had papers he had written out for each of them. He told them always to keep a copy and that another would be filed at the Fairfax County Courthouse for them as soon as possible.
    Jane shook her head as if we were pure mad. Emily nudged Priscilla. “You do this?” I heard her whisper savagely. “You do this jus’ to get me to leave?”
    Priscilla scowled back.
    Dandridge shuffled his feet. “You want me to leave, boss?” he asked Upton.
    â€œOf course not,” Upton said.
    â€œThen, why you do this for?”
    â€œI have to do it. The newspapers are saying you’re in slavery. It doesn’t look good for Miss Tracy.”
    â€œWe ain’t in no slavery,” Priscilla mumbled. “If’n I was, an’ wanted to be free, doan you think I cudda walked off any time I went travelin’ with Miss Sarah?”
    We all stood looking at one another, alternately embarrassed and proud. They of their loyalty, and we that we were setting them free.
    â€œWell, at any rate,” Upton said, “if anybody asks you, you’re free. Now that your papers are in good order.”
    They walked away mumbling and questioning the sanity of white people.
    â€œWe knows we free,” I heard Dandridge say to the others.
    â€œThey gots to make it look good for themselves,” Priscilla answered.
    â€œI cudda run a hunnert times,” Emily said. “If I felt like it.”
    In the evening, when all the chores are done, I often take tea on the piazza. I have managed to convince Upton to sit with me. It is still in disrepair, but at least the falling-down pillars are fixed.
    I am told that General Washington and