Colonel Lloyd's Cruelty Analysis

One of the biggest problems facing American families today is the inability to afford fresh, nutrient filled food. In the United States today over 13 million families don’t have the money to buy fresh food and have to live on unhealthy diets. In the essay Prudence or Cruelty, author Nicholas Kristof talks about how much of a danger malnutrition is to poorer American families. Kristof mentions that the sole reason for such a high rate of malnutrition in poor U.S citizens stems from the lack of money to buy fresh goods. The price of fresh goods is too much compared to the amount of money these families are making. With multiple mouths to feed and a limited budget, going to the grocery store for these families is almost unheard of. These families

Frederick Douglass’ autobiography, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave offers a depiction of slavery like very few before him, from his firsthand accounts. Douglass wanted to show his opposition to slavery and knew he would meet many criticisms. Due to this criticism, he had to mask much of his work with irony. Some of his works are obvious and others are a bit harder to see. The more difficult ones were put in place by Douglass in order to provide a deep and profound statement, without arousing too much opposition. If he had he would have faced much more threats than he did. He not only

In Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass Fredrick is treated terribly by all of his masters and no one cares about him or any of the other slaves. The southerners act like they are disposable and that they can just go buy another one. All of his owners treat him like trash and beat him until he stand up to one and fights him after that he is left alone. Everyone in Frederick Douglass is a mean person who doesn’t care about anyone but themselves and how much money they can make.

Frederick Douglas was born into the slave trade in Talbot County, Maryland. He was sent to work on a plantation for the Hugh’s Family for about seven years. This is the location where his learning truly began. His mistress was a “kind, tender-hearted, woman” who treated Frederick as a human instead of property the family owned. This was a dangerous thing for both parties at this time in history it was considered wrong. Frederick States “Slavery proved as injurious to her as it did to me” which I see the connection he had made to her change of personality because of slavery. She had heavenly qualities that slavery was able to divest from her. It was injurious to Fredrick not only for the lashings a salve would

The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass details the oppression Fredrick Douglass went through before his escape to freedom. In his narratives, Douglass offers the readers with fast hand information of the pain, brutality, and humiliation of the slaves. He points out the cruelty of this institution on both the perpetrator, and the victims. As a slave, Fredrick Douglass witnessed the brutalization of the blacks whose only crime was to be born of the wrong color. He narrates of the pain, suffering the slaves went through, and how he fought for his freedom through attaining education.

Frederick Douglass, the author of the Narrative of the life of Frederick Douglass was a self-taught slave that was able to escape the brutality of slavery in the year of 1838. Frederick Douglass’s book is separated into 3 main sections, including, a beginning, middle, and end. The purpose of the narrative is to improve the audience's understanding of Douglass’s experience of being a slave, the horrible treatment slaves received, and how Douglass was able to overcome and escape slavery. All throughout the narrative, Douglass uses many rhetorical devices, including, diction, imagery, and syntax, which helps the audience understand, one of his main chapters, chapter 5. In this chapter Douglass implies that the overall purpose is to emphasize the animalistic, inhuman treatment slaves received, how Douglass felt about leaving Colonel Lloyd’s plantation, and his luck of being able to move to Mr. and Mrs. Auld's.

Frederick Douglass focuses mostly on appealing emotionally to pathos through the use of imagery. He writes, “there were no beds given the slaves, unless one coarse blanket be considered such.” He again appeals to pathos when describing the eating portions. Douglass explains the eating troughs used for children and says “few left the trough satisfied.” Douglass illustrates the cruel conditions slaves faced, from the bare sleeping quarters to the harsh whippings received. This effects the reader by helping them visualize the conditions the slaves were placed in. He chose to do this to inform those who weren’t aware of what was happening inside the gated properties. Douglass next establishes credibility through the use of ethos. He begins his narrative by giving background information and stating that he has “no accurate knowledge” of his age. Douglass implies that he can be trusted because of his own personal experience.

Douglass not only describes slaves as animals, but he describes slave treatment as if they were animals to further describe the horrendous lives of slaves. Slaves were fed food in troughs (36). By choosing the word “trough”, Douglass emphasizes the poor treatment of slaves; slaves were not good enough to be fed from bowls or plates, they were no better than animals. Douglass also compares women on the plantations to breeding animals. Women were expected to reproduce in order to increase their masters’ wealth, not to create a family. Women and children were separated before the child was a year old so they would not form familial bonds with one another. When Douglass’ own mother died, he compared it to a stranger dying because he had no connection with her (18). Slaves were not only thought of animals, but also fostered as animals. Douglass describes Mr. Covey as a “nigger-breaker”, Douglass was broken in “body, soul, and spirit” by

Throughout our lives, we undergo many changes and we also see many changes in other people. Our world today has been influenced immensely by the world of the past. In the Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, Frederick undergoes many changes in his life and the lives of the people around him especially the slaveholders that he served. Throughout the narrative, we as the reader see that slavery was a terrible thing and that it affected the slaves in horrific ways but not just the slaves were affected, the slaveholders were also affected in horrible ways.

Douglas tries to change his readers’ beliefs about what it means to be dedicated to the idea that “All men are created equal’’ by explaining the injustices of slavery. One example Douglass writes about is when Colonel Lloyd would whip the slaves that took care of the horses because they either fed them too much or too little or they were too early or too late. According to the narrative, “ If a horse did not move fast enough, or hold his head high enough, it was owing to some fault of its owner.’’ ( Douglass, Chpt.3, Para.3) Colonel Lloyd whips the slaves for things that are out of their control. They can’t control the horse and tell it what to do and it’ll just listen. If it’s one little mistake and the horses aren’t intact, then it's on

In January 1834, Frederick was sent to work for Edward Covey, a poor farmer who had gained a reputation around town for being and expert "slave breaker" , Frederick was sent to work with him for the punishment of setting up the religious meetings. Covey hid in bushes and spied on the slaves as they worked, if he caught one of them resting he would beat him with thick branches. After being on the farm for one week, Frederick was beaten for letting an oxen team run wild. The months that followed weren't much better, he was continually whipped until he began to feel that he was "broken" . So after working for Covey for a year, Frederick was sent to work for a farmer named William Freeland, who was a relatively kind master. Frederick did not care about having a kind master because of the hell he went through and all he wanted was freedom.

Douglass and Clinkscales wanted to educate people on the relationships between slaves and slaveowners by writing their personal observations on it. Douglass had an undoubtedly different and negative view of this relationship than Clinkscales. In Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, Douglass describes one of the slave owners barbarity toward the slave, “He was… the most dreaded by the slaves. His presence was painful…” (Douglass 13). Douglass uses the words dreaded and painful to emphasize the fear and aversion the slaves had for their owners. By illustrating the way the owners handled the slaves and the enmity and anxiety the slaves felt when in the presence of their owner, depicts to the audience how terribly the two groups felt toward each other. Douglass describes Colonel Lloyd as one of the most sadistic masters he had ever experienced, he describes

of Darkness: the chain gangs, the grove of death, the payment in brass rods, the

Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, depicts a vivid reality of the hardships endured by the African American culture in the period of slavery. One of the many things shown in Frederick's narrative is how slaves, in their own personal way, resisted their masters authority. Another is how slaves were able to create their own autonomous culture within the brutal system in which they were bound. There are many examples in the narrative where Frederick tries to show the resistance of the slaves. The resistors did not go unpunished though, they were punished to the severity of death. Fredrick tells of these instances with a startling sense of casualness, which seems rather

Born into slavery, Douglass knew nothing, not even a mother’s love, except hunger, toil, and abuse during his childhood. Readers are introduced to Colonel Lloyd, Douglass’ master. Colonel Lloyd’s employed overseer, Mr. Gore, used every possible moment to mistreat and abuse slaves. Douglass wrote that “to be accused was to be convicted” (13). This quote shows that Douglass, as well as the rest of the slaves, had no rights in society no matter how innocent they were. Mr. Gore took it to another level and would do whatever he wanted and the slaves could not do anything about it. Even though he was trapped in slavery, he managed to get an education.