An Address to the Negroes in the State of New-York (1806)
An Address to the Negroes in the State of New-York (1806)
An Address to the Negroes in the State of New-York (1806)
by Jupiter Hammon
Wikisource,
TO THE MEMBERS OF THE AFRICAN SOCIETY, IN THE CITY OF NEW-YORK.
Gentlemen,
I TAKE the liberty to dedicate an Address to my poor brethren to you. If you think it is likely to do good among them, I do not doubt but you will take it under your care. You have discovered so much kindness and good will to those you thought were oppressed, and had no helper, that I am sure you will not despise what I have wrote, if you judge it will be of any service to them. I have nothing to add, but only to wish that “the blessing of many ready to perish, may come upon you.”
I am Gentlemen,
Your Servant,
JUPITER HAMMON.
Queen’s Village, 24th Sept. 1786.
TO THE PUBLIC.
IN the first impression of the following pages, printed in New-York, 1787, by Carrol and Patterson, they say:
As this Address is wrote in a better stile than could be expected from a slave, some may be ready to doubt of the genuineness of the production. The Author, as he informs in the title page, is a servant of Mr. Lloyd, and has been remarkable for his fidelity and abstinence from those vices, which he warns his brethren against. The manuscript, wrote in his own hand, is in our possession. We have made no material alterations in it, except in the spelling, which we found needed considerable correction.
New-York, 20th Feb. 1787.
WE, the Subscribers, having had personal acquaintance with Jupiter Hammon, Author of the Address to the People of Colour in the State of New-York, believe he supprorted a good moral character; was much respected in his master’s family, and among his acquaintance in general; and we have no doubt but the Address alluded to, is a genuine production of his own.
Arnold Fleet,
Samuel Haviland,
Fry Willis.
Oysterbay, 10th of 1st mo. 1806.
To the People of Colour.
THE excellent advice contained in the following Address, which has lately been presented to me, I conceive to be so eminently worthy your serious notice, that I have thought proper to reprint it for your perusal. Coming from one of your own colour, you will naturally receive it with greater interest, and I trust bestow upon it a more patient attention.
Whilst I earnestly request you to treasure up the valuable counsel contained in the Address itself, let me also affectionately exhort you to take heed to your conduct and company. Strive industriously to get learning, to enable you to read these excellent and best of writings, the Sacred Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments; and not only to read, but put in practice, the precepts they contain. To such of you as have not, or are not likely to be so much favoured, still this consolation remains, that, through infinite mercy, every son and daughter of Adam, (as daily and living experience proves) are favoured with a secret something in their own breasts, which reproves for evil, and comforts for well doing. This is nothing short of