David M Alister: A Slave

I was born a slave in Norfolk, Virginia, but never realized I was until about eight years of my childhood had passed. I was deprived of information about myself and had no recollection of who my parents were or what my actual age was. My best estimation is that I am about twenty-seven years old. My master, David M’Alister, called me by the name of Rachael. I have lived on his plantation for as long as I could remember, and have been known as his favorite house servant. One afternoon, I was sent out on an errand to fetch bread for the mistress. I ran into the most handsome man named Robert; he lived just about 8 miles away from my plantation, and better yet, was a free man. Over the course of time, we became great acquaintances and he offered to buy my freedom and start a family. I went straight to tell my mistress and she near threatened to kill me. She believed that slaves had no
I never told my mistress the truth, for I knew how I would be treated if she knew. I let her assume my baby was from Robert. When the time came for birth, my mistress soon discovered who the father actually was. To my surprise, I was having twins. Not only was it bad enough that I was having a mulatto child, but I was now having two, and they were both girls. My heart ached for their future. Slavery is terrible in general, but it is much more worse for women than it is men. Two weeks after my recovery from giving birth to twin girls, I was brought into the kitchen by my mistress. I was demanded to strip my clothes off my back. My mistress then proceeded to tie my hands with a strong rope to the hook of the wall of the kitchen, next to the door that led outside. My arms were stretched up at full length and I was whipped. I screamed at every blow to my back, and could feel the warm blood dripping down, forming a puddle by my feet. I thought I was going to die. I could not move from my mattress to take care of my newborn twins for about a