Fredrick Douglass throughout the novel is describing the horrific actions that maintain the institution of slavery. Separating a child from their mother means that one was never properly nurtured. He never knew his mother and did not build that loving bond that any human child needs to grow emotionally healthy.
Never having enjoyed, to any considerable extent, her soothing presence, her tender and watchful care, I received the tidings of [my mother’s] death with much the same emotions I should have probably felt at the death of a stranger.
(Douglass 2)
Douglass describes how he never experienced a parental relationship. A mothers’ love is supposed to be unconditional yet his was taken from him. He uses the words “soothing” and “tender” to describe a relationship he never felt. It would be discomforting to the reader to imagine if they were forced to part with their own flesh and blood. In addition, Douglass makes the reader sympathize with him even more when