“Thank you Massa, I’se tired and hungry, an’ de fac’ am I doan know what to do with myself.”
“Well, no matter about that just now. Come along;” and Eber M. Pettit, long known as an earnest Abolitionist in Cattaraugus and Chautauqua counties, led the disheartened wanderer to his home, where, after supper, he questioned him as to his history, and when he had learned his unvarnished tale, he suggested that the man should stay with him that winter as a man-of-all-chores, and attend the village school.
As a result of that evening’s conference there appeared among the children of the district school in a few days a colored man of about twenty five years of age, learning with the youngest of them his a b c. This was an innovation, unique in the extreme. Some of the villagers turned up their noses at the “nigger,” but the social standing of Mr. Pettit, and the story of Jo which was freely circulated among the people, together with his genial disposition and kindness of manner, soon silenced all cavil and the school quietly progressed.
Learning that the editor of the _Liberty Press_ was in Washington, Mr. Pettit addressed him in the following letter:
_Dear General._—I have at my house a colored man named Jo Norton. Something over a year ago he left a wife and child in the Capital, the property of a Mr. Judson. She was to have been brought off directly after he left, but the effort failed and he understands she has been sold South. Will you be so kind as to inquire into the matter and see what can be done in the case if anything? Make your return to Jo Norton, direct.
This letter was duly posted, and on the morrow an ebony face, the very picture of expectancy, put in an appearance at the village post office with the query, “Any letter for Jo Norton, Massa pos’ massa?” Thus it was twice a day for a week, when his unsophisticated importunity was rewarded by a missive bearing the address,
and bearing the post-mark of the Capital. It read as follows:
The woman about whom Mr. Pettit wrote me is here. After her husband’s escape she was detected in what was thought to be an effort to leave and was thrown into prison, where she lost an infant child. After three months she was visited by her master, and on a solemn promise never to make another effort to run away she was taken back to the family where she and the boy appear to be treated with great kindness. Though he has been offered $800 for her, Mr. Judson said he never sold a slave, and never will, but if her husband can raise $350 for them by March 4th, proximo, they will be given free papers so I can bring them North with me at that time.