Frederick Douglass: The Abolitionist Movement

The mid-nineteenth century was a time full of change for African Americans in the United States. It was a time where the abolitionist movement reached its peak and was eventually successful. One of the key leaders and members of this movement was Frederick Douglass, who was a former slave himself. He managed to escape slavery by going north, where he joined in the abolitionist movement, where he fought hard for black freedom. Throughout his life, different life experiences slowly altered Douglass’s understanding of his condition as a slave and finally motivated him to seek and ultimately achieve his freedom, such as his inability to know his family and genealogy and the extreme brutality toward himself and others, as well as the kindness he …show more content…
One of the most common forms of punishment slaves had to suffer through was whipping, such as the one Douglass witnessed, where his aunt, Esther, was cruelly flogged. This was one of the first major events that made him question why things were the way they were. Following the flogging of Esther, he starts to see it more often, like in the cases of Nelly and Denby, where extreme force and cruelty were used. This brutality makes him question why more is not being done about the problem of slavery and why God would create a situation like this, especially given “that killing a slave, or any colored person, in Talbot county, Maryland is not treated as a crime, either by the courts or the community.” It lights a fire within Douglass, sparking a motivation in him young, to fight the institution of slavery, giving him a reason to someday become a …show more content…
In Baltimore, his “religious nature was awakened by the preaching of a white Methodist minister, named Hanson.” This preacher all men were equal in their sinning, no matter their skin color or whether they were free or slave, which appealed to Douglass because the idea had the same thoughts on equality that Douglass had. It appealed to the ideals that everyone is created equally and they sin just the same no matter what race or social class. The religion he found through this man gave him a new hope, a new way in which he could somehow find the answers to the problems he has been dealing