Becoming America - An Exploration of American Literature from Precolonial to Post-Revolution, 2018a

BECOMING AMERICA
REVOLUTIONARY AND EARLY NATIONAL PERIOD LITERATURE
he cannot distinctly recall every event; * * *—that as soon as they had cast anchor
at six of the clock in the evening, as has before been stated, the American Captain
took leave, to return to his vessel; that upon a sudden impulse, which the deponent
believes to have come from God and his angels, he, after the farewell had been
said, followed the generous Captain Amasa Delano as far as the gunwale, where
he stayed, under pretense of taking leave, until Amasa Delano should have been
seated in his boat; that on shoving o, the deponent sprang from the gunwale into
the boat, and fell into it, he knows not how, God guarding him; that—
* * * * *
[Here, in the original, follows the account of what further happened at the
escape, and how the San Dominick was retaken, and of the passage to the coast;
including in the recital many expressions of “eternal gratitude” to the “generous
Captain Amasa Delano.” The deposition then proceeds with recapitulatory
remarks, and a partial renumeration of the negroes, making record of their
individual part in the past events, with a view to furnishing, according to
command of the court, the data whereon to found the criminal sentences to be
pronounced. From this portion is the following:]
—That he believes that all the negroes, though not in the rst place knowing to
the design of revolt, when it was accomplished, approved it. * * * That the negro,
José, eighteen years old, and in the personal service of Don Alexandro, was the one
who communicated the information to the negro Babo, about the state of things in
the cabin, before the revolt; that this is known, because, in the preceding midnight,
he use to come from his berth, which was under his master’s, in the cabin, to the
deck where the ringleader and his associates were, and had secret conversations
with the negro Babo, in which he was several times seen by the mate; that, one
night, the mate drove him away twice; * * that this same negro José was the one
who, without being commanded to do so by the negro Babo, as Lecbe and Martinqui
were, stabbed his master, Don Alexandro, after be had been dragged half-lifeless to
the deck; * * that the mulatto steward, Francesco, was of the rst band of revolters,
that he was, in all things, the creature and tool of the negro Babo; that, to make his
court, he, just before a repast in the cabin, proposed, to the negro Babo, poisoning
a dish for the generous Captain Amasa Delano; this is known and believed, because
the negroes have said it; but that the negro Babo, having another design, forbade
Francesco; * * that the Ashantee Lecbe was one of the worst of them; for that, on
the day the ship was retaken, he assisted in the defense of her, with a hatchet in
each hand, with one of which he wounded, in the breast, the chief mate of Amasa
Delano, in the rst act of boarding; this all knew; that, in sight of the deponent,
Lecbe struck, with a hatchet, Don Francisco Masa, when, by the negro Babo’s
orders, he was carrying him to throw him overboard, alive, beside participating
in the murder, before mentioned, of Don Alexandro Aranda, and others of the
cabin-passengers; that, owing to the fury with which the Ashantees fought in the
engagement with the boats, but this Lecbe and Yan survived; that Yan was bad
as Lecbe; that Yan was the man who, by Babo’s command, willingly prepared the
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