Record Data
Transcription
The Emancipation of Dred Scott.
From the St. Louis Evening News, 26th.
This morning, TAYLOR BLOW, Esq., appeared in the Circuit Court, and entered the emancipation of DRED SCOTT, his wife, HARRIET, and his two daughters, ELIZA and JANE. The persons thus liberated were conveyed to Mr. Blow by their owner, Hon. Mr. CHAFFHE [CHAFFEE], of Massachusetts, for the purpose, as the law of this State on the subject requires, that the emancipation shall be performed by a citizen of Missouri. DRED SCOTT was, originally, the slave of Capt. PETER BLOW, who brought him to this State from Virginia, and the act of liberation was, therefore, appropriately performed in the name of one of his master’s family. TAYLOR BLOW is one of our best citizens, and is one of “them boys” whom DRED says he was “raised” with. So the famous old darkey is free at last. After battling in vain for his freedom for ten years, and at a heavy expense, in the Courts of Missouri and the Supreme Court of the Republic, he has received it as a gift at the hands of his master. His daughters, ELIZA and JANE, were virtually free before, having achieved by their heels what the more conscientious DRED could not secure by ten years of litigation. Their whereabouts has been kept a secret, thought no effort has been, and none probably would have been made to recover them. Their father knew where they were and could bring them back at any moment. He will, doubtlass, recall them now. He might have run away himself, if he had desired, without the slightest apprehension of any attempt being made to recapture him, but he had staked his fate on the result of the famous suit of SCOTT vs. SANFORD, and was determined to abide by that decision, whatever it might be. He is getting to be pretty well advanced in years, and, as a slave, would be estimated at about $350. He can now, if he feels inclined, indulge the desire he formerly expressed to us, of traveling over the North, and making a “right smart chance of money,” by telling who he is.
