What I made by the water-
melons I sold there, amounted to nearly five hundred dollars. Various
other methods I in order to enable me to redeem my family. In the
night-time I fished with set-nets and pots for eels and lobsters, and
shortly after went a whaling voyage in the service of Col. Smith.
After being seven months, the vessel returned, laden with four hundred
barrels of oil. About this time, I became possessed of another
dwelling-house, and my temporal affairs were in a pretty prosperous
condition. This and my industry was what alone saved me from being
expelled that part of the island in which I resided, as an act was
passed by the select-men of the place, that all negroes residing there
should be expelled.
Next after my wife, I purchased a negro man for four hundred dollars.
But he having an inclination to return to his old master, I therefore
let him go. Shortly after I purchased another negro man for twenty-
five pounds, who I parted with shortly after.
Being about forty-six years old, I bought my oldest child Hannah, of
Ray Mumford, for forty-four pounds, and she still resided with him. I
had already redeemed from slavery, myself, my wife and three children,
besides three negro men.
About the forty-seventh year of my life, I disposed all my property at
Long-Island, and came from thence into East-Haddam.
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