Frederick Douglass

NARRATIVE OF THE LIFE OF "FREDERICK DOUGLASS" (Annotated) Frederick Douglass

Featured content includes commentary on major characters,25 important quotes, essay topics, and key themes like The Meaning of Christ in Christianity and Vengeance and Mercy. Frederick Douglass was born into slavery sometime in 1817 or 1818. Like many slaves, he is unsure of his exact date of birth. Douglass is separated from his mother, Harriet Bailey, soon after he is born. His father is most likely their white master, Captain Anthony. Captain Anthony is the clerk of a rich man named Colonel Lloyd. Lloyd owns hundreds of slaves, who call his large, central plantation the "Great House Farm." Life on any of Lloyd's plantations, like that on many Southern plantations, is brutal. Slaves are overworked and exhausted, receive little food, few articles of clothing, and no beds. Those who break rules-and even those who do not-are beaten or whipped, and sometimes even shot by the plantation overseers, the cruelest of which are Mr. Severe and Mr. Austin Gore.