During the reading of Mary Prince, I believe that Mrs. Wood hiring Martha Wilcox was very significant. The reason it was important because Wilcox is a mulatto woman and had a similar personality like Mrs. Wood and Mr. Wood. In addition, Martha Wilcox was considered to be superior over Mary Prince. I am disgusted at Martha’s attitude towards Mary Prince because she would always told Mrs. Wood if Mary refuse to perform her task. Also, another thing I feel outrageous is Mary being severely whipped by Mrs. Wood. Furthermore, she was locked in a cage like an animal. After being tortured physical and mental, Mary was very weak and could barely performed her tasks. Moreover, the other slaves worried about her illness. Unfortunately, they cannot tend her because Mrs. Wood ‘s wrath. Both Mr. Wood and Mrs. Wood planned to let Mary find an owner. Since Mary had been saving a lot of money due to working in small-time services, it was futile for her to find another owner.

As I continued reading the narrative I noticed that even though Mary was going through a tough time, what kept her positive was her faith in God. During that time with Mrs. Wood the great wash came around she had to lift many heavy things and she told Mrs. Wood that she was very very ill the slave master showed no remorse or sympathy towards her. Mary was threatened that if she did not complete the chores she would be out of the job and personally kicked out by Mr. Wood. In page 22 she talks about when she went into the service of Mr and Mrs Pringle and how Mary is comfortable their even though she is separated from her husband. Mary also mentions that the mistress teaches the word of god and how it helps her through out the day, taking away from the pain she once went through. In this time period faith in god was pretty had to find because the slaves had no access to any holy places and they sort of lose hope and faith in god. So for Mary to still have faith in god shows that even though going through all the ill treatment she still didn’t give up and thinking that something better was coming her way. Also I liked that the mistress was the one that was reading chapters to her about god because in that time that wasn’t aloud. It made me believe that there are still good people during that time of sorrow and sadness.

I applaud Mary Prince for taking the step towards leaving her enslaved life even after she knew she had nowhere else to go.  Like most humans, being ill-treated is not something often handled well and she put up with being mistreated way too long. As a individual who had the option to get out of the environment that she was in, this is something that most slaves could only imagine being placed into. I understand why she stayed, however, because it is only human nature to stick to what we are used to. Being able to read this from the point of view of someone who had to endure such deplorable and abhorrent things throughout their life, is very eye-opening to the fact that most things today are taken for granted. I express a great veneration for Mary Prince because she had intrepidity and resilience and used that to her advantage.

Adding on to this, I would like to discuss a key quote that was pertinent to this use of fortitude exhibited by Mary Prince.  This is found on page 23 when she mentions, “I still live in the hope that God will find a way to give me my liberty, and give me back my husband…to keep down her fretting, and to leave all to Him.”  This quote genuinely spoke to me because you could not only read and hear Mary’s words, but acutely feel her desolation and hope for amelioration.  It also brought up Mary’s strong belief in religion as her use of sustenance through such afflicting times.  She resorts to church as means to the spiritual energy needed to persevere, and this proves to be effective when she falls ill again with rheumatism and the church takes care of her.  She gained a sense of benefit when she was able to attend church, and this most certainly proved to be an inflection point as it gave her mettle.  Ultimately, she was able to meet and receive kindheartedness from individuals that would lead to her development of self and resolve.

Continuing to read “The History of Mary Prince, A West Indian Slave” (pages 20-41) I was astonished that although Mary was degraded in my eyes, and totally stripped of her humanity from being a slave she still found herself in the midst of it all. Mary has gotten married! This was a turning point for me in the story because I thought just maybe Mary could live a ‘somewhat’ normal life. However, when Mary married Mr. Woods, Mr. D was immensely raged. I disliked the fact that all of this tension was directed to poor old Mary, who only sought like I said, a ‘normality’. Mr. D than began to treat Mary very harshly solely for the reason that she was now a married a women. I felt Mary was still strong threw all of this, because shes amazing, shes Mary Prince. I liked the way that her self worth was always there even when times got tough. I’m interested in continuing my reading, and reading more stories for this class based on similar situations.

Mary Prince mentions earlier in the text of having Saint Anthony’s fire on her left leg leaving her almost a cripple. Not only suffering from a skin infection, Mary Prince also develops Rheumatism which is a debilitating disorder that effects the joints of the body. Although a cripple, Mary Prince was still forced to work and beaten. This makes the reader wonder what other infections, diseases, and sufferings Mary Prince had been through which the text has not included.
Furthermore, her willpower to continue on and her tenacity to be free is incomparable to most. The thoughts that were running through her mind that kept her going through all this pain. How was Mary Prince able to convince herself to not give up and see the light at the end of the tunnel? All those sleepless nights and hopelessness and she was still able to find strength and pull through. It’ll come a time when we have a “bad day” and think of Mary Prince. Our worst day is a good day for Mary Prince.

It was empowering to hear when Mary stood up to master D. While reading the History of Mary prince in the sense I was longing to hear about a slave standing up to a master. Also I couldn’t imagine earning 20 cents a day for the amount of labor that Mary what endure. Now to hear that the $2.25 that she would make a week would go directly to the master is also one of the moment that pissed me off. Another part that was significant was when Mr. D have the gaul to saw that Mary could not be sold any master that would miss treat her. This was a moment of confusion because of the way he treated her and was concerned about how she was going to be treated by another master. Do Mr. D actually have a soft spot for Mary. I think not. !!!!!

The part that I found most interesting was when Mary Prince went to England with her master and mistress, at that point she was suffering heavily with her rheumatism but they payed no mind to it. They thought she was lying and being lazy, which was obviously not true. They forced her to do tasks that she could not do and her owners asked her to leave the house for the third time, and she did as they asked. She left them and never came back but what was odd is that they didn’t actually want her to leave and never gave her freedom. She was technically a free woman in England but not in her native place and she wanted that. They tried to persuade her owners to give her freedom, they even offered them a big amount of money but still they did not give in. They didn’t love her or anything of that matter, so why didn’t they just take the money and let her go? That shows that they wanted to toy with her mentally and make the rest of her life insufferable.

The sheer determination Mary possesses stuck out to me in the beginning of the reading. While other slaves had some time to I guess rest for a couple of hours she would go out and do extra work for small payments in hopes of accumulating enough one day to buy her own freedom. Even though she saved a lot of money and even found herself a husband and people to assist her with her savings, her master wouldn’t budge and shut down all offers to sell her. While a free woman in England her wishes to be free and get back with her husband were still denied even though she had help from a group known as the Anti-Slavery Society. Through out all the attempts to return back a free woman to be with her husband Mr.Woods would turn them down even though he was offered a pretty large sum of cash. All in all Mary’s resilience is amazing and I found it funny how she told her husband that if he wanted to marry her he would have to come to church with her. It just shows how strong she is and even though the odds are against her somethings must get done her way.

What I have gathered from this read so far, Mary started working for Mr. and Mrs. Wood in Antigua. Upon this time Mary suffered from an illness called rheumatism. This illness left her quite crippled to the point where she had to start walking with a stick. Although she suffer from rheumatism it was still expected of her daily duties (this sure could not have been easy for her). Later on in the story she met a man named Daniel James. James was a carpenter and cooper, he also was a slave who brought his freedom. In 1826 Mary and Daniel had gotten married and while the two were happy Mr. and Mrs. Wood were enraged by the them getting married. At this point in the story I started to become angry because of the way Mrs. Wood treated Mary after she found out she (Mary) had gotten was married. I mean beating Mary because she got married was uncalled for and throughout the story you can see Mrs. Wood mistreating Mary only for the fact she had gotten married.

The interesting  point I found while reading the text was on the bottom half of page 21 when Mary explain that she got sick with Rheumatism. Now I know that she must have been in a lot of pain because the illness affects the joints and causes them to become very painful. She explains that she could not do much work though it was still require of her. It puts it all into perspective, with me being a nursing student and learning about the condition that she is speaking of I am aware that she needed rest especially in the times when she had flare ups of the joints that’s the time she needed to rest. She was not able to do that because of her masters demands and obligations she had to fulfill.

I found this interesting because they put her out into a little old house and though she cried it wasn’t her master that turned to her aid. It’s as if they didn’t cared it she died all they wanted was for her to keep working regardless  the condition she was in. She fought to do her best and even had to speak up for herself about the bad treatment she was receiving. I am inspired by her strength though I never wish that anyone else would ever have to go through anything like this.