I was astonished by how much information I learned about Fredrick Douglas’s life, as well as the lives of those around him in just the first part of this reading. While my education has made a clear point to teach me about the history of slavery, there is an aspect of reading a first-hand account that teaches me so much more.

I felt myself overwhelmed with emotion while I was reading Douglas’s writing. This was described to me in the forward, but I didn’t expect Douglas to be so blunt and upright with the facts. He didn’t hold anything back in terms of brutal details of whippings that he witnessed or the pains of starvation that he went through. While this was hard to read, because the thought of a human being treated like that makes me sick, it was important to hear the truth. Douglas did not try to sugar coat his experience at all and provided real and raw accounts of all his interactions.

One thing I was really impressed by was Douglas’s inability to give up. Even from a very young age, he had witnessed so much mistreatment. Yet continued to fight for something, even if he didn’t know what it was yet. When he learned that knowing how to read and write would be a great advantage in life, he went forward with the goal of achieving this. One line that stuck out to me in this sense was “The first step had been taken. Mistress, in teaching me the alphabet, had given me the inch, and no precaution could prevent me from taking the ell.” (1187). He realized the opportunity he was given from learning the A,B,C’s and he ran with it. He would not stop until he had the skills that he deserved and the life that he deserved. Reading Douglas’s personal account is so moving and so important in our country’s history.