Frederick Douglass: “Upon either side we saw grim death, assuming a variety of horrid shapes.”

He was called upon not merely to administer the government, but to decide, in the face of terrible odds, the fate of the Republic.

My grandmother was all the world to me, and the thought of being separated from her was a most unwelcome suggestion to my affections and hopes.

No word of retaliation when a black man is slain by a rebel in cold blood.

I believed I should get enough to eat at Covey’s, even if I suffered in other respects, and this to a hungry man is not a prospect to be regarded with indifference.