Frederick Douglass: “I never met with a slave who could tell me how old he was.”

On the recordJanuary 1, 1855

I never met with a slave who could tell me how old he was.

Said by

Frederick Douglass

Source

Douglass highlights the deliberate ignorance imposed on enslaved people regarding their personal details, such as age, as a tool of oppression.

More from Frederick Douglass

Jan 1, 1881

We are no longer four millions of slaves, but six millions of freemen.

Jan 1, 1881

The nation or people which shall comply with them will rise, and those which violate them will fall, and perhaps will disappear altogether.

Jan 1, 1881

Nothing but the shot-gun or the bull-dozer’s whip can keep them from voting their convictions.

Jan 1, 1881

In any fair condition of things the men who till the soil will become proprietors of the soil.