She kept on begging and beseeching them, most piteously not to separate the three. All the frowns and threats of Freeman, could not wholly silence the afflicted mother. She wanted to be with her children, she said, the little time she had to live.

… Eliza shrunk before him, and tried to wipe away her tears, but it was all in vain. Freeman turned round to her, savagely, with his whip in his uplifted hand, ordering her to stop her noise, or he would flog her. The man answered that he could not afford it, and then Eliza burst into a paroxysm of grief, weeping plaintively. She promised, in that case, to be the most faithful slave that ever lived. She besought the man not to buy him, unless he also bought herself and Emily. All the time the trade was going on, Eliza was crying aloud, and wringing her hands. The little fellow was made to jump, and run across the floor, and perform many other feats, exhibiting his activity and condition. In this passage, Northup describes a heart-rending scene in a slave market in New Orleans in which a mother, Eliza, is separated from her son Randall and daughter Emily. Northup regained his freedom, which was unusual for an individual who was kidnapped and sold into slavery. Northrup spent 12 years as a slave in Louisiana before he eventually escaped north with the help of a sympathetic Canadian named Samuel Bass. While traveling as a musician in Washington, DC, he was drugged, kidnapped, and sold into slavery. Northup was a free African American who worked as a farmer and professional musician. Like Frederick Douglass, Solomon Northup chronicled the story of his life in slavery.

I can analyze issues in history to help find solutions to present-day challenges.

I can create an argument using evidence from primary sources.

I can explain how laws and policy, courts, and individuals and groups contributed to or pushed back against the quest to end slavery.

I can interpret primary sources related to Founding principles of liberty, equality, and justice from the colonial era to the outbreak of the Civil War.How did the principles of the Declaration of Independence contribute to the quest to end slavery from colonial times to the outbreak of the Civil War?

Twelve years a slave