Well, I did it. Oh, it was a long rowin time in the cold, with me worryin. But pretty soon I see a light way up high. Then I rem
embered the woman told me to watch for a light. Told me to row to the light, which is what I did. And when I got to it, there were two men. They reached down and grabbed the girl. Then one of the men took me by the arm. Said, “You about hungry?” And if he hadn’t been holdin me, I would of fell out of that rowboat. Well, that was my first trip. I was scared for a long time after that. But pretty soon I got over it, as other folks asked me to take them across the river. Two and three at a time, I’d take them. I got used to makin three or four trips every month.
—“Carrying the Running-Aways,”
Virginia Hamilton
What is the topic of this passage?
an enslaved man rowing other people to freedom
a runaway who has not eaten in days
details about what slavery was like in the South
a man’s last trip down the Ohio River
I would assume they treat her bad because she is mixed so that’s why she “tried to pass” as white. Then everyone at the negro school thought she was kinda an imposter and judged her.