Longnu

=Elizabeth Van Lew= = =
 * Birthday:** October 17, 1818
 * Hometown:** Richmond, Virginia
 * Profession:** Abolitionist/ Spy
 * School:** Quaker School
 * Favorite Books:** Bible
 * Political Views:** Republican
 * Activities:** Helping Others
 * Interested In:** Men
 * Relationship Status:** Single
 * Favorite Quotations:** "Slave power crushes freedom of speech and of opinion. Slave power degrades labor. Slave power is arrogant, is jealous and intrusive, is cruel, is despotic, not only over the slave but over the community, the state." -Elizabeth Van Lew.
 * About me:** Hello. My name is Elizabeth Van Lew. But you can call me “Bet” or “Crazy Bet.” Why? Well because during the Civil War, I would pretend to be crazy as a disguise so that I can free the slaves. I was born in Richmond, Virginia. My father owns a hardware business and we have a good life. My parents sent me to Philadelphia Quaker School where I became an abolitionist. After school was done, I returned back to Richmond and freed all of my parents slaves and bought some so that they could be free. Civil War started so I decided to go undercover as a spy because I had to stand up on what I believed in. So I joined the Richmond Underground. My mother and I gathered information at Libby prison because that was where many of the Union soldiers were held. I would bribe the guards with food to find out information. And so I freed the slaves and the prisoners.


 * Status Updates:**


 * 1) ** 1860: ** I’m sick and tired of all these things going on especially the racism and inequality. Not only that, but the children are involved. So who wants to join me in the protests of inequality between white and black graduation ceremonies?
 * 2) ** 1859: ** I was elected as the head of Union spies by general Benjamin F. Butler's spy network. My job is to maintain until the end of the war.
 * 3) ** 1858: ** I kind of had bribed the Confederate prison guards today so that they would let Union prisoners escape from Libby Prison and other Confederate prisoner-of-war camps. I hate seeing these Union prisoners in here. It kills me inside. I don’t want anyone to suffer and the fact that they have no rights or freedom makes it worse.
 * 4) ** 1857: ** I was elected as the head of Union by general Benjamin F. Butler's spy network. My job is to maintain until the end of the war.
 * 5) ** 1856: ** My mom and I visited the Richmond prisons today and we finally captured the Union soldiers who were being held there.
 * 6) ** 1855: ** Today was amazing. I helped about 109 prisoners escaped through the tunnel of Libby. Aren’t you proud of me? Click “like” if you are.
 * 7) ** 1851: ** I decided to commit myself to finding ways to undermine Confederate war aims. I want to help these slaves escape. They don’t need this in their life.
 * 8) ** 1850: ** Today was the first time that I attended a Quaker school in Philadelphia. It was really good. I’d learned about the abolitionists. This is what I want to be when I grow older.

Notes

All the years that I’d been in school learning about slavery, I’ve learned about resisting simply as in running away. I never knew that there are other forms of resistance that the slaves utilized. I am doing this project because I want to research more about the slaves. I want to go into detail instead of remaining with the basic because there are not that mamy details on slavery. And I hope to find my answers. There are varieties of slave resistance according to __Google,__ but the main ones are day-to-day resisting, runaways, and abolitionist. Everyday resistance is one of the most common forms of resistance to slavery. The everyday forms of resistance are pretending to be sick, pretending not to understand instructions, breaking tools, stealing food, and occasionally setting fire to property. If this type of resistance keeps on going, it would increase more boundaries for the African Americans and the whites has more control. What I mean by this is that if Africans keeps on resisting to their master, then the slaves will have more work and torture and the masters are getting more control over the slaves. Runaways were another common slavery resistance. Slaves run away because they want to escape from slavery. Many of the fugitives try to escape from slavery by using the Underground Railroad to the free states. The fugitive’s slaves tried to form a runaway community called the “maroon colonies.” During the 18th century, slave revolts became active in many countries/islands such as Jamaica, Haiti, Venezuela etc. Slave revolts are when they outvoted by the white master. What? Did I confused you there? Well let me break it down to you. I'm trying to say that no matter how much the slaves refuse to do something, they will never win because it's the white people choice. If you think about it, the whites don't agree or do any compromise with the slaves. Slaves would runaway at nighttime so that no one would see them escaping. They would travel by foot because they didn’t have any money and they’re SLAVES. No one would give them a ride because it would have been dangerous to ask for a ride. Some slaves would rather die than be a slave. When they travel, they would have to be very cautious because patrols were everywhere looking for them and if the patrol were to capture them, then the slaves would be punished while the patrol people would get reward. Such as money. Slaves would get beaten, sold, parts of their body cut off and etc if they were caught. Some slaves succeeded and became free. This is where the abolitionist people come in the picture. I want to explain what abolitionist means. Abolish means to do away with, with something. Obviously that “something” is slavery. From what I’ve learned so far about abolitionists is that they are the people who would try to help the slaves get to freedom. Also, the abolitionist movement attempted to end the racial segregation and discrimination between the African American people. Not only that but there was a whole movement to send Freedmen to Africa (Liberia). Because of this movement, slavery began to somewhat loosen up and African American people were treating a little bit better. After this movement, the 13th amendment was ratified. The 13th amendment stated that slavery or forced labor was abolished and it’s illegal in the United States. I realized that African Americans had been through so much for their freedom. They had been sold, beaten and damaged physically and mentally just for FREEDOM. It makes me appreciate on how much freedom I have right now. I can’t imagine being a slave. We tend to blur the fact that real people lived through it and were changed by the event. One hundred eighty-five thousand black Americans fought to free their people. The war was about a "new birth of freedom. In conclusion, these are the three-slaves resistance that I’ve read or heard about.
 * Write about THREE instances of resistance to slavery that you have read/heard about. **

Slavery in the United States began soon after English colonists first settled Virginia in 1607. It lasted as a legal institution until the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution in 1865. It continues illegally to this day. Slavery existed back then because it was a way for the masters to benefit themselves. Slavery still exists today in the 21st century. About 80% of women and children are still in slavery. In my perspective, there shouldn’t be any slavery because it mean and cruel. I had always believed that people should be free and shouldn't be treated in this type of way. Growing up, that's all that I wanted to happen in this world. No one wants to get beaten; they don’t want to do a certain job so there’s other ways to handle a situation like this. In conclusion, this is why slavery exist and what I think what slavery means.
 * What is slavery and why does it exist? **
 * It all started in Jamestown Virginia, 1619. African arrived in Virginia as legal indentured servants. From 1619 to 1640, African Americans earned their freedom by working as laborers for the European settlers. In 1641, Massachusetts wrote a “Body of Liberties” article stated that the cause of Africans needed to change. They became chattel slaves who were owned by the masters. Not only that, but they were abused and sold so that the master can get money off of it. According to worldnetweb.princeton.edu, their definition of slavery is “ ** bondage: the state of being under the control of another person.” I agree with that meaning because back then during slavery time, the masters would use the slaves to do the labor and if they didn’t do it then they would get beaten. The masters would sell their slaves to make money. It was wrong of the masters to do that to the slaves because they could of sold other things rather than the slaves. Africans were the main people to be enslaved in British America because they could be purchased cheaply at the west coast.
 * Reflect on the Civil War: Where is the country headed in 1865? **

== Since the North was invading their country, the South had to defend themselves so they started to fight back. Lincoln faced opposition and criticisms from the variety of people so he tried to pin the situation on slavery when it had nothing to do with the war. The war was about how the South own about 6% percent of the slaves while other countries owned the other 94%. At the end of the day, Lincoln caused the lives of more than 600,000 Americans. Basically they were fighting because the tax was killing their economy and for the denial for states of rights. == == In 1865, the Union Army removed all the resistance and moved up to the North of South Carolina. About 120,012 men were killed in action during this Civil War. At the end of the day, slavery was abolished, some soldiers were killed, died because of a disease, and some went home safely. In conclusion, Civil had caused so much people pain. I can’t believe this much people died. And people are dying because of the economy and selfishness. == Photo Gallery
 * We talk about the Civil War in class and discuss on how it happened and what happened. But do you ever ask yourself why did it happen? I mean don’t you want to know why? I certainly do. So keep on reading and you’ll find out. **
 * Let’s start from the beginning. President Lincoln was elected in the 1860. One of the things that happened after Lincoln were elected as president was the Congress and Lincoln, which were also known as the Morrill Tariff Act. What is a Morrill Tariff Act? Well it’s a **controversial law because the South believed that they paid the major portion, but received few benefits of the revenue. This act caused the southerners into bankruptcy and it doubled the tax. Even though the Southern states only made up about 30% of the population. They still paid at least 80% of the tax. The South then began to withdraw from the Union in order to gain the government in which they would be. The only way for the North to collect this tax was to invade the Southern land and property by war. ** On July 21, 1861, the fist real battle of the Civil War began. This battle was fought in Mansas Junction. This battle was between the North and the South. **

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 * Some good resources:**
 * 1) __Kindred__ by Octavia Butler
 * 2) //Glory// (1989) a movie about the 54th Massachusetts Regiment (an all black regiment who fought with incredible valor in the Civil War in a segregated unit led by a white officer). It was directed by Edward Zwick and starred Matthew Broderick, Denzel Washington, Cary Elwes, and Morgan Freeman. It won three Oscars, including Best Supporting Actor (Washington).
 * 1) [] - a website with many, many primary sources from the Civil War and the antebellum period.
 * 2) __Killer Angels__ by Michael Shaara - a historical fiction novel about the Battle of Gettysburg written from the point of view of a variety of both Union and Confederate soldiers. It is extraordinarily well researched and gives some great insights into //why// people were fighting (on both sides) in addition to a general view into the time period. This book was also made into a film by the name "Gettysburg" (1993) directed by Ronald F. Maxwell. The full text is not available online but you can read some of it through googlebooks: [|here]
 * 3) //Gone With the Wind// (1939) a movie about the Civil War south based on the extraordinarily long book by the same title and written by Margaret Mitchell. You can probably find some clips online to get a feel for how the era was portrayed and what some (idealized) plantations looked like. It stars Clark Gable, Vivian Leigh, Leslie Howard, and Olivia deHaviland.
 * 4) [] - a website with two pages of pictures you may want to browse and/or use.
 * 5) [] - A website with many, many good links about the Civil War. I strongly recommend that you check it out.