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was separated from her family. She was also nervous that her kids
would be taken from her if she stood up for herself. However some
slaves had communities of support, but in this case Celia did not. Her
isolation from a slave community probably harmed her chances of
being able to defend herself and have others to help. Her experiences
as a slave are tragic and horrific and remind me of one of the primary
sources we looked at, the letter written by Elizabeth Sprigs to her
father. Elizabeth was a female, an indentured servant and she was
white, so she was actually treated a little bit better than Celia, but she
was still treated poorly. In the letter she wrote to her father, she
complained about her unfortunate circumstances. Life as an
indentured slave was not easy and she obviously had to endure many
hardships. Celia also faced many hardships and specifically fell victim
to abuse from her owner and had to deal with the trauma that came
from Newsoms treatment and use of her for his sole pleasure. Some
thing that I learned was how helpless all women were during that time,
albeit some more than others. Obviously female slaves were at a huge
disadvantage, they were always being used and treated unfairly. If they
tried to change their situations, many times they would get physically
hurt or have their children taken away from them. This stopped a lot of
them from fighting back. Even white women, if they had any opinions,
could not say anything because they were dependent on the males in
the household. Mary and Virginia, daughters or Robert, could not even
If Celia did not have any kids, do you think she would have chosen to
run away? If she did choose to run away would that have been a better
decision than doing what she did to Newsom? Also, if George hadnt
pressured her to stand up to Newsom, do you think she ever would
have?