Twelve Years a Slave

A blight spreads through Epps’s cotton crops, and Epps suffers financially. Thus, he leases out Northup to Judge Turner’s sugar plantation. Northup excels at cane harvesting and quickly rises in ranks among the slaves at Turner’s. As a result, he is given the unpleasant responsibility of serving as overseer. This role requires Northup to whip other slaves if he sees them transgressing or standing idle.

Judge Turner also allows Northup to earn money from playing the violin at special events and from extra work tasks performed on the Sabbath. Northup becomes known as a rich man among the other slaves of Bayou Boeuf.

Northup approaches a ship’s captain and asks if he can hide in the ship and escape to his freedom. Though sympathetic, the captain declines, afraid of the possible consequences for himself if Northup is discovered. 

Christmas arrives on Epps’s plantation. Northup describes their three days of Christmas celebration—the only days off the slaves are given all year—as times of precious joy. The slaves collaborate to prepare special feasts, and Northup plays his violin while all dance merrily, removed from the drunken antics of their master. Young men and women slaves often find romance during these days, and sometimes, marriages bloom from these romances. Northup bitterly points out that as happy as these days are, they are but a short period of bliss within long periods of suffering.

Back at Epps’s plantation, Northup is made a driver in the fields. He is forced to whip other slaves for any small behavioral transgressions. If he refuses, he himself is punished with the whip.

Northup tries to help Patsey avoid unfair punishment by Epps. As a result, he makes himself the target of Epps’s drunken rages. On one occasion, Epps resorts to chasing him with a knife. Northup is saved just in time by Epps’s wife, who defends him against her husband.

Epps hires a poor White man named Armsby to work as a picker on his plantation. Desperate to obtain freedom, Northup tries to convince Armsby to deliver a letter he has written to his loved ones in New York. Armsby promises to mail the letter but then divulges Northup’s plan to Epps. Northup manages to convince Epps that Armsby is lying, claiming that Armsby invented the story so Epps would promote him to the role of overseer. Epps is so averse to the idea of the lower-class Armsby tricking him that he chooses to believe Northup. The incident serves as a strong reminder to Northup, however, that he must remain on his guard at all times.

To illustrate the perils of running away, or even moving from one plantation to another without a pass, Northup tells the story of a fellow slave named Wiley. During the night, Wiley attempts to visit a friend at another plantation, traveling without a pass from Epps. On his way back, a band of patrollers catch him and brutally beat him. They return him to Epps, who follows up with an even more vicious beating. In response, Wiley runs away from Epps. He doesn’t get far before he is apprehended and put into a holding cell. The uncle of Epps’s wife goes to retrieve Wiley. He returns Wiley with a note requesting that Epps spare him from beating. Epps disregards the note and gives him one of the most inhumane floggings Northup has ever witnessed.

Northup also bitterly recalls the story of a slave named Lew Cheney. Cheney attempts to lead a rebellion, then turns on all the Black captives involved in the rebellion. While the members of this potential uprising are maimed and tortured, Cheney is rewarded by his master.

Chapter 17 closes with Northup’s call for vindication on the behalf of all Black captives subjected to the inhumanities of slavery. He writes:

They are deceived who flatter themselves that the ignorant and debased slave has no conception of the magnitude of his wrongs. They are deceived who imagine that he arises from his knees, with back lacerated and bleeding, cherishing only a spirit of meekness and forgiveness. A day may come—it will come, if his prayer is heard—a terrible day of vengeance, when the master in his turn will cry in vain for mercy (165).

Northup hears a rumor that a local tanner is planning to purchase him. He confides to a fellow slave, Phebe, that he would be relieved to work for someone other than Epps. Epps’s wife overhears Northup and tells her husband, who furiously beats him for his perceived disloyalty.

Epps also ruthlessly and unfairly punishes Patsey for venturing to another plantation. Patsey attempts to explain that she only went to this plantation to obtain a bar of soap from her friend (because Mistress Epps spitefully denies her soap). Falsely believing that Patsey is having an affair with the master of this other plantation, Epps strips her naked and orders Northup to whip her. Dissatisfied with the whipping Northup gives her, Epps takes the whip and lacerates her until her back is flayed open.

Chapter 18 ends with a dark moment wherein Epps’s 10-year-old son tours the fields with him, whip in hand, eager to follow in his father’s footsteps. Epps’s son curses and mocks his slaves while Epps laughs.