I was born in Tuckahoe,Talbot Country,Maryland. I have no accurate knowledge of my age,never having seen any record containing it. By far the larger part of the slaves know as little of their ages as horses know of theirs,and it is the wish of most masters within my knowledge to keep their slaves thus ignorant .I do not remember having ever met a slave who could tell of his birthday. They seldom come nearer to _ than plantingtime,harvesting,springtime,or falltime. A lack of information concerning my own was a source of unhappiness to me even during childhood. The white children could tell their ages,but I could not tell. Why the same right ought to be taken away from me!I was not allowed to ask my master about it. He considered all such questions on the part of a slave improper and impolite. The nearest estimate I can live makes me now between twentyseven and twentyeight years of age. I come to this,from hearing my master say,some time during 1835,I was about seventeen years old. My mother was named Harriet Bailey. She was the daughter of Isaac and Betsey Bailey,both colored,and quite dark. My father was a white man. The opinion was also whispered that my master was my father;but of the correctness of this opinion,I know nothing and I have no means to know. My mother and I were separated when I was but an infant--before I knew her as my mother. It is a common custom,in the part of Maryland from which I ran away,to part children from their mothers at a very early age. Frequently,before the child has reached its twelfth month,its mother is taken from it,and hired out on some farm a considerable distance off,and the child is placed under the care of an older woman,too old for field labor. The author was most probably raised  _  .
by his grandparents by an old woman slave with his master's support together with other children