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Part 1, November 1803 – February 1805

• Part 1, November 1803 – February 1805 introduces ten-year-old Hetty “Handful” Grimke. Handful is one of fourteen slaves to the Grimke family of Charleston, South Carolina.

• Aunt-Sister, having been with Mrs. Grimke since childhood, is the most senior slave along with Tomke, the butler.

• “Mauma,” Handful’s mother, is named Charlotte.

• Sarah Grimke, daughter of Mrs. Mary Grimke, turns eleven in this section of the novel. Sarah has nine siblings: John, Thomas, Mary, Frederick, (herself in the middle), and Anna, Eliza, Ben, Henry, and baby Charles.

• Mr. Grimke is a veteran of the American Revolution, a judge on South Carolina’s highest court, as well as a member of the elite planter class.

• Sarah’s earliest memory is of her mother beating the slave, Rosetta, for not working fast enough; the blood and suffering of Rosetta terrified Sarah and caused her to develop a stutter.

• On Sarah’s eleventh...

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