SOURCE: Ferguson, Moira. “Extending Discourse and Changing Definitions.” In Subject to Others: British Women Writers and Colonial Slavery, 1670-1834, pp. 273-98. New York: Routledge, Chapman and Hall, 1992.

In the following excerpt, Ferguson examines the 1831 slave narrative The History of Mary Prince: A West Indian Slave to show that Prince's language and agenda were often at odds with white female abolitionists.

An Ex-slavewoman Narrates Her Experiences

I would rather go into my grave than go back a slave to Antigua, though I wish to go back to my husband very much—very much—very much! I am much afraid my owners would separate me from my husband, and use me very hard, or perhaps sell me for a field negro;—and slavery is too bad. I would rather go into my grave!

—Mary Prince, testimony to attorney George Stephen.

In The History of Mary Prince: A West Indian Slave...