LiederNet logo

CONTENTS

×
  • Home | Introduction
  • Composers (20,110)
  • Text Authors (19,487)
  • Go to a Random Text
  • What’s New
  • A Small Tour
  • FAQ & Links
  • Donors
  • DONATE

UTILITIES

  • Search Everything
  • Search by Surname
  • Search by Title or First Line
  • Search by Year
  • Search by Collection

CREDITS

  • Emily Ezust
  • Contributors (1,114)
  • Contact Information
  • Bibliography

  • Copyright Statement
  • Privacy Policy

Follow us on Facebook

© by Tsitsi Ella Jaji

Matilda's Tom
Language: English 
When she spell
 [ ... ]

This text may be copyright, so we will not display it until we obtain permission to do so or discover it is public-domain.

The following advertisement from the Freedom on the Move database inspired this text:

$40 Reward. RANAWAY from the subscriber, six
miles west of Greensborough, on the 23d of June
last, a bright mulatto fellow named TOM, 23
years of age, 5 feet 6 inches high, stout made, no
flesh marks recollected, has a stern countenance
when spoken to. Also a black woman, the wife
of said fellow, by the name of MATILDA, about
20 years old, 5 feet 4 inches high, has a glum
down look when spoken to; has holes in her
ears for rings, and has rather bumby face -- their
clothes cannot be described, as they took away
all they had, and none particularly recollected.
It is supposed that they will endeavour to get to
Mobile or Pensacola, either by land or water.
It is rather presumed they will try to impose
themselves as free negroes, to some barge, as
the fellow can read print, & I have good grounds
to believe he can write. The above reward will
be paid if taken and secured in some jail so I get
them out of the county, or $30 if taken within this
county.

Benjamin Brown. Green County, (Ala.) 
July 4. 63c

Mobile Commercial Register
September 18, 1823


Text Authorship:

  • by Tsitsi Ella Jaji , copyright © [author's text not yet checked against a primary source]

Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):

  • by Shawn Okpebholo (b. 1981), "Matilda's Tom", subtitle: "An anthem" [ voice and piano ], from Songs in Flight, no. 8 [sung text checked 1 time]

This text was added to the website: 2023-10-04
Line count: 19
Word count: 69

Gentle Reminder

This website began in 1995 as a personal project by Emily Ezust, who has been working on it full-time without a salary since 2008. Our research has never had any government or institutional funding, so if you found the information here useful, please consider making a donation. Your help is greatly appreciated!
–Emily Ezust, Founder

Donate

We use cookies for internal analytics and to earn much-needed advertising revenue. (Did you know you can help support us by turning off ad-blockers?) To learn more, see our Privacy Policy. To learn how to opt out of cookies, please visit this site.

I acknowledge the use of cookies

Contact
Copyright
Privacy

Copyright © 2025 The LiederNet Archive

Site redesign by Shawn Thuris