When the battle ended and I heard that the Union Army had been defeated, I couldn't believe it. My mistress said to me, 'You know the Northern soldiers can't fight us here'. But I said, 'Ain't God the captain? He started this war, and he's right in front. He may stop in his career and let you rest up a little bit now, but our Captain ain't never been beaten. Soon He'll start out again, and you'll hear the bugle blow, and He'll march on to victory. Where the Bible says, 'Be not afraid; you shall set under your own vine and fig tree', that means us slaves, and I tell you we're going to be a free people. You all will be getting your pay sure for the way you've done treated us poor black folks. We've been killed up like dogs, and the strikes you've laid on us hurt just as bad as if our skin was white as snow. But I ain't going to run away or from my children in the river as some slaves have, for I'm as certain this war will set us free as that I stand here'. I told her just what I thought, and my mistress said, 'Fanny, you is foolish', and my master said, 'You ain't got no sense'. And I said to my master, 'When I was a young girl you sold ninety-six people at one time to pay a debt'. Then I sat down and cried, and the white people stood there and laughed at me. 'Lord', I said, 'I'd rather be dead than have my children sold away from me'.

What It Means

This is a placeholder explanation generated by the low-overhead model. It interprets "When the battle ended and I heard that the Union Army had been defeated, I couldn't believe it. My mistress said to me, 'You know the Northern soldiers can't fight us here'. But I said, 'Ain't God the captain? He started this war, and he's right in front. He may stop in his career and let you rest up a little bit now, but our Captain ain't never been beaten. Soon He'll start out again, and you'll hear the bugle blow, and He'll march on to victory. Where the Bible says, 'Be not afraid; you shall set under your own vine and fig tree', that means us slaves, and I tell you we're going to be a free people. You all will be getting your pay sure for the way you've done treated us poor black folks. We've been killed up like dogs, and the strikes you've laid on us hurt just as bad as if our skin was white as snow. But I ain't going to run away or from my children in the river as some slaves have, for I'm as certain this war will set us free as that I stand here'. I told her just what I thought, and my mistress said, 'Fanny, you is foolish', and my master said, 'You ain't got no sense'. And I said to my master, 'When I was a young girl you sold ninety-six people at one time to pay a debt'. Then I sat down and cried, and the white people stood there and laughed at me. 'Lord', I said, 'I'd rather be dead than have my children sold away from me'." in the context of "Fannie Lee, a Virginian slave, as quoted in Battleground Adventures in the Civil War (1915), by Clifton Johnson, Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, p. 150" to mean that wisdom is timeless.