What hatred will Do

Of all the atrocities, man has endured; none has caused more misery and destruction to the soul than human bondage, also identified as slavery. It is illustrated in Louisa May Alcott’s story: “My Contraband,” originally published “The Brothers.” The Civil War was fought over slavery. It pitted brother against brother, but this did not kill these brothers, it was the deep and festering hatred they had for each other that sent them to their early graves. The story these individuals create is complex and depressing; the main character, Robert is a contraband (a slave who has come to the North to seek freedom). Instead of finding freedom, he finds his half brother Ned and his wife Lucy. After the death of his master, Robert arrives from the South to freedom in the North to work in a hospital caring for wounded men of the war. His assignment is to help Miss Dane, a nurse, tend to a dying Rebel.

Miss Dane appears to be the narrator in the story She is aware of Robert’s troubled existence and observes despair from the moment their encounter. Upon their first meeting, she sensed sadness from deep within him she remarked, “I had seen colored people in what they call “the black sulks” when,

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Again, she pleaded with Robert only this time not for an explanation. Hatred began to seethe inside Robert he located Ned and declared, “I half murdered him – an’ tonight I’ll finish” (535). He ran towards Ned who stabbed him with a sword in return Robert’s fellow soldier did the same to Ned. The world Ned and Robert were from was the same and yet they are opposite. He was sent to fight at Fort Wagner. Miss Dane was confused and stunned by these events. for days, they neither smiled nor spoke, and scarcely ate. When Robert saw Lucy at another plantation and the Marster found out the Robert liked her he bought her. The slave and the master will never be equal. The omission by Ned that Lucy had “cut her throat” (532) was the -------that Robert needed to cleanse his hatred of Ned. Ned felt he had achieved his final revenge by whipping Robert and the sale of him. Robert was calm and told her “Sit still, Missus; I won’ hurt yer…but you waked up to soon (533).

Miss Dane and the Doctor helped Robert start over.

Approximate Word count = 1342
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)

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