![]() ![]() ![]() Gordon had anticipated that he would be pursued and carried with him onions from the plantation, which he rubbed on his body to throw the dogs off-scent. Upon learning of his flight, his master recruited several neighbors and together they chased after him with a pack of bloodhounds. In March 1863 he fled his home, heading east towards the Mississippi River. While the plantation owner discharged the overseer who had carried out this vicious attack, for the next two months as Gordon recuperated in bed, he decided to escape. ![]() This beating left him with horrible welts on much of the surface of his back. ![]() Gordon had received a severe whipping for undisclosed reasons in the fall of 1862. The photograph pictures the runaway slave Gordon exposing his scourged back to the camera of two itinerant photographers, William D. This famous photo of the welts on his badly "scourged back" was taken while he was being fitted for a uniform.Īs this famous photograph suggests, photography was capable of communicating powerful ideas about the so-called “ peculiar institution” - ideas that ultimately undermined the prevailing notion that slavery was a benign tradition. The Scourged Back: This slave named Gordon ran for 80 miles to join the Union Forces in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, in March 1863. ![]()
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