Uncle Tom's Cabin

Uncle Tom, George, Mr. Shelby, Little Eva, and Simon Legree are just some of the characters in Harriet Beecher Stowe's pre-Civil War South novel Uncle Tom's Cabin. Uncle Tom's Cabin predominantly deals with the horror and inhumanity of slavery. Stowe strongly expresses that slavery destroys families and christian values. Set in antebellum America the story follows the life of pious and humble slave Uncle Tom through his trials and tribulations as a slave. A slave owner named Shelby is forced to sell his treasured slave Uncle Tom and a young boy named Harry to settle his debts. Harry's mother can't stand the fact of losing her son so she runs away during the middle of the night. Eliza and Harry are helped by various people and eventually end up in the Quaker settlement Indiana. Tom who didn't flee isn't so lucky. Tom depends on the bible for comfort. On the way to Haley's plantation,Tom saves Eva St. Clare from drowning and her father purchases him to show his thanks. Later on Eva becomes sick and senses she is going to die so she gives all the servants a lock of her gold hair and implores them to become Christians. She insists that her father sets Tom free and after her death he leans on Tom for spiritual guidance and support. Eva's father is fatally wounded when he intervened in a drunken brawl at a bar and Tom's chance of freedom is gone. St. Clare's wife has Tom auctioned off to a yankee with a plantation down south named Simon Legree. Tom is beaten for refusing to whip a slave woman, Lucy. Cassy helps tend to Tom's wounds. Cassy hides with another slave, Emmeline, in Legree's attic, trying to plan an escape. Legree insists that Tom knows where they're hiding and beats him until he tells, but he never does. George, the son of Tom's first owner, makes it just in time before Tom dies. After Tom's death, the young Shelby vows to do whatever is within the power of one man to abolish slavery. He boards a steamer for Kemeets Cassy and Emmeline, recently escaped. Through sheer coincidence, they meet a Madame de Thoux on board. She is none other then George Harris' sister. Cassy is discovered to be Eliza's mother. The whole family is reunited in Canada. Madame de Thoux finances George's education, and the entire group chooses to move to Liberia to fight slavery practices from there. George Shelby returns to his mother's estate and, true to his promise, emancipates all his slaves. Harriet Beecher Stowe set out to let everyone know exactly what was slavery and how human beings were treated. Stowe set out what she meant to accomplish and she did it well. Uncle Tom's Cabin is extremely touching by the affection reader's have on Tom. Stowe wrote Uncle Tom's Cabin to make a point on how slavery affected everyone and how bad slavery was. Stowe got her point across to her reader's by establishing a well-mannered, spiritual person like Tom and showing reader's that even bad things happen to "good" slaves. Especially, when Tom is beaten and later dies due to the beaten he got from his slave owner Legree. Stowe made Uncle Tom's Cabin more realistic on slavery when she uses two women speaking of the slaves and one believing slavery is wrong and the other believing that slaves are better off slaves than they are better free because they have free food,shelter,etc. Stowe also states very good in this conversation that some slaves are better off but not most slaves because most slaves have very cruel slave owner's and some even beat their slaves to the point of death. Tom'at the lady was stating about death and how slavery was bad. Stowe used an example like this because it was how most people in this time thought slavery was. A lot of people believed that slaves were a lot better off being slaves while some believed that slaves needed to be free. Uncle Tom's Cabin was written to show people the "dark" side of slavery and open discussion on slavery. By Stowe writing Uncle Tom's Cabin it started an uprising about slavery and people begin discussing it more and it later began the Civil War. Uncle Tom's Cabin is very tear-jerking and heart warming. In Conclusion, Uncle Tom's Cabin is one of the best books ever and expresses nothing but views on slavery. In Uncle Tom's Cabin you will notice that slavery is expressed as an evil that must be resisted. Ignoring slavery is as destructive as practicing it. Slavery is damaging to families by tearing them apart like Eliza and Harry and it is also damaging to our christian values by making us believe that there is only one GOD on "their" side meaning whites.