We whose names are under-written, do assure the World, that the Poems specified in the following Page, were (as we verily believe) written by PHILLIS, a young Negro Girl, who was but a few years since, brought an uncultivated barbarian from Africa, and has ever since been, and now is, under the disadvantage of serving as a slave in a Family in this Town . . .
Signed, this seventh day of May, in the town of Boston, province of Massachusetts, in the year of our Lord, 1772.
Thomas Hutchinson, governor
Andrew Oliver, lieutenant governor
Councilmen Thomas Hubbard, John Erving, James Pitts, Harrison Gray, James Bowdoin,
JOHN HANCOCK
Merchants Joseph Green, Richard Carey
Reverends Charles Chauncy, Mather Byles,
Ebenezer Pemberton, Andrew Eliot, Samuel Cooper,
Samuel Mather, John Moorhead,
Nathaniel Wheatley, signing for her master,
John Wheatley
“Those dear men. I am so gratified.” Mrs. Wheatley dabbed at her eyes with a handkerchief.
“I’d be considerably more gratified if they hadn’t taken on so about Phillis being a slave,” Mary said angrily. “In heaven’s name, what’s wrong with Hancock? He knows we don’t refer to our servants as slaves!”
It was late afternoon. Nathaniel and I had just returned from the governor’s mansion with the signed paper in hand.
Nathaniel was triumphant. I was dazed. It had started to rain outside. Aunt Cumsee had just served tea. The paper was passed around and digested with the tarts Aunt Cumsee had taken from the beehive oven.
When it came into my hands, I could scarce believe it. There it was, the richest of vellum, with the blackest of ink. All those signatures saying my poetry was mine!
“Couldn’t you have had some say about the wording, Nathaniel?” Mary asked. “‘Under the disadvantage of slavery’? This paper must go to London! What will people think?”
I knew what I thought. That I would like to get up and throttle Mary, despite the fact that she was balancing four-month-old John Lathrop, Junior, on her knee and was already two months in circumstances with her next one.
Did she have no idea of what I had been made to endure this day? Could she have stood up to such questioning?
“We’re wearying Phillis.” Mrs. Wheatley got up, reached for a shawl, and put it around my shoulders. “We must think of her welfare. She isn’t that strong.”
“I’m fine, ma’am,” I said.
“I still think that Nathaniel should have insisted on having the wording changed,” Mary said. She was determined today, to give the devil his due.
“No matter, Mary,” her mother said.
“That was not Nathaniel’s duty,” her father said. “He was acting in my stead. If not for this gouty foot I’d have been there myself. By heaven, I missed it! No! Nathaniel acted as I would have done. He acquitted himself well. Now I will hear no more of it.”
The matter was finished.
“Nathaniel, fetch my Madeira. By heaven, I will have a toast!” My master set down his cup.
It was done. Nathaniel poured some for himself and his father, who held up his glass. Toasts were made.
They toasted the committee. Then John Hancock. Then Mrs. Wheatley. Finally, Mr. Wheatley held up his glass to me. “To Phillis,” he said, “for you do us proud.”
“Hear, hear,” Nathaniel said.
“And now, I have an announcement.” Mr. Wheatley still held forth his glass. “I am retiring. An advertisement saying such will appear in all the papers tomorrow. Nathaniel has done so well running things that I feel assured in leaving everything in his hands.”
Everyone cheered.
“And another announcement. Within the year, Phillis will have to set sail for London. Mrs. Wheatley has been in correspondence with the Countess of Huntington, who will sponsor her there. She will travel under the protection of Nathaniel, on our own ship.”
“Nathaniel is going to London?” Mary was full taken aback.
I almost felt sorry for her. Mary knew she would never go abroad.
“He must,” her father said. “Our mercantile business has grown so that we must set up an office in England.”
There was much kissing and hugging all around. Nathaniel was congratulated by his father. His mother embraced him. Mary offered her cheek for a kiss.
“London!” Mary whispered snidely to me later in the hall as I held little John so she could put on her cloak. “Well, just remember who you are. Remember your place.”
“How can I not,” I returned, “when others are constantly speaking of it?”
She turned away. I could not dismiss her remark out of hand. It cut like a knife. But I was numb. Numb with joy. I was, after all, going to England. My work would come out in a book there. I was being sponsored by a countess.
But more than all else, I was going with Nathaniel.