Colonel Lloyd has a massive plantation with 300-400 slaves. They are given very little food and clothing, and children who are too young to work in the fields go almost naked because they are given no clothing. The slaves work almost constantly and drop with weariness when they stop working. They sleep with blankets but no beds, but they are too weary to notice the difference.

Mr. Lloyd's house and estate are run like a well-oiled business, as slaves carry out functions such as blacksmithing, weaving, coopering, and other tasks. Slaves vie for the right to serve in his plantation house and believe that it's a great honor to receive this right. Mr. Lloyd cares deeply for his horses and severely punishes any slave who is not perfect in his or her duties with the horses. Slaves must listen attentively to Mr. Lloyd when he speaks, and they are beaten harshly if they do not show the utmost respect and attention at all times.

Douglass describes life on the plantation as harsh and violent. He compares it unfavorably to being a slave in a city. When he was a slave in Baltimore, he noted that the proximity of homes to one another made it less likely that the owners would be too abusive. He also had a chance, while running errands in the city, to mingle with free people.

The plantation, however, was horrific. He describes being traumatized as a child the first time he saw his aunt beaten by their master, Colonel Lloyd. He says the following of Lloyd's frequent beatings of her:

He was a cruel man, hardened by a long life of slaveholding. He would at times seem to take great pleasure in whipping a slave. I have often been awakened at the dawn of day by the most heart-rending shrieks of an own aunt of mine, whom he used to tie up to a joist, and whip upon her naked back till she was literally covered with blood.

He also states that the comforting testimony of slaves, when questioned by whites, that their owners are good to them is a lie. He tells the story of a slave who had never met his master, Colonel Lloyd, but who was questioned by a white man about how the plantation slaves were treated. The slave answered honestly that they were treated badly. The white man turned out to be Lloyd. The slave was sold south to Georgia to set an example to the other slaves not to complain.

Overall, Douglass remembers the time on the plantation as frightening and unhappy. Slaves lived in very poor conditions. For example, young children had almost no clothing:

the children unable to work in the field had neither shoes, stockings, jackets, nor trousers, given to them; their clothing consisted of two coarse linen shirts per year. When these failed them, they went naked . . .

Douglass describes the slaves on Colonel Lloyd's massive plantation as living in fear of beatings and other forms of physical abuse. He is a child, but he remembers seeing older slaves whipped for even very minor offenses. Labor on the plantation was back-breaking, and slaves were generally supplied with only very bare necessities for survival. In addition to agricultural labor, the slaves also did all sorts of skilled work, including "shoemaking and mending, the blacksmithing, cartwrighting, coopering, weaving, and grain-grinding." The slaves had different overseers, one of which, Mr. Severe, was very cruel and almost sadistic, beating slave mothers in front of their children. The whole plantation was run in a very business-like way, and slaves tended to differentiate among themselves based on division of labor on the farm.

How did Frederick Douglass describe slave life on Colonel Lloyd’s plantation in his Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass?

Conditions are harsh and cruel on Colonel Lloy's plantation, but the slaves are used to it.

Douglass describes the harsh conditions on Colonel Lloyd’s plantation in great detail.  For example, he describes the slaves’ meager allotment of food and clothing.

The men and women slaves received, as their monthly allowance of food, eight pounds of pork, … and one bushel of corn meal. Their yearly clothing consisted of two coarse linen shirts, one pair of linen trousers … one jacket, one pair of trousers for winter… one pair of stockings, and one pair of shoes … (Ch. 2)

They also were not allowed beds, sleeping on the floor with a coarse blanket.  Douglass did not consider this a great hardship because the slaves had such harsh lives in general, and they did not know any differently.  It demonstrates what a difficult position they were in.  They were treated unfairly and suffered deprivation at every turn, but it was the only life they knew.

As soon as the horn was sounded, the slaves were expected to get up and get into the fields. Anyone who was late was punished very harshly. 

Mr. Severe, the overseer, used to stand by the door of the quarter, armed with a large hickory stick and heavy cowskin, ready to whip any one who was so unfortunate as not to hear, or, from any other cause, was prevented from being ready to start for the field at the sound of the horn. (Ch. 2)

Mr. Severe was extremely harsh and profane, and the slaves hated him, but fortunately he was replaced when he died by Mr. Hopkins, who was much were humane.  Even though he still whipped the slaves, because that was expected, he did not do it overmuch, and did not seem to take pleasure in it, so he was considered by the slaves “a good overseer.”

All of the slaves on the plantation wanted to work in the main farm, described as the Great House Farm.  A slave’s prestige was determined by the position of his master, so the closer he was to him and the richer his master, the more prestigious the slave.

Douglass describes the hardships of slavery in a very matter of fact way.  He sometimes describes things that affected him emotionally, such as his reaction to the singing of slaves, and how it brought him to tears. 

Every tone was a testimony against slavery, and a prayer to God for deliverance from chains. The hearing of those wild notes always depressed my spirit, and filled me with ineffable sadness. (Ch. 2)

Even when slaves seem happy, and whites or northerners mistake them for being happy, Douglass feels that the signing of slaves is one of the harshest testaments against slavery.  Although he is often as matter of fact as possible in his narrative, his purpose the entire time is to make sure that the reader knows the horrors of slavery.