Uncle Tom

Uncle Tom is an enslaved man. Although he is good and unrebellious, he is sold by his enslaver. After serving a second, kind but improvident man, he comes under the ownership of brutal Simon Legree and dies as a result of his beatings.

Eliza

Eliza is an enslaved woman. Learning that her child is about to be sold away along with Tom, she takes the child and runs away, crossing the Ohio River by leaping from floating ice cake to floating ice cake.

George Harris

George Harris, Eliza’s husband, is enslaved on a neighboring plantation. He also escapes, passing as a Spaniard, and reaches Ohio, where he joins his wife and child. Together, they go to freedom in Canada.

Harry

Harry is the child of Eliza and George.

Mr. Shelby

Mr. Shelby is the original enslaver of Eliza, Harry, and Uncle Tom. Encumbered by debt, he plans to sell an enslaved person to his chief creditor.

Haley

Haley is the buyer, a New Orleans slave dealer. He shrewdly selects Uncle Tom and persuades Mr. Shelby to part with Harry in spite of his better feelings.

George Shelby

George Shelby is Mr. Shelby’s son. He promises to buy Tom back one day but arrives at Legree’s plantation as Tom is dying. When his father dies, he frees all the enslaved people in his household in Uncle Tom’s name.

Mrs. Shelby

Mrs. Shelby is Mr. Shelby’s wife. She delays the pursuit of Eliza by serving a late breakfast.

Marks and Loker

Marks and Loker are slave-catchers hired by Haley to track Eliza through Ohio. Loker, wounded by George Harris in a fight, is given medical treatment by the Quakers who are protecting the freedom seekers.

Augustine St. Clare

Augustine St. Clare is the purchaser of Tom after Tom saves his daughter’s life. He dies before making arrangements necessary to free those he has enslaved.

Eva St. Clare

Eva St. Clare is Augustine St. Clare’s saintly and frail daughter. Before her death, she asks her father to free the people he enslaves.

Mrs. St. Clare

Mrs. St. Clare is a hypochondriac invalid. After her husband’s death, she sends Tom to the slave market.

Miss Ophelia

Miss Ophelia is St. Clare’s cousin from the North. She comes to look after Eva and is unused to lavish Southern customs.

Topsy

Topsy is a pixie-like Black child bought by St. Clare for Miss Ophelia to educate; later, he makes the gift legal.

Simon Legree

Simon Legree is the alcoholic and superstitious brute who purchases Tom and kills him. He is a Northerner by birth.

Cassy

Cassy is enslaved by Legree. She uses his superstitions to advantage in her escape. Her young daughter, who was sold years ago, proves to be Eliza, and mother and daughter are reunited in Canada.

Emmeline

Emmeline is enslaved by Legree. She escapes with Cassy.

Madame de Thoux

Madame de Thoux, whom Cassy and Emmeline meet on a northbound riverboat, proves to be George Harris’s sister.

Aunt Chloe

Aunt Chloe, Uncle Tom’s wife, is left behind in Uncle Tom’s cabin on the Shelby plantation.

Senator Bird

Eliza first finds shelter in Ohio in Senator Bird’s house.

Mrs. Bird

Mrs. Bird is Senator Bird’s wife.

Simeon and Rachel Halliday

The Hallidays give shelter to the freedom seekers.

Following the lives of three enslaved individuals and their experiences both in and out of bondage, Stowe’s novel examines the impact of slavery on both Black and white people in the antebellum South, the period before the Civil War. The central character, Tom, is an enslaved man who initially resides with the Shelbys in Kentucky, then with the St. Clares in New Orleans, and finally on Simon Legree's plantation in Louisiana. At the Shelbys’, Tom, affectionately known as Uncle Tom, is married to Chloe, and they have three children. Stowe aimed to illustrate in this novel that enslaved people were capable of forming loving, Christian families, much like free white people. Uncle Tom’s cabin is depicted as a warm household, with Chloe cooking at the stove, the children playing on the floor, and Tom bouncing the baby on his knee. Tom is a devout Christian and is revered by the other enslaved individuals as a spiritual leader. He successfully converts others to his cherished Christianity. At the St. Clares’, Tom and little Eva share a deep faith in God and heaven.

Unfortunately for Tom, his circumstances take a turn for the worse when his enslaver, Arthur Shelby, decides to sell him. Tom was given to Mr. Shelby when Arthur was an infant; Mr. Shelby is Tom’s original enslaver. As the novel begins, Shelby is reluctantly arranging to sell Tom to Haley, a slave trader. Shelby, considered “a kind master” in the context of slavery, shows his humanity through his reluctance to sell Tom. Mr. Shelby’s wife, Emily, described as a woman of “high moral and religious sensibility and principle,” attempts to persuade her husband not to sell Tom and little Harry, Eliza’s son. She has raised Eliza since childhood and has treated her with special favor. Reflecting the novel’s strong domestic and moral themes, Mrs. Shelby believes it is crucial to keep enslaved families together. Although Mr. Shelby cares for Tom, his financial troubles force him to proceed with the sale, as he needs the money that the valuable Tom will bring.

When Eliza overhears the plan to sell Tom and Harry, she decides to escape the plantation with Harry and take the “underground railroad” to freedom in Canada. Eliza becomes a symbol of motherhood in the novel, famously making a desperate flight across the frozen Ohio River by jumping barefoot on sheets of ice. A refined and religious young woman enslaved by the Shelbys, Eliza is married to George Harris, a light-skinned enslaved man on a neighboring plantation. Their only child, Harry, is the center of Eliza’s life, and she risks everything to protect him. Eliza's mixed heritage and light skin would have made her plight more relatable to the typical nineteenth-century reader. During her escape, Eliza receives help from Rachel and Simeon Halliday, a Quaker family, as well as from Senator John Bird and his wife, Mary. Ironically, Senator Bird had voted for the Fugitive Slave Law in Congress, a decision for which his wife chastises him. When Eliza and Harry seek shelter at their home, the senator is moved by their situation and changes his mind about the law, assisting her in avoiding capture.

Meanwhile, Uncle Tom’s saintly character is revealed as he accepts the indignity of being sold “down the river” to New Orleans. On the steamboat, Uncle Tom befriends a little girl named Eva St. Clare, who is as kind-hearted as he is. After Uncle Tom saves Eva when she falls into the river, her father, Augustine St. Clare, purchases him out of gratitude. Uncle Tom is taken to the St. Clare plantation, where he lives a relatively comfortable life as the head coachman. Tom feels fortunate to have St. Clare as his enslaver. Sensitive, kind, and contemplative, St. Clare adores his daughter, Eva; tolerates his demanding wife, Marie; enjoys debating political issues with his cousin Ophelia; and indulges the people he has enslaved. Reflecting his name, St. Clare is “gay, airy, [and] handsome,” but he is somewhat of a disillusioned idealist. As a young man, St. Clare had a nature of “romantic passion,” but his defining life event was losing his one true love due to a misunderstanding. To his cousin’s dismay, St. Clare refuses to read the Bible or call himself a Christian. Despite being a “heathen” enslaver, St. Clare holds surprisingly humanitarian views that emerge during his discussions about slavery and race relations with Ophelia, Marie, or his brother Alfred.

St. Clare’s daughter, Eva, is the light of his life. Sadly, her fragile health mirrors her beauty. Eva’s full name, Evangeline, underscores her dedication to evangelism, a passion she shares with Tom. Eva befriends Tom and evokes love in everyone she meets. Often described as “Christ-like,” Eva seems too pure for this world. She is portrayed as “spirit-like,” with “large, mystic eyes,” and she even manages to convert the seemingly amoral Topsy, an enslaved girl in the St. Clare household, to Christianity. Eva frequently talks about going to heaven and feels profound compassion for others, especially for those less fortunate, such as her family’s enslaved people. She often speaks to her father, mother, and cousins Henrique and Ophelia about her abhorrence of slavery. Just before her death, Eva gathers all the household members by her bedside to announce her impending death, urge them to become Christians, and give each of them a lock of her hair as a keepsake. Her deathbed scene is one of literature’s most famous, epitomizing Victorian domestic melodrama, with Little Eva struggling for breath as her loved ones surround her, tears streaming down their faces. Before she passes, Eva makes her father promise to free all his enslaved people. St. Clare tells Tom he will be freed, but the elderly enslaved man chooses to stay to help convert St. Clare to Christianity. When St. Clare dies unexpectedly before freeing the enslaved people, his wife sells them at a public auction. Uncle Tom is bought by the malevolent Simon Legree.

Simon Legree is Tom’s final enslaver, a ruthless owner of a desolate Louisiana plantation where the enslaved laborers endure abuse and hopelessness. Legree’s name, synonymous with greed, has become a symbol of evil and cruelty. His plantation exemplifies the worst conditions of slavery: he beats, underfeeds, overworks, and bullies his enslaved workers. He denies them proper housing, warm clothing, and even the solace of religious faith, forbidding them from seeing God as a higher power than himself. Legree attempts to corrupt Tom by offering him power over the other enslaved people, but Tom’s Christian faith gives him the strength to resist. Tom’s defiance enrages Legree, who threatens to kill him for not recognizing him, rather than God, as his master. Legree’s obsession with power and control has turned him into a depraved monster, illustrating the demoralizing effects of slavery on enslavers.

During his time on the plantation, Tom meets Miss Cassy, an enslaved woman owned by Legree. Since arriving at the plantation as a young girl, Cassy has been forced to be Legree’s mistress. She befriends Tom after Legree purchases him. Despite her enslavement, Cassy remains strong and dignified, though she describes herself as “a lost soul” and confesses to Tom that she has lost her faith in God. Her bitterness and anger stem from her tragic experiences: her two children were sold away, and she killed a third in infancy to spare it from a life of slavery. Eventually, Cassy and Emmeline, another enslaved woman, escape together after Tom's death and make their way to Canada. There, Cassy is reunited with Eliza Harris, discovering Eliza to be her long-lost daughter.

Tom’s faith faces its greatest challenge under Legree’s control. The malevolent Legree attempts to break Tom’s spirit, asking him, “An’t I yer master? . . . An’t yer mine, now, body and soul?” Tom resolutely responds, “My soul an’t yours, Mas’r! . . . It’s been bought and paid for by one that is able to keep it.” Legree fails to shake Tom’s religious convictions.

Tom’s death at the hands of Legree and his enforcers, Quimbo and Sambo, mirrors a Christlike sacrifice. Even as he forgives his tormentors, he converts them while his blood stains their hands. Meanwhile, George Shelby, the son of Tom’s original enslaver, has been searching for Tom since his sale down the river. George finds Tom just in time to say goodbye before he dies. Enraged, George threatens to charge Legree with murder, but Legree cynically notes that no white jury will convict him for killing an enslaved person. George sorrowfully realizes Legree will evade justice but vows to do “what one man can do to drive out this curse of slavery from my land!” Returning to Kentucky, George frees all the people he has enslaved, urging them to “be as honest and as faithful a Christian as Tom was.”

In American culture, Uncle Tom’s name has become synonymous with obsequious behavior, especially by a Black person towards a white person. While Tom is indeed gentle, devoted, and trustworthy to his “kind” enslavers, Shelby and St. Clare, these traits arise from his deep Christian faith rather than a self-serving lack of dignity. Within the context of the entire novel, which heavily relies on the nineteenth-century audience’s Christian values, Tom symbolizes the strength and support Christianity can offer even in the most desperate situations.