Point of View

Authors Note: In the book Soldier’s Secret, Deborah Sampson is the main character and she talks about her life and what happened to her. I always wonder it was like to be her best friend, Jennie, who is a slave at a house nearby were Deb works. Jennie always says how lucky Deb is that she is not a slave but you never get to hear Jennie’s point of view or her life.

I work in a big house as a slave. I get pushed around and beaten but I can’t do anything about it. I don’t know how to read or write or do anything so my best friend Deb wants to teach me. I don’t know if I really want her to teach me because if my master sees me knowing how to read or write he will know that I sneak away during lunch time. Deb is so sure that he won’t find out by I’m not sure she knows what she is talking about. I meet her in the woods every day during lunch time because my master never sees me or knows that I leave the house. Deb brings a book to the woods every day tries to teach me. I told her I am scared that my master will find out by she says her won’t so she teaches me anyways. Deb is very demanding and thinks she always right so I can’t say no to her… I’m too scared to.

One day Deb came up to me and told me a secret about how she watches the soldiers train in the morning, then practices what they do in her room. She also told me that she found Sam’s old breaches and that she put them on and she wondered what is was like to be a man. How you go treated compared to a woman? How much fun it is was to be free! She said that she put her hair put and went to town to see if anyone would notice her or if they would treat her differently. No one noticed her! I told her not to keep going out disguised but she didn’t listen and did it anyway. I don’t agree with what she is doing because it could get her killed… I told her that but she doesn’t thing anyone will notice her so she ignores me and what I say. I haven’t met her in the woods for a couple days so I don’t know if anything has happened to her. It scares me that I haven’t seen her because something could have happen like her be killed, get in trouble and be in jail or the worse one of all… have to go to war!