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The Anti-slavery Harp: A Collection of Songs for Anti-slavery Meetings cover

The Anti-slavery Harp: A Collection of Songs for Anti-slavery Meetings

Chapter 35: RIGHT ON.

By William Wells Brown

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About This Book

A compilation of abolitionist songs and lyric pamphlets intended for anti-slavery gatherings, offering moral appeals, narratives of suffering, and calls to collective action. Poems dramatize the anguish of enslaved mothers, the fate of separated families, and the experiences of fugitives guided by the North Star, while urging political and religious solidarity against slavery. Several pieces adapt their words to familiar popular airs to facilitate communal singing, and the collection blends emotional testimony, exhortation, and patriotic imagery to mobilize audiences for emancipation.

RIGHT ON.

Air—Lenox.

Ho! children of the brave,

Ho! freemen of the land,

That hurled into the grave

Oppression’s bloody band;

Come on, come on, and joined be we,

To make the fettered bondman free.

Let coward vassals sneak

From freedom’s battle still,

Poltroons that dare not speak

But as their priests may will;

Come on, come on, and joined be we,

To make the fettered bondman free.

On parchment, scroll and creed,

With human life-blood red,

Untrembling at the deed,

Plant firm your manly tread;

The priest may howl, the jurist rave,

But we will free the fettered slave.

The tyrant’s scorn is vain,

In vain the slanderer’s breath,

We’ll rush to break the chain,

E’en on the jaws of death;

Hurrah! hurrah! right on go we,

The fettered slave shall yet be free.

Right on, in freedom’s name,

And in the strength of God,

Wipe out the damning stain,

And break the oppressor’s rod;

Hurrah! Hurrah! right on go we,

The fettered slave shall yet be free.