Edward Covey

Who is Edward Covey?

Edward Covey, a farmer of Talbot County, Maryland was an early 19th-century American slaveholder. He is described by Frederick Douglass in My Bondage and My Freedom as a "first rate hand at breaking young negroes". In 1833, Douglass was rented to Covey for a year so that Covey would break the teenage slave's spirit. One day, after numerous vicious beatings at Covey's hands, Douglass fought back. He fought off Covey's cousin and his fight with Covey himself, which lasted nearly two hours long, ended with Douglass's victory. Douglass later wrote that "It is, perhaps, not altogether creditable to my natural temper, that, after this conflict with Mr. Covey, I did, at times, purposely aim to provoke him to an attack, by refusing to keep with the other hands in the field, but I could never bully him to another battle."