Chains

by

Laurie Halse Anderson

Teachers and parents! Our Teacher Edition on Chains makes teaching easy.

Master Bellingham Character Analysis

Master Bellingham is a Patriot living in New York. He owns and enslaves Curzon and is supposedly desperate to arrest the Locktons. Curzon trusts Bellingham and convinces Isabel to spy for the Patriots because he believes that Bellingham will free Isabel and Ruth if Isabel can provide useful intelligence. But Isabel realizes that she and her information seem unreliable because she isn’t able to pass along certain details about the Locktons, so Bellingham never frees her. Though it’s never confirmed whether Bellingham would’ve kept his word if Isabel had given him more, later events call Bellingham’s commitment to enslaved people’s freedom and well-being into question. Though Curzon sees it as a kindness when Bellingham promises to free Curzon if Curzon signs up for military service in his place, for instance, other enslaved people insist this actually just guarantees that Curzon will die during the war.

Master Bellingham Quotes in Chains

The Chains quotes below are all either spoken by Master Bellingham or refer to Master Bellingham. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Freedom Theme Icon
).
Chapter 6 Quotes

“They won’t say anything in front of me.”

“You are a small black girl, Country,” he said bitterly. “You are a slave, not a person. They’ll say things in front of you they won’t say in front of the white servants. ’Cause you don’t count to them. It happens all the time to me.”

Related Characters: Isabel (speaker), Curzon (speaker), Master Elihu Lockton, Master Bellingham
Page Number: 41
Explanation and Analysis:
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Chains PDF

Master Bellingham Quotes in Chains

The Chains quotes below are all either spoken by Master Bellingham or refer to Master Bellingham. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Freedom Theme Icon
).
Chapter 6 Quotes

“They won’t say anything in front of me.”

“You are a small black girl, Country,” he said bitterly. “You are a slave, not a person. They’ll say things in front of you they won’t say in front of the white servants. ’Cause you don’t count to them. It happens all the time to me.”

Related Characters: Isabel (speaker), Curzon (speaker), Master Elihu Lockton, Master Bellingham
Page Number: 41
Explanation and Analysis: