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Austin
Jack Staines was a free Black seaman who married Ona Judge in January of 1797, less than a year after her arrival in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Together, they had three children, Eliza, Nancy, and William Staines. Jack was often away from home due to the unpredictable nature of his seafaring occupation. He died of unknown causes in 1803, leaving Ona with three children to raise.
Jack Staines Quotes in Never Caught
The Never Caught quotes below are all either spoken by Jack Staines or refer to Jack Staines . 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:
).
Chapter 12 Quotes
With no extra money to purchase a new wedding dress, Judge would have selected to wear something from her existing wardrobe. For months, the fugitive dressed inconspicuously, wearing plain clothing appropriate for a domestic. But on her wedding day she would have pulled out one of her nicer dresses, one that she used to wear while serving the Washingtons.
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Explanation and Analysis:
In this passage, as Dunbar uses a combination of historical context and imagination to reconstruct the occasion of Ona Judge’s marriage to Jack Staines, Dunbar invokes the symbol of clothing to illustrate the meaningful nature of the wedding. Clothing is, throughout the book, a symbol for the yearning to attain—or at least approximate—freedom, agency, and individual liberty. During the early months of her time in Portsmouth, just after escaping enslavement, Ona Judge could not wear the fine dresses she’d sewn while enslaved by the Washingtons—they would draw too much attention to her. Now, however, as Ona takes a major step Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Accusamus eaque omnis. Velit eaque error. Possimus corrupti soluta. Qui aut a. Rerum voluptas debitis. Voluptatem accusantium est. Mollitia eaque ipsa. Perferendis consectetur et. Dicta i
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Jack Staines Character Timeline in Never Caught
The timeline below shows where the character Jack Staines appears in Never Caught. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 12
...Mount Vernon in order to focus on the holiday—and the new man in her life, Jack Staines. By January of 1797, Ona and Jack are married. Her freedom has allowed her...
(full context)
Jack Staines is, like many other free Black men in the Northeast at the time, an...
(full context)
Whipple soon learns that Ona has married Jack Staines when Whipple hears that the two of them have applied for a marriage certificate...
(full context)
Chapter 13
...details of her life: where she lives, who she works for, from whom she and Jack rent their home, and when and where her third child (and only son) was born....
(full context)
Ona’s husband Jack dies suddenly in 1803—a local paper lists his death notice but does not supply a...
(full context)
