Escape From Slavery

I suffered much from Hunger, but much more from cold. In hottest summer and coldest winter, I was kept almost naked-no shoes, no stockings, no jacket, no trousers, nothing on but a coarse tow linen shirt, reaching only to my knees. I had no bed, I must have perished with cold, but that, the coldest nights, I used to steal a bag which was used for carrying corn to the mill. I would crawl into this bag, and there sleep on the cold, damp, clay floor, with my head in and feet out. My feet have been so cracked with frost, that the pen with which I am writing might be laid in the gashes.

From Escape from Slavery: The Boyhood of Frederick Douglass in His Own Words