page_title: Uncle Tom's Cabin
section_title: Other characters
hierarchical_section_title: Uncle Tom's Cabin / Other characters
caption_attribution_description: English: Title: Eva and Topsy / Louisa Corbaux delt. et lith. Abstract/medium: 1 print&#160;: lithograph, color.
context_page_description: Uncle Tom's Cabin; or, Life Among the Lowly is an anti-slavery novel by American author Harriet Beecher Stowe. Published in 1852, the novel had a profound effect on attitudes toward African Americans and slavery in the U.S. and is said to have "helped lay the groundwork for the Civil War".
  Stowe, a Connecticut-born teacher at the Hartford Female Seminary and an active abolitionist, featured the character of Uncle Tom, a long-suffering black slave around whom the stories of other characters revolve. The sentimental novel depicts the reality of slavery while also asserting that Christian love can overcome something as destructive as enslavement of fellow human beings.
  Uncle Tom's Cabin was the best-selling novel of the 19th century and the second best-selling book of that century, following the Bible. It is credited with helping fuel the abolitionist cause in the 1850s. In the first year after it was published, 300,000 copies of the book were sold in the United States; one million copies in Great Britain. In 1855, three years after it was published, it was called "the most popular novel of our day."
context_section_description: These are the more notable of the secondary and minor characters in Uncle Tom's Cabin:
  Arthur Shelby – Tom's master in Kentucky. Shelby is characterized as a "kind" slaveowner and a stereotypical Southern gentleman.
  Emily Shelby – Arthur Shelby's wife. She is a deeply religious woman who strives to be a kind and moral influence upon her slaves and is appalled when her husband sells his slaves to a slave trader. As a woman, she has no legal way to stop this, as all property belongs to her husband.
  George Shelby – Arthur's and Emily's son, who sees Tom as a friend and as the perfect Christian.
  Chloe – Tom's wife and mother of his children.
  Augustine St. Clare – Tom's third owner and father of Eva. St. Clare is complex, often sarcastic, with a ready wit. After a rocky courtship he marries a woman he grows to hold in contempt, though he is too polite to let it show. St. Clare recognizes the evil in chattel slavery but is not willing to relinquish the wealth it brings him. After his daughter's death he becomes more sincere in his religious thoughts and starts to read the Bible to Tom. He plans on finally taking action against slavery by freeing his slaves, but his good intentions ultimately come to nothing.
  Marie St. Clare – Wife of Augustine, she is a self-absorbed woman without a hint of compassion for those around her, including her own family. Given to an unending list of (apparently imaginary) physical maladies, she continually complains about the lack of sympathy she is receiving. She has separated her personal maid, Mammy, from her own two children because they would interfere with her duties. As Marie drives Mammy to exhaustion, she criticizes her for selfishly seeking to attend her own family. Upon the unexpected death of Augustine, Marie countermands the legal process that would have given Tom his freedom.
  George Harris – Eliza's husband. An intelligent and clever half-white slave who is fiercely loyal to his family.
  Harry - Eliza's son. He is supposed to be sold to Mr. Haley by Mr. Arthur Shelby.
  Topsy – A young slave girl. When asked if she knows who made her, she professes ignorance of both God and a mother, saying "I s'pect I growed. Don't think nobody never made me." She is transformed by Eva's love. During the early-to-mid 20th century, several doll manufacturers created Topsy and Topsy-type dolls. The phrase "growed like Topsy" (later "grew like Topsy") passed into the English language, originally with the specific meaning of unplanned growth, later sometimes just meaning enormous growth.
  Miss Ophelia – Augustine St. Clare's pious, hard-working, abolitionist cousin from Vermont. She displays the ambiguities towards African-Americans felt by many Northerners at the time. She argues against the institution of slavery yet, at least initially, feels repulsed by the slaves as individuals.
  Cassy - A light-skinned (quadroon) slave on Legree's plantation who has been sexually exploited by Legree. She is an embittered woman, pent on revenge, though somewhat softened by Uncle Tom's Christian faith. After Uncle Tom's death, she takes nonviolent revenge on Legree, suggesting to him that a building on his plantation is haunted, and thus contributing to his death. She is able to escape with Emmeline, a young slave girl, and finally finds her long-lost daughter, Eliza.
  Prue – A depressed slave who was forced to let her child starve to death. She takes up drinking in her misery, and is ultimately beaten and killed for it.
  Quimbo and Sambo – slaves of Simon Legree who act as overseers of the plantation. On orders from Legree, they savagely whip Tom but afterward tearfully repent of their deeds to Tom, who forgives them as he lies dying.
  Mr. Haley - A coarse slave trader who buys slaves from Mr. Arthur Shelby.
  Tom Loker - A slave hunter hired by Mr. Haley to catch Eliza and her son Harry.
caption: Eva and Topsy, an 1852 literary poster by British lithographer Louise Corbaux
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