Flash for Freedom!

Flash for Freedom! is a 1971 novel by George MacDonald Fraser. It is the third of the Flashman novels.

Plot introduction

Presented within the frame of the supposedly discovered historical Flashman Papers, this book describes the bully Flashman from Tom Brown's Schooldays. The papers are attributed to Flashman, who is not only the bully featured in Thomas Hughes' novel, but also a well known Victorian military hero. The book begins with an explanatory note detailing the discovery of these papers and also discussing the supposed controversy over their authenticity. A reference is made to a New York Times article from July 29, 1969, that puts these claims to rest. Fraser hints that the article supports the papers' authenticity, although of course the opposite is true.

Flash for Freedom begins with Flashman considering an attempt at being made a Member of Parliament and continues through his involvement in the Atlantic slave trade, the Underground Railroad, and meeting a future president, detailing his life from 1848 to 1849. It also contains a number of notes by Fraser, in the guise of editor, giving additional historical information on the events described.

Plot summary

From Dahomey to the slave state of Mississippi, Flashman has cause to regret a game of pontoon with Benjamin Disraeli and Lord George Bentinck. From his ambition for a seat in the House of Commons, he has to settle instead for a role in the West African slave trade, under the command of Captain John Charity Spring, a Latin-spouting madman. Captured by the United States Navy, Flashman has to talk his way out of prison by assuming the first of his many false identities in America. After a visit to Washington D.C. and an unsettling meeting with Abraham Lincoln (still a junior congressman at the time), he escapes his Navy protectors in New Orleans and holes up at a whorehouse run by an amorous madame, Susie Willinck. He is again taken into custody, this time by members of the Underground Railroad. Traveling up the Mississippi River with a fugitive slave ends badly once again, and the rest of the story has Flashman as a slave driver on a plantation, a potential slave himself, and a slave stealer fleeing from vigilantes. Eventually he ends up back in New Orleans at the mercy of Spring. This story is continued in Flashman and the Redskins.

At the end of the novel, the editor (Fraser) claims that the escape of Cassy and Flashman across the Ohio River was the inspiration for the anti-slavery novel, Uncle Tom's Cabin, with the names altered and the story focusing on the slave Cassy rather than Flashman. This is similar to a claim made by Flashman that his experiences in Royal Flash were the basis for The Prisoner of Zenda.

Characters

Fictional characters

• Harry Flashman - The hero or anti-hero
• Morrison - His father-in-law
• Captain John Charity Spring - The formidable and eccentric captain of the Balliol College, a slave ship owned in part by Morrison. He continually utters Latin phrases (conveniently translated by Fraser).
• Lady Caroline Lamb - A slave transported by the Balliol College whom Flashman "covers" and teaches some English, giving her the name of a famous British aristocrat.
• Susie Willinck - A New Orleans madame who Flashman hides out with on his escape from the Naval authorities.
• Cassy - A slave who helps Flashman escape from his imprisoners in Mississippi.
• George Randolph - An rebellious slave Flashman whom is ordered to transport to Cincinnati. Randolph is presumed dead after falling overboard, but turns up alive at the end of the novel.

Historical characters

• Benjamin Disraeli - The future Prime Minister, who Flashman calls a "cocky little sheeny".
• Lord George Bentinck
• Fanny Locke
• William Ewart Gladstone
• King Gezo - King of Dahomey. Spring deals with him for slaves.
• Dahomey Amazons - The army of King Gezo who butcher a small number of Spring's crew.
• Abraham Lincoln - Future President of the United States. Flashman describes him as "an unusually tall man, with the ugliest face you ever saw, deep dark eye sockets and a chin like a coffin" and says, "just why I liked him I couldn't say; I suppose in his way he had the makings of as big a scoundrel as I am myself".