To Kill a Mocking Bird from Tom Robinson’s View Point

To Kill a Mocking Bird

Tom Robinson

My name is Tom Robinson. I lived on the outskirts of Maycomb Country with my wife, Helen, and kids. I worked on Mr. Link Deas’s farm as a work hand. He hired me even though I’m a Negro and have a crippled arm; he’s a very nice man. Every day on the way to work, I would pass the Ewell’s home. They’re a white family that lived by the dump. Sometimes I would pass by and help their oldest girl, Mayella, with some of their yard work. None of her younger brothers or sisters seem to help, so I liked to help her. I just thought it was the right thing for me to do, besides, I felt sorry for her. One day, Mayella says that she has something for me to do inside the house. None of the kids were around though, and I got kind of worried. When Mayella shut the door behind me and started kissing me, I knew I was in trouble. I started to push her away when her daddy, Bob, saw us through the window. I knew I was in trouble then, even though none of it was my fault, I was still black and it would be my fault if anyone caught me. When he opened the door, I just started to run. I don’t know if Mayella was beaten by her father, but all I knew was I had to run. I ran all the way home, as fast as lighting. I told Helen about everything and she said it would all be okay. But Mr. Ewell had already called Mr. Heck Tate, the sheriff, and said that I had that I had raped and beaten Mayella. I knew that I could be killed on this charge, and I got really nervous. I wondered why everyone believed Mr. Ewell’s lies. I couldn’t have beaten up Mayella, I only have one good arm! The other one was torn up in a cotton gin when I was a little boy. But when they assigned Atticus Finch to be my lawyer for a trial, I put my soul to rest. Mr. Finch would take care of me no matter what he said. People in town were upset though. They said Mr. Finch shouldn’t defend a Negro like me. They said that it wasn’t his place, but Mr. Finch didn’t listen to them. He stood by me through the entire time, and told me that he wouldn’t want any other case.

One night, the police came and took me to jail though. Although I was very afraid, I saw that Mr. Finch came to sit by me the entire night. He read until a bunch of men came up and threaten to beat him up if he didn’t move from his spot. I knew they just wanted to kill me and I wished that Mr. Finch would move so he wouldn’t get hurt. But then three kids came running up, two of them must have been his, because they called him dad, but they started talking to the group of men. The little girl started talking about one of their sons. She said he was a nice boy and that she liked him a lot, and I wondered how that man felt hearing that when he was going to kill someone. I guess he felt bad about it, because he just told the little girl he’d tell his son hello for her and then the mob went away! I was so relieved that I told Mr. Finch to go home. I got some sleep.

The trial was in a couple of weeks, and when it finally got there, I was really nervous. I had to hear Mayella and Mr. Ewell lie up on the stand. They knew I didn’t