American Slavery: 1619-1877
by Kolchin.
Chapter 4 Antebellum Slavery: Organization, Control, Paternalism
Thesis:
“Antebellum Southern slavery became both more rigid ad more paternalistic; in the process it also became increasingly distinctive.”
Section 1 Slavery Growth (Patterns of Behavior)
Expansion of Slavery statistics according to census data
1790 = 697,000
1810 = 1,194,000 (70% growth)
1860 = 3,953,000
Also Geographic Expansion
Countries in Western Hemisphere- Brazil, Cuba, Puerto Rico and the US South
Patterns of Behavior
Masters:
Treatment and concern improves
Manumission ends
Slave dependence and docility
Section II Domestic Slave Trade 94
Slave population in US was highest
More slaves in America after 1830 than other slave holding countries: Brazil, Caribean (Cuba)
Slaves were 1/3 of Southern population
Cotton Caused the persistence of slavery
2 types of Cotton- Long-staple and Short-staple
Massive expansion of cotton export to Britain
Leading export of the US (exceeded in dollar value all other exports)
Lead to Textile factories in NorthLead to more slavery
Stats:
1790- 3000 bales year
1810- 178,000 bales year
1860- 4 million bales
AL, MS, LA ½ of all cotton grown in America, 79% in 1859
SC only 10%
Prices for slaves began to rise
“Domestic Slave trade “slave owners moved hundreds of thousands of surplus slaves west.” 96
Each decade 100,000 moved west, 1810-1860
1milllion slaves moved west between 1790 -1860 form MD, VA and Carolinas
30% chance of being “Sold South”
Lucrative Business trading slaves, 15-25 years of age
One company in VA Armfield and Franklin, “Purchased and resold more than 1000 slaves annually” 97
“sale of any sort was one of the most dreaded events in the life of a slave, but sale to the Southwest meant being permanently separated from home, friends, and often family members…” 97
98, Slave Auction quote:
“de saddes’ thing dat ever happen to me.” Virginia Randall when her sister was sold away
“Slaves in the upper south heard rumors of a far more brutal slavery in AL, Mississippi, and Louisiana. “ 98
Lot’s of distaste for slave traders: “Polite” sentiment in the South bemoaned the forced separation of family members and looked down on traders as coarse, crude, and mercenary…”
Even Southerners were complaining about the slave trade.
The price and demand for slaves increased.
Section III Diversity of Slave Experience 99
Slaves faced a variety and diversity of experiences
Some free blacks owned slaves
Lots of different jobs/functions
Rural/urban/domestic work/field work/personal attendants etc
“Slaves served as preachers, carpenters, blacksmiths, house servants, drivers, and laborers…”
Comparing colonial slavery with late slavery
Certain Dominant Patterns
Stats:
Delaware = 1.6% (slavery was in decline in Delaware, MD, and MO
Slaves constituted about half the population
For the deep south
57% in SC
Large population in Caribbean (Jamaica for example was 10 blacks to 1 white)
American South:
9/10ths of slaves lived on farms less than 30 slaves (102)
Only 2.7% owned 50 or more slaves
1/4 of slaves lived in Large Plantations 50 or more
¼ lived in in with 1-9 slaves
½ of lived with 10-49 slaves
Most slaves lived on farms with resident masters. (who believed in personal management of their holdings)
Vs
Absentee Masters
Slave Management
“Resident masters usually supervised operations personally” 102
“On farms with fewer than 10 slaves, masters could typically be found in the field, toiling alongside their slaves…”
Overseers
Overseers- they were professionals generally, wielded great authority… carrying out daily policies set by their watchful employers” 103
They were middle management, it was a thankless job
“Subordination to the master is the first of an overseer’s duties.”
They were distrusted.
“making sure that everyone knew who was really in charge. Many planters encouraged slaves to report on the misdeeds of their overseers.”
The overseer was never popular and the master turned on them regularly:
“…planters reviled their overseers for being greedy, dishonest, and lazy, mishandling the slaves, and showing a lack of proper respect for their employers.” 104
Majority of slaves did not have overseers
Slave Driver:
“Slaves on large plantations usually worked in gangs, often headed by a slave driver appointed form among the male slaves for his strength, intelligence, loyalty…” 103
In America the slave had a special characteristics
“the intense relationship between slaves and slave owners was at the heart of the distinctive salve society of the Antebellum South.” 105
Different from other slavery areas like Caribbean or Russia.
Section IV Types of Slave Work 105
“ a broad range of endeavors… they cultivated, cleared land, cared for their (masters) comfort as cooks, grooms and personal servants… attended to the needs of fellow slaves… working as preachers, child care, doctors,…’
“On every plantation the sick nurse or doctor woman, is usually the most intelligent female on the place; and she has full authority.” Of the sick. 105
¾ worked as field labor
¼ had other duties
Some slaves had specialized labor
Women slaves cared for master’s personal comfort- house servants
Fewer skilled artisans—due to labor shortages, and they were used for cotton.
Harvest time lots of work, 14 hours regularly
Basic Pattern of Field Work
Long hours
Slow paced
Sometimes frantic pace
Daylight hours
Sundays off usually
Very little stratification among the slaves
House servants (sometimes seen as spies for the master) vs. Field Hands had some resentment
Urban slaves were hired out
Most went to the fields
Temporary nature of slavery
The life of a slave was transient (changing)
“One or more changes in status during their lifetime… they were sold, inherited, hired out, moved form one region to another…” 110
House slaves were usually young or old, too young for the fields or too old for the fields
“In short, although there was an extraordinary variety of slave experiences, the slave population was relatively undifferentiated in terms of economic and social status” 111
Section V Paternalism 111
“Slavery represented a civilization or way of life that ordered their very existence.”111
Duality of ideas:
Slaves were 1. Property and 2. People with lives
Paternalism =acting as a parent… “but slavery in which masters took personal interest in the lives of their slaves.” 111
Treating them as children, “who needed constant direction as well as constant protection.” 118
Masters had a paternalistic self-image
Examples: Most of them
- Knew them by name
- Frequent interaction
- Directing labor
- Supervising welfare
- Slaves were part of the master’s extended household
Southerners View:
Southerners increasingly wanted to show the world they were humane = Paternalism.
“Antebellum southern publicists increasingly bombarded of the reading public with admonitions to take good care of their people, looking after their physical needs, spiritual welfare, and general happiness. As Presbyterian minister Charles Jones argued in his book the Religious Instruction of Negroes 1842, blacks
“were placed under our control… not exclusively for our benefit but for there’s also, so they could receive moral and religious uplift
“we cannot disregard this obligation does divinely impose, without forfeiting our humanity, or gratitude, or consistency, and our claim to the spirit of Christianity itself.”
And “although that was strong propagandistic element to such public discourse –
defenders of slavery were eager to prove to the outside world the humane nature of the slave regime the profusion of essays speeches and sermons on the Christian responsibilities’ a slave owners inevitably influenced the general consciousness and behavior of southern whites at large.” 112
Paternalism in Perspective:
“Slaveholder paternalism encompassed behavior with sharply divergent implications: the paternalistic master dispensed supervision and punishment together with love and protection, and could easily cross the line from benevolent patriarch to despot… So long as their authority was unquestioned , most slave owners could accentuate their “soft” side, represented by honor, duty, and nobles oblige.” 126
Slaves did have “abundant food”
Fredrick Douglas comment, “not to give a slave enough to eat, is regarded as the most aggravated development of meanness even among slaveholders.”
Standard Rations
1 peck of corn meal
2-4lbs of pork or bacon per week
And any other foods they could obtain
Small garden plots, sometimes chicken, vegetables, fruit, opossum, fish…
Sugar, coffee, and even whiskey
Health and Disease
Housing and clothing very limited but functional
“Cabins” 16x18feet
Bad shoes, mostly bare feet
Medical care limited but valued by the masters
Sometimes holidays, BBQ, celebrations for slaves.
Religion:
2nd Great Awakening
Wave of evangelical revivals
Conviction of some white southerners that religion would be a stabilizing force.
Baptist and Methodist
White and blacks were close
Childhood
“Paternalism was pervasively shaped by the intimacy of childhood comradeship.” 117
“Negro women are carrying black and white babies together in their arms; black and white children are playing together… black and white faces are constantly thrust out of doors, to see the train go by.” 117
Familiarity and closeness/intimacy were common
Masters saw the relations with slaves as positive but not the slaves
Section VI Control of Slaves 118
“The pervasive presence of white Southerners shaped the everyday lives of the slaves.”118
Lots of Rules
“When to rise in the morning, when to go to the fields, when to break for meals, how long and how much to work, and when to go to bed… limits on leaving home, getting married…” 118
Paternalism also meant to “destroy every vestige of slave independence” 119
Corporal Punishment: the Lash/whipping
“Slave owners spanned the full range from gentle humanitarians who abjured use of the lash and whose fortunate charges were sometimes termed “free” by neighboring slaves to sadistic psychopaths like Hoover, the North Carolinian who beat his pregnant slave Mira ‘with clubs, iron chains, and other deadly weapons…” 121
“Almost all masters punished, most more than they would have been willing to admit… A whipping could be a formal occasion- a public, ritualized display in which a sentence was carried out in fromt of an assembled throng or a casual affair…”
“To bondspeople (and abolitionists) the lash came to symbolize the essence of slavery.” 121
Sex Exploitation:
Masters impacted slave women with, “special hardships.”
“Mary Chestnut diarist from the era commented, “We live surrounded by prostitution… like patriarchs of old our men live all in on house with their wives and concubines, and the mulattoes one sees in every family exactly resemble the white children.” 124
Harriet Jacobs, ex slave, said the victims were black women forced to endure the shameful indignities… no slave woman was safe from unwanted sexual advances.” 124
“It should be noted that slave women were also easy targets for black sexual aggression. Although a slaves’ rape of a white woman was a capital offense, the rape of a slave woman was ignored both by state laws and in most cases by slave owners; the disapproval of other slaves – and fear of retribution at their hands – constituted the main deterrent to sexual abuse of slave women by slave men.)
Sex between white men and black women was a routine feature of life on many, perhaps most, slave holdings, as masters, their teenage sons, and a large holdings there overseers took advantage of the situation to engage in that kind of casual, emotionless sex on demand unavailable from white women. What was routine in casual to white men cost anguish to black women, anguish graphically described by Harriet Jacobs in her autobiography Incidents in the life of a slave girl.” 125
Forced Separation:
“The ultimate and most dreaded form of interference in slave family life was the forced separation of family members.”
They were sold as necessity dictated.
Many slave owners disliked the practice and were sometimes very thoughtful of not doing it… they did it regularly.
Sometimes they were loaned out, or hired out to work in other locations.
“Sale produced the most wrenching and permanent disruption of families.”
½ of all children were separated from at least one parent.”
Death of the owner was a very dreadful experience for a slave. They worried about their own fate.
Racist assumptions underlie all the treatment:
“blacks lacked whites’ capacity for forming deep, long-lasting relationships.” 126
Section VII “Laws for Slaves” 127
There were “Slave Codes” that indicate how masters wanted things to function, but they sparsely enforced.
“Neither laws protecting nor laws restricting slaves were always enforced, and the vast majority of crimes committed by and against slaves were handled informally on farms and plantations, without resort to the judicial system.”
Laws were designed to strengthen slavery
The deep south were more draconian.
Examples:
Limits on slave movement
Limits on slave assembly
Laws called for supervision
Slave patrols
Limits on:
Possession of liquor
Hiring out
Possession of weapons
Restrictions on reading and writing (esp. VA, GA, NC, SC)
Limits were greater in the 19th century than before
It was more difficult for slaves to become free, laws against manumission
Requirements for freed slaves to leave the state
Paternalism still persisted, many believed slaves needed protections.
Slave Codes also referenced limits to mistreatment for slaves
Codes listed punishment for mistreatment of slaves
“The master must treat his slave with humanity, and must not inflict upon him any cruel punishment… he must provide him with a sufficiency of healthy food and necessary clothing, cause him to be properly attended during sickness, and provide for his necessary wants in old age.” 130
10 years in prison for murdering a slave.
Example: Alabama Slave Code of 1852
Slaves could not testify against whites. (so not so many masters were charged)
Whites were only prosecuted for mistreating slaves when whites complained.
Prohibition of selling slaves under age 11
Ch. 5 Antebellum Slavery: Slave Life
According to the author, were slaves totally dominated by white owners/overseers?
Section I: introduction
What is Kolchin’s thesis?
Slaves managed to develop their own semi-autonomous way of life. Even though their work was closely monitored.”
“…away from work, they lived and loved, played and prayed, in a world largely unknown to the masters.” 133
Section II: 134historiography, interpretations of Slavery over time.
- What does Kolchin say about sources?
- Identify the various interpretations:
- Ulrich Philips
- Stanley Elkins
Cruelty of Slavery
Slaves as victims/slaves as objects
Slaves as resilient and autonomous
Section III 138Varying conditions of slave living
- Using quotes make a list of characteristics of slave life.
- Family Life
- Slave Marital Life- matriarchy, male absenteeism,
- Children of Slaves- young children, naming, literacy,
- Insecure nature of Slave Family life
Section IV Slave Religion 143
Outline the various elements regarding Slave religion
Section V The Slave Community 148
How did Slave society manifest?
1. Was it a life totally dominated by whites or did slaves have some autonomy? (use details and quotes to answer)
- Why are slave folktales significant? 154
Section VI 155 Slave Resistance
Section VII 161 Individual Resistance 161
Chapter 5 “Antebellum Slavery “Slave Life” 133
“Masters never achieved the total domination they sought over their slaves.”
“Slaves lived in a world that was influenced but by no means totally controlled…”
“Slave managed to develop their own semi-autonomous way of life.”
Whites were Paternalistic
“Slaves at work were closely regulated but away from work, they lived and loved, played and prayed, in a world largely unknown to the masters.” 133
Current: Social Historians have increasingly devoted energy to the lives of slaves vs the institution of slavery from the white dominance perspective.
Focus now is “families, religion, social organization, resistance to oppression”
Historiography:
Over time the interpretation of slavery has changed.
Traditionally pre-1960 Historians have tell the story of slavery through the power of the “masters.”
Historians- Slaves appeared in histories as “objects of white action.” (as virtually powerless victims)
“focused more on what slavery did to the slaves than what slaves did themselves.”134
“The tendency to treat slaves as objects persisted” 135 (1950)
Ulrich Phillips (1918)
One historian Ulrich Phillips, focused on the white planters, and generalized racist assumptions of the slaves themselves.”
Whites as actors and salves as acted upon… (powerful and powerless)
He said:
“the negro was what the white man made him.”
The plantation was a “school constantly training and controlling pupils….”
Slaves, “became largely standardized into (a type)… an eagerness for society, music and merriment… receptiveness for any religion.. (that was) exhilarating, a proneness to superstition, a courteous acceptance of subordination, readiness for loyalty of a feudal sort…”
Phillips “devoted most of his attention to the way planters managed their slaves, not to the slaves themselves.” 134
Kenneth Stamp (1956)
A later historian, “Neo-abolitionist” “stressed the cruelty of slavery usually led to focusing on the injuries done to slaves.”
Stamp changed the interpretation to highlighting the cruelty, but also focused similarly with Phillips, on “…. White slave owners… acted and black slaves were acted upon.” Still the victim interpretation.
Still showed master perspective- “revealed more about behavior and thought of master than of the slaves.” 135
Stanley Elkins (1959)
Elkins continued the “slaves as victims” interpretation
He saw the Slave as, “emasculated, docile, Sambo, who came to identify with that very master.”