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Life Under Slavery

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Life under slavery was harsh, and during the mid-1800s, it was the main way of living in the South. Unlike the North, the South had very few industries, but made up for this with plantations. They then gained wealth by using slavery as they pleased, but under slavery, African- Americans were treated brutally. Under this kind of treatment, slaves made many ways to endure this pain and even sometimes then rebel.
Life in slavery was not just harsh because of the countless hours they had to be working with little or no pay, but there was also a constant fear of families and loved ones being separated or killed. At any time, a slave could have been sold to a "different owner, or a slaveholder’s death could lead to the breakup of an enslaved family"(433). With the fear of being separated, extended families were formed within slaves so that if parents and their children would be separated when sold, aunts, uncles, or close family friends would raise the children in substitution of the parents. …show more content…

Resisting slavery was a very daily thing for slaves, but it was almost never harmful. Those who were enslaved had their own way of resisting or rebelling and " For the most part enslaved people resisted slavery by working slowly or by pretending to be ill"(437). Armed rebellions and up rises were rare but did occur. These up rises often didn't occur because African-Americans living in the south knew that they only lose if they had an armed rebellion. They knew this because of slave codes, laws that the Southern states had to control slaves, would only get even more cruel after an uprising. For example, an armed uprising which occurred in 1831 known as Turner's rebellion "that resulted in the death of at least 55 whites" (435), then ended with the leader, Nat Turner, to be hanged and slave codes became

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