Reflections on Slavery: Individuals Born Into and Gew Up Under Slavery

William Robbins’s plantation. “The boy Luke was happy. When Shavis Merle, a white man with three slaves to this name, sought to hire Luke during the harvest...for $2 a week. Merle believed in feeding his workers plenty of food, but they gave it all back in the field, from sunup to sundown, and no one that year gave up more than Luke did. After Luke died in the field, merle protested up and down about paying compensation, but Willy Robbins got him to pay Henry $100 for the boy. ‘Fair business is fair business,’ Robbins had to keep telling Merle. Moffett was early to the boy’s funeral, which Merle attended, and Moffett said some words at the gravesite, but no one said more than Elias and at the last his new wife had to put her arms around him to bring an end to all the words.” (Jones 103). Personally, this was the point in the novel where I began to get attached to Jones’s characters. This is an example of Jones’s use of imagery which is used not only show the meaning of the work, but as well as to leave an impact on the reader at the end of the chapter, which personally is why I really enjoyed this novel. Another example of imagery that Jones’s uses that leaves an impact on the reader is when when Sheriff John Skiffington shoots Mildred, Augustus’s wife, for hiding Moses, Henry’s first slave which ran

Perhaps one of the strongest elements of slavery is honor. Honor has had a wide range of impact in history, whether it was shaping major dynasties and hierarchies, deciding an individuals’ role in society, or family ties and marriages. This sense of worth, high esteem, or virtue was also manipulated by slave masters in order to control their slaves. “The slave could have no honor because of the origin of his status, the indignity and all-pervasiveness of his indebtedness, his absence of any independent social existence, but most of all because he was without power except through another” (p 6). This element is not just a physical force, such as coercive power, which one can heal and

Harriet Jacobs and Frederick Douglass both wrote narratives that detailed their lives as slaves in the antebellum era. Both of these former slaves managed to escape to the North and wanted to expose slavery for the evil thing it was. The accounts tell equally of depravity and ugliness though they are different views of the same rotten institution. Like most who managed to escape the shackles of slavery, these two authors share a common bond of tenacity and authenticity. Their voices are different—one is timid, quiet, and almost apologetic while the other one is loud, strong, and confident—but they are both authentic. They both also through out the course of their narratives explain their desires to be free from the horrible practice of slavery.

This theme helps illuminate how black people came to be treated in America both when slavery existed and beyond into today’s society. The theme that black people are disposable bodies within American society. Because of the tradition of treating black people as objects or whose value strictly came from their ability to make profit, the idea of what it means to be black in America is imbedded in the danger of losing one’s body. Although slavery has ended, the racism remains as a violence inflicted on black people’s bodies. Coates is more than happy to emphasize that racism is an instinctive practice.

(3) When first reading these narratives one would often assume, by what history tells us, that slave owners were cruel, hated men who often beat slaves severely if they committed even the slightest infraction. While this depiction does stand true for some slave owners, I was surprised to find that most of the former slaves interviewed in the “Slave Narratives” often held their masters in high regards, referring to them as kind and good. Former slave Harriett Gresham even goes as far to say that her master, Mr. Bellinger was “exceptionally kind”. Many slaves in the narratives described their masters as good to his slaves and never whipping them unless it was absolutely necessary. However, when the former slaves spoke of the “paterollers”, white men who roamed the roads in search of runaway slaves often beating them and returning them to their owners, they were described as being very cruel to slaves showing no sympathy to any slave found running away from a

The movement to eliminate slavery in the United States during the antebellum years was difficult and did not go unchallenged as there were many people who were pro-slavery while others were anti-slavery. Before the Civil War there was debate over the issue of slavery. Slaves were considered property, and were property because they were black. Many people in the South were strong advocates of slavery, while people in the North were opposed to it. In the South, slavery was a social and powerful economic institution. During this period in the south Pro-Slavery activists did not empathize with the system and conditions the

“They [the slaves] are all well treated, and we love them and take good care of them just like a part of our family...” (pg. 82, para. 1).

Slavery has always been viewed as one of the most scandalous times in American history. It may seem that the entire institution of slavery has been categorized as white masters torturing defenseless African Americans. However, not every slave has encountered this experience. In this essay I will focus on the life of two former slaves Harriet Smith and Mr. George Johnson and how in some cases their experience were similar as well as different in other aspects. The negative aspects of slave life were unquestionably heinous and for that reason especially, it is also important to also reveal the lives of slaves whom were treated fairly and with respect.

In Frederick Douglass’ The Heroic Slave, readers are first introduced to Madison Washington, an enslaved black man, through the perspective of the narrator, Mr. Listwell, a white, northern traveller. It is through this description of his physical features that we are able to catch a glimpse of Washington’s personality - one which defies and breaks stereotypes of black men in the nineteenth century.

In one chapter of his autobiographical publication Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: An American Slave, the abolitionist activist Douglass shares his experience as a field hand under one white slavemaster Mr. Covey. Covey was a more volatile and violent man than Douglass was used to, who prided himself in his ability to “break negroes” through harsh lashings. Douglass recalls that hardly a week went by in which he was not whipped once. One day, he finally retaliated, seizing Covey by the throat, fighting with him, and ultimately emerging victorious from a two hour altercation. Despite his actions being violent, threatening, and rebellious, Douglass is never punished for it and in fact never whipped again for the remaining duration

The slaves’ first person accounts about their experiences with slavery are important for modern Americans to read because it allows their long-oppressed voices to be heard. Slaves of the 1600’s were oppressed for an extreme amount of time – put down, silenced, degraded, dehumanized. Their words did not meet the ears of whites without punishment, unless it was for the benefit of the slave owner, like when a slave betrayed other slaves about revolt plans, or even after the events of slavery when blacks were paid to lie to other blacks. “The white folks would pay n*****s to lie to the rest of the n*****s to get the farming done for nothing… but we

For example, Campbell Davis’s master made sure his slaves had large meals on holidays, and even had a Santa Claus for the young children. He also supplied them with quality clothes and shoes. In addition, when Hettie married Benjamin Dixon, a slave of her master’s neighbor, her husband’s master allowed Benjamin to work part time for the McClain’s so that Hettie and Benjamin could spend time together. Both masters were considerate to the needs of their slaves. Also, when the Civil War ended, Davis’s master told his slaves “they [were] free, but they could stay on and work for their vitals and clothes or they could leave.” As opposed to Kentucky, where blacks were still enslaved after the war, this master treated his former slaves with kindness and respect. Not all white slave owners were as ruthless or cold-hearted as they can be

Throughout the semester, it has been a primary discussion of the differing ideas of freedom that are presented throughout the numerous narratives. One of the main differences amongst the narratives is the different experiences that results in where people are positioned in their lives, such formally enslaved people or people never enslaved. For example, there is exposure to the life of a slave in the Born in Slavery: Slave Narratives. The belief amongst people is that people enslaved are unhappy in their enslaved positions. As it is written by William Moore, Emma Blalock, John C. Bectom, Uncle David Blount, discussing the brutal conditions and hardships of slavery that are come to known throughout history.

What all three stories have in common are they’re in the 1800’s in the southern part of the United States where slavery is still legal. The main characters in each story, Solomon from “12 Years a Slave”, Frederick Douglass from The Narrative, and Uncle Tom from Uncle Tom’s Cabin, had nice master that treated them with respect; they each had an experience with another master that acquired a “very high reputation for breaking … slaves … [,] a ‘nigger-breaker’ ” (pg.971). They knew nothing less than hard work would be tolerated. Anything the master believes was less than that would be whip, or get the “devil [whipped] out” (pg. 986) of them.

There were three ways to be born into slavery. The most desirable- from a buyers perspective- was the product of two good, obedient slaves with exceptional physical characteristics and personalities. The magnanimous and coveted reward for producing such offspring was Freedom. Freedom requires a Sacrifice. The second, derived from Roman law- the legal status of the child, followed the legal status of the mother. Long had it been a comic staple that a slave bare a striking resemblance to an esteemed and powerful gentleman. Lastly, and this reality polite society wanted to sweep under the rug- a young woman- certain of the affections of a young man and then deceived and deprived of such- would find herself in a situation. In possession of that which she could not afford to keep; but for which she could receive a tidy sum for herself and preserve her dignity. These, they call The Abandoned.