CHAPTER IV

WERE SOME STATES ENGAGED IN BREEDING AND RAISING NEGROES FOR SALE?

As we now have a somewhat definite idea as to the amount of the domestic slave trade the next questions which naturally claim our attention are: Were some States consciously and purposely engaged in breeding and raising negroes for the Southern market, and also, what were the sources of supply for the trade? The former of these queries is, no doubt, the most controverted and difficult part of our subject.

The testimony of travellers and common opinion generally seems to have been in the affirmative. A quotation or two will suffice to show the trend: The Duke of Saxe Weimar says, "Many owners of slaves in the States of Maryland and Virginia have ... nurseries for slaves whence the planters of Louisiana, Mississippi and other Southern States draw their supplies."[190]

In a "Narrative of a Visit to the American Churches," the writer, in speaking of the accumulation of negroes in the Gulf States, says: "Slaves are generally bred in some States as cattle for the Southern market."[191] And the Rev. Philo Tower, writing about twenty years later draws a more vivid picture. "Not only in Virginia," he says, "but also in Maryland, North Carolina, Kentucky, Tennessee and Missouri, as much attention is paid to the breeding and growth of negroes as to that of horses and mules.... It is a common thing for planters to command their girls and women (married or not) to have children; and I am told a great many negro girls are sold off, simply and mainly because they did not have children."[192]

Undoubtedly some planters in all the slave States resorted to questionable means of increasing their slave stock, but that it was a general custom to multiply negroes in order to have them to sell is very improbable.

Many of these travellers show prejudice. We have wondered, therefore, whether it were too much to assume that they had more thought for the effect their narrative would produce in the North or in England than for its truth. Is it not probable that foreigners may have got their information about breeding slaves when in the free States rather than actual evidence of such an industry where the industry was supposed to be carried on? It seems, at any rate, more than probable that the exceptional cases which they found were made to appear as the general rule. Then, too, the very fact that some States sold great numbers of slaves was sufficient evidence to some, no doubt, that they were engaged in the business of raising them for sale. It seems very natural that this should be inferred. Consequently travellers reported that certain sections were engaged in breeding and raising slaves for market. They made the accusation that the so-called "breeding States" were in the slave-breeding business for profit. But was it profitable? If not, why were they in this business?

A negro above eighteen years of age would bring on an average about $300 in the selling States from 1815 to, say, 1845. Sometimes he would bring a little more, sometimes less.[193] Between the age of ten and the time of sale we will suppose the slave paid for his keeping. But before that time he would be too small to work. There was always some defective stock which could not be sold;[194] this, taken in connection with the fact that all negroes did not live to be ten years of age, probably not more than half,[195] we shall be under the necessity of deducting about one-half of the $300 on this account. This will leave $150 or $15 per year for the possible expense of raising him. A bushel of corn a month would have been about $8 per year for corn; fifty pounds for meat $4. It is not likely he could have been clothed for less than $3, and the $15 is gone, with nothing left for incidentals. We think the above a very fair estimate.[196] In 1829 the average price of negroes in Virginia was estimated at only $150 each.[197]

Why did not the border slave States raise hogs instead of negroes? Bacon was at a good price during that period.[198]

The fact is the negroes probably increased without any consideration for their master's wishes in the matter. A planter could stop raising hogs whenever he might choose, but it seemed to be hardly within the province of the master to limit the increase of his negroes. And the better they were treated evidently the faster the increase. A man who had one or two hundred negroes, and had scruples about selling them, unless he should be able to add to his landed estate as they increased was in a bad predicament. It seems some such men had the welfare of their negroes at heart and used every means to keep them. Andrews tells of one:

"A gentleman," he says, "in one of the poorer counties of Virginia has nearly 200 slaves whom he employs upon a second rate plantation of 8,000 or 10,000 acres, and who constantly brought him into debt, at length he found it necessary to purchase a smaller plantation of good land in another county which he continues to cultivate for no other purpose than to support his negroes."[199]

Sometimes men who were in prosperous circumstances would buy land as fast as their slaves increased and settle them upon it.[200]

Slaves were seldom sold until they were over ten years of age,[201] consequently if it were true that the border States made a business of breeding and raising them for sale we should naturally expect to find in these States a much greater proportion under ten than in the buying States. To determine the truth of this we shall have recourse to the Census Reports. The States of Virginia, Maryland, Kentucky and North Carolina, in 1830, had, in round numbers 984,000 slaves, of which 349,000 were under ten years of age, and 635,000 over. This shows that in these States there were 182 over ten years of age to every 100 under ten. Taking an equal number of the principal cotton-growing and slave-buying States, say, Georgia, Mississippi, Alabama and Tennessee, we find that they had 346,000 over ten and 196,000 under ten,[202] consequently for every 176 of the former they had 100 of the latter. Therefore, at this time, the principal so-called "slave-breeding" States had a smaller number of slaves under ten years than an equal number of buying States. The numbers, it will be seen, differ as the ratios 100-182 and 100-176.

In 1840 there were in the Southern States about 2,486,000 slaves, of whom about 844,000 were under ten years of age, on an average, therefore, of 100 under ten to every 194 over. Taking each State separately we find that Virginia had just an average, having 100 of the former to 194 of the latter; Maryland, 100 to every 203; Delaware, 100 to 218; District of Columbia, 100 to 280; Kentucky, 100 to 179; North Carolina, 100 to 176; Missouri, 100 to 172; South Carolina, 100 to 205; Louisiana, 100 to 267; Mississippi, 100 to 206; Florida, 100 to 220; Georgia, 100 to 188; Arkansas, 100 to 195; Tennessee, 100 to 170 and Alabama, 100 to 190.[203] Thus it is shown that the buying States of Alabama, Georgia and Tennessee each had more children in proportion to their slave population than Virginia; and that Maryland and Delaware had about the same proportion as the buying States of Mississippi, Florida and Arkansas. It would hardly be fair, however, to compare the District of Columbia with Louisiana.

In 1860 we find that the proportion of slave children under ten years of age is much less in all the States than in 1840.[204] In Virginia, at this time, there were 100 under ten years to 227 over that age; Delaware 100 to 233; Maryland, 100 to 229; Kentucky, 100 to 204; South Carolina, 100 to 224; North Carolina, 100 to 202; Missouri, 100 to 190; Georgia, 100 to 221; Louisiana, 100 to 285; Mississippi, 100 to 242; Texas, 100 to 209; Arkansas, 100 to 219; Tennessee, 100 to 200; Alabama, 100 to 221 and Florida 100 to 224.[205] This schedule shows that the buying States which had a greater number of slave children in proportion to their slave population in 1860, than Virginia, Maryland and Delaware, were Georgia, Arkansas, Tennessee, Alabama, Texas, and Florida.

It is noticeable in both schedules that the State of Louisiana is an exception. The proportion of children there was much less than in the other States. This is probably due to the strenuous work on sugar plantations. It is also noticeable that the Western States had the greatest proportional number of children, which is to be accounted for by the healthfulness of the climate and by its being a rich and prosperous farming section, where negroes were well fed and probably free from the malarial ailments of some other sections. The conditions, therefore, were very favorable to the prolific negro race.

We think it would be only natural that one should expect to have found in Virginia and Maryland, which have had to bear the brunt of the accusation of breeding slaves, the greatest proportion of children; not only because of the reiterated accusations, but also on account of the exportation of adult slaves from these States, which had the tendency to heighten the proportion of children in these States and lessen it in the States to which slaves were carried.

With regard to slave breeding, Shaffner, a native of Virginia, says: "From our own personal observation, since we were capable of studying the progress of human affairs, we are of opinion that there is less increase of the slaves of the so-called 'breeding States,' than of the more Southern of Gulf States.[206] "We doubt if there exists in America a slave owner that encourages the breeding of slaves for the purpose of selling them. Nor do we believe that any man would be permitted to live in any of the Southern States that did intentionally breed slaves with the object of selling them.[207]

Southerners generally have denied the accusation. When Andrew Stevenson, of Virginia, was minister to England, he was, upon one occasion, taunted by Daniel O'Connell with belonging to a State that was noted for breeding slaves for the South. He indignantly denied the charge.[208] And in 1839 the editor of the "Cincinnati Gazette" was much abused for asserting that Virginia bred slaves as a matter of pecuniary gain.[209]

Nehemiah Adams, a clergyman, went South in the early fifties biased against slavery, but says, "the charge of vilely multiplying negroes in Virginia is one of those exaggerations of which the subject is full, and is reduced to this: that Virginia being an old State fully stocked, the surplus black population naturally flows off where their numbers are less."[210]

It would seem that these States are not only practically freed from the charge of multiplying slaves and raising them for market as a business, but that, as a rule, they did not sell their slaves unless compelled to do so by pecuniary or other embarrassments.

Probably many planters were as conscientious about their slaves as Jefferson appears to have been. In a letter he says:

"I cannot decide to sell my lands. I have sold too much of them already, and they are the only sure provision for my children, nor would I willingly sell the slaves as long as their remains any prospect of paying my debts with their labor."[211]

It seems that he was finally compelled to sell some of them.[212] Madison parted with some of his best land to feed the increasing numbers of negroes, but admitted to Harriet Martineau that the week before she visited him he had been obliged to sell a dozen of them.[213] And Estwick Evans, who made a long tour of the country in 1818, says, "I know it to be a case, that slave holders, generally, deprecate the practice of buying and selling slaves."[214] No doubt, the planters were always glad to get rid of unruly and good-for-nothing negroes, and these were pretty sure to fall into the hands of traders.[215] The slave traders had agents spread over the States, where slaves were less profitable to their owners, in readiness to take advantage of every opportunity to secure the slaves that might in any way be for sale. They would, even when an opportunity occurred, kidnap the free negroes. They also sought to buy up slaves as if for local and domestic use and then would disappear with them.[216] And it was a common occurrence for plantations and negroes to be advertised for sale. In one issue of the "Charleston Courier" in the winter of 1835 were advertised several plantations and about 1,200 negroes for sale.[217] At such sales negro traders and speculators from far and near were sure to be on hand attracted by the prospect of making good bargains.[218]

Probably we could not better close this chapter than with a quotation from Dr. Baily, who was editor of the "National Era," a moderate antislavery paper. It appears to us that he correctly and concisely sums up the whole matter:

"The sale of slaves to the South," he says, "is carried on to a great extent. The slave holders do not, so far as I can learn, raise them for that special purpose. But here is a man with a score of slaves, located on an exhausted plantation. It must furnish support for all; but while they increase, its capacity of supply decreases. The result is he must emancipate or sell. But he has fallen into debt, and he sells to relieve himself of debt and also from the excess of mouths. Or he requires money to educate his children; or his negroes are sold under execution. From these and other causes, large numbers of slaves are continually disappearing from the State....

"The Davises in Petersburg are the great slave dealers. They are Jews, who came to that place many years ago as poor peddlers.... These men are always in the market, giving the highest price for slaves. During the summer and fall they buy them up at low prices, trim, shave, wash them, fatten them so that they may look sleek and sell them to great profit....

"There are many planters who cannot be persuaded to sell their slaves. They have far more than they can find work for, and could at any time obtain a high price for them. The temptation is strong for they want more money and fewer dependents. But they resist it, and nothing can induce them to part with a single slave, though they know that they would be greatly the gainers in a pecuniary sense, were they to sell one-half of them."[219]

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 190: Bernard, Duke of Saxe Weimar, Travels Through North America, 1825-26, Vol. II., p. 63.]

[Footnote 191: Reed and Matheson: Visit to the Am. Churches, Vol. II., p. 173.]

[Footnote 192: Tower: Slavery Unmasked, p. 53. Note.--"The following story was told me by one conversant with the facts as they occurred on Mr. J.'s plantation, containing about 100 slaves. One day the owner ordered all the women into the barn; he followed them whip in hand, and told them he meant to flog them all to death; they, as a matter of course, began to cry out, 'What have I done, Massa?' 'What have I done, Massa?' He replied: 'Damn you, I will let you know what you have done; you don't breed. I have not had a young one from you for several months.' They promptly told him they could not breed while they had to work in the rice ditches."

Slavery Unmasked was published in 1856. Exactly the same story as above, almost verbatim, is found in "Interesting Memoirs and Documents Relating to American Slavery." published in 1846. The fact that this story is told in different books published ten years apart indicates that such instances were very rare. It seemed strange that each writer should claim to have received the story from a friend, or "one conversant with the facts," for one seems to have copied directly from the other. It was no doubt mere hearsay with both writers.

Others on slave breeding are: Buckingham: Slave States of America, Vol. I., p. 182; Miss Martineau: Society in America, Vol. II., p. 41. Jay; Miscellaneous Writings, p. 457. Abdy: Journal of a Residence in the United States, Vol. II., p. 90. Rankin: Letters on American Slavery, p. 35. Candler: A Summary View of America, p. 277. Kemble: Journal of a Residence on a Georgian Plantation, pp. 60, 122.]

[Footnote 193: Proceedings and Debates of the Virginia State Constitutional Convention, 1829-30, p. 178. Dew: Debates in Virginia Legislature, 1831-2. Pro-Slavery Argument, p. 358. Andrews: Domestic Slave Trade, p. 77.]

[Footnote 194: Chambers: Am. Slavery and C. Laws, p. 148.]

[Footnote 195: Kemble: Journal of a Residence on a Georgia Plantation, pp. 190, 191, 199, 204, 214, 215. We get from these that out of about 74 born 42 died very young.]

[Footnote 196: Stuart: Three Years in North America, Vol. II., p. 103. He says it cost $35 per year to feed and clothe an adult negro a year. Must cost half that much for a young one.]

[Footnote 197: Proceedings and Debates of Virginia State Con. Convention, 1829-30, p. 178.]

[Footnote 198: Hunt's Merchants' Magazine, Vol. VI., p. 473.]

[Footnote 199: Andrews: Slavery and the Domestic Slave Trade, p. 119.]

[Footnote 200: Chambers: Am. Slavery and Color, p. 194.]

[Footnote 201: Ibid., p. 148.]

[Footnote 202: Census of 1830.]

[Footnote 203: Census of 1840.]

[Footnote 204: We do not know why unless it is because slaves being higher more care was taken of them, which as a consequence caused them to live longer.]

[Footnote 205: For data upon which these arguments are based see Census Reports of 1830, 1840, and 1860.]

[Footnote 206: Shaffner: The War in America, p. 256.]

[Footnote 207: Ibid., p. 296.]

[Footnote 208: Annual Report of Am. and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society, 1850, p. 108.]

[Footnote 209: Ibid.]

[Footnote 210: Nehemiah Adams: Southern View of Slavery, p. 78.]

[Footnote 211: Ford: Jefferson's Works. Vol. VI., pp. 416-417.]

[Footnote 212: Ford: Jeff. Works. Vol. VI., p. 214.]

[Footnote 213: Martineau: Retrospect of Western Travel, Vol. II., p. 5.]

[Footnote 214: Evans: A Pedestrious Tour, p. 216.]

[Footnote 215: Olmsted: Seaboard Slave States, p. 392.]

[Footnote 216: Reed and Matheson: Narrative of a Visit to the American Churches, Vol. II., p. 173.]

[Footnote 217: Charleston Courier (S.C.), Feb. 12, 1835.]

[Footnote 218: Sequel to Mrs. Kemble's Journal, p. 1. (Yale) Slavery Pamphlet, Vol. XVII. De Bow's Review, Vol. XXIV., p. 595. Liberator, Sept. 7, 1860; also May 6, 1853.]

[Footnote 219: National Era, June 10, 1847.]