"Beside the common inducement, the desire of gain, to make a large crop, the desire is increased by that spirit of gambling, so common at the south. It is very common to _bet_ on the issue of a crop. A.
lays a wager that, from a given number of hands, he will make more cotton than B. The wager is accepted, and then begins the contest; and who bears the burden of it? How many tears, yea, how many broken const.i.tutions, and premature deaths, have been the effect of this spirit? From the desperate energy of purpose with which the gambler pursues his object, from the pa.s.sions which the practice calls into exercise, we might conjecture many. Such is the fact. In Middle Florida, a _broken-winded_ negro is more common than a _broken-winded_ horse; though usually, when they are declared unsound, or when their const.i.tution is so broken that their recovery is despaired of, they are exported to New Orleans, to drag out the remainder of their days in the cane-field and sugar house. I would not insinuate that all planters gamble upon their crops; but I mention the practice as one of the common inducements to "push n.i.g.g.e.rs." Neither would I a.s.sert that all planters drive the hands to the injury of their health. I give it as a _general_ rule in the district of Middle Florida, and I have no reason to think that negroes are driven worse there than in other fertile sections. People there told me that the situation of the slaves was far better than in Mississippi and Louisiana. And from comparing the crops with those made in the latter states, and for other reasons, I am convinced of the truth of their statements."
DR. DEMMING, a gentleman of high respectability, residing in Ashland, Richland county, Ohio, stated to Professor Wright, of New York city,
"That during a recent tour at the south, while ascending the Ohio river, on the steamboat Fame, he had an opportunity of conversing with a Mr. d.i.c.kinson, a resident of Pittsburg, in company with a number of cotton-planters and slave-dealers, from Louisiana, Alabama, and Mississippi, Mr. d.i.c.kinson stated as a fact, that the sugar planters upon the sugar coast in Louisiana had ascertained, that, as it was usually necessary to employ about _twice_ the amount of labor during the boiling season, that was required during the season of raising, they could, by excessive driving, day and night, during the boiling season, accomplish the whole labor _with one set of hands_. By pursuing this plan, they could afford _to sacrifice a set of hands once in seven years!_ He further stated that this horrible system was now practised to a considerable extent! The correctness of this statement was substantially admitted by the slaveholders then on board."
The late MR. SAMUEL BLACKWELL, a highly respected citizen of Jersey city, opposite the city of New York, and a member of the Presbyterian church, visited many of the sugar plantations in Louisiana a few years since: and having for many years been the owner of an extensive sugar refinery in England, and subsequently in this country, he had not only every facility afforded him by the planters, for personal inspection of all parts of the process of sugar-making, but received from them the most unreserved communications, as to their management of their slaves. Mr. B., after his return, frequently made the following statement to gentlemen of his acquaintance,--"That the planters generally declared to him, that they were _obliged_ so to over-work their slaves during the sugar-making season, (from eight to ten weeks,) as to use _them up_ in seven or eight years. For, said they, after the process is commenced, it must be pushed without cessation, night and day; and we cannot afford to keep a sufficient number of slaves to do the _extra_ work at the time of sugar-making, as we could not profitably employ them the rest of the year."
It is not only true of the sugar planters, but of the slaveholders generally throughout the far south and south west, that they believe it for their interest to wear out the slaves by excessive toil in eight or ten years after they put them into the field.[4]
[Footnote 4: Alexander Jones. Esq., a large planter in West Feliciana, Louisiana, published a communication in the "North Carolina True American," Nov. 25, 1838, in which, speaking of the horses employed in the mills on the plantations for ginning cotton, he says, they "are much whipped and jaded;" and adds, "In fact, this service is so severe on horses, as to shorten their lives in many instances, if not actually kill them in gear."
Those who work one kind of their "live stock" so as to "shorten their lives," or "kill them in gear" would not stick at doing the same thing to another kind.]
REV. DOCTOR REED, of London, who went through Kentucky, Virginia and Maryland in the summer of 1834, gives the following testimony:
"I was told confidently and from _excellent authority_, that recently at a meeting of planters in South Carolina, the question was seriously discussed whether the slave is more profitable to the owner, if well fed, well clothed, and worked lightly, or if made the most of _at once_, and exhausted in some eight years. The decision was in favor of the last alternative. That decision will perhaps make many shudder.
But to my mind this is not the chief evil. The greater and original evil is considering the _slave as property_. If he is only property and my property, then I have some right to ask how I may make that property most available."
"Visit to the American Churches," by Rev. Drs. Reed and Mattheson.
Vol. 2 p. 173.
REV. JOHN O. CHOULES, recently pastor of a Baptist Church at New Bedford, Ma.s.sachusetts, now of Buffalo, New York, made substantially the following statement in a speech in Boston.
"While attending the Baptist Triennial Convention at Richmond, Virginia, in the spring of 1835, as a delegate from Ma.s.sachusetts, I had a conversation on slavery, with an officer of the Baptist Church in that city, at whose house I was a guest. I asked my host if he did not apprehend that the slaves would eventually rise and exterminate their masters.
"Why," said the gentleman, "I used to apprehend such a catastrophe, but G.o.d has made a providential opening, a _merciful safety valve_, and now I do not feel alarmed in the _prospect_ of what is coming.
"What do you mean," said Mr. Choules, "by providence opening a merciful safety valve?" Why, said the gentleman, I will tell you; the slave traders come from the cotton and sugar plantations of the South and are willing to buy up more slaves than we can part with. We must keep a stock for the purpose of _rearing_ slaves, but we part with the most valuable, and at the same time, the most _dangerous_, and the demand is very constant and likely to be so, for when they go to these southern states, the average existence Is ONLY FIVE YEARS!"
Monsieur C.C. ROBIN, a highly intelligent French gentleman, who resided in Louisiana from 1802 to 1806, and published a volume of travels, gives the following testimony to the over-working of the slaves there:
"I have been a witness, that after the fatigue of the day, their labors have been prolonged several hours by the light of the moon; and then, before they could think of rest, they must pound and cook their corn; and yet, long before day, an implacable scold, whip in hand, would arouse them from their slumbers. Thus, of more than twenty negroes, who in twenty years should have doubled, the number _was reduced to four or five_."
In conclusion we add, that slaveholders have in the most public and emphatic manner declared themselves guilty of barbarous inhumanity toward their slaves in exacting from them such _long continued daily labor_. The Legislatures of Maryland, Virginia and Georgia, have pa.s.sed laws providing that convicts in their state prisons and penitentiaries, "shall be employed in work each day in the year except Sundays, not exceeding _eight_ hours, in the months of November, December, and January; _nine_ hours, in the months of February and October, and _ten_ hours in the rest of the year." Now contrast this _legal_ exaction of labor from CONVICTS with the exaction from slaves as established by the preceding testimony. The reader perceives that the amount of time, in which by the preceding laws of Maryland, Virginia, and Georgia, the _convicts_ in their prisons are required to labor, is on an average during the year but little more than NINE HOURS daily. Whereas, the laws of South Carolina permit the master to _compel_ his slaves to work FIFTEEN HOURS in the twenty-four, in summer, and FOURTEEN in the winter--which would be in winter, from daybreak in the morning until _four hours_ after sunset!--See 2 Brevard"s Digest, 243.
The other slave states, except Louisiana, have _no laws_ respecting the labor of slaves, consequently if the master should work his slaves day and night without sleep till they drop dead, _he violates no law!_
The law of Louisiana provides for the slaves but TWO AND A HALF HOURS in the twenty-four for "rest!" See law of Louisiana, act of July 7 1806, Martin"s Digest 6. 10--12.
III. CLOTHING.
We propose to show under this head, that the clothing of the slaves by day, and their covering by night, are inadequate, either for comfort or decency.
Hon. T.T. Bouldin, a slave-holder, and member of Congress from Virginia in a speech in Congress, Feb. 16, 1835.
Mr. Bouldin said "_he knew_ that many negroes had _died_ from exposure to weather," and added, "they are clad in a _flimsy fabric, that will turn neither wind nor water_."
George Buchanan, M.D., of Baltimore, member of the American Philosophical Society, in an oration at Baltimore, July 4, 1791.
"The slaves, _naked_ and starved, _often_ fall victims to the inclemencies of the weather."
Wm. Savery of Philadelphia, an eminent Minister of the Society of Friends, who went through the Southern states in 1791, on a religious visit; after leaving Savannah, Ga., we find the following entry in his journal, 6th, month, 28, 1791.
"We rode through many rice swamps, where the blacks were very numerous, great droves of these poor slaves, working up to the middle in water, men and women nearly _naked_."
Rev. John Rankin, of Ripley, Ohio, a native of Tennessee.
"In every slave-holding state, _many slaves suffer extremely_, both while they labor and while they sleep, _for want of clothing_ to keep them warm."
John Parrish, late of Philadelphia, a highly esteemed minister in the Society of Friends, who travelled through the South in 1804.
"It is shocking to the feelings of humanity, in travelling through some of those states, to see those poor objects, [slaves,] especially in the inclement season, in _rags_, and _trembling with the cold_."
"They suffer them, both male and female, _to go without clothing_ at the age of ten and twelve years"
Rev. Phineas Smith, Centreville, Allegany, Co., N.Y. Mr. S. has just returned from a residence of several years at the south, chiefly in Virginia, Louisiana, and among the American settlers in Texas.
"The apparel of the slaves, is of the coa.r.s.est sort and _exceedingly deficient_ in quant.i.ty. I have been on many plantations where children of eight and ten yeas old, were in a state of _perfect nudity_. Slaves are _in general wretchedly clad_."
Wm. Ladd, Esq., of Minot, Maine, recently a slaveholder in Florida.
"They were allowed two suits of clothes a year, viz. one pair of trowsers with a shirt or frock of osnaburgh for summer; and for winter, one pair of trowsers, and a jacket of negro cloth, with a baize shirt and a pair of shoes. Some allowed hats, and some did not; and they were generally, I believe, allowed one blanket in two years.
Garments of similar materials were allowed the women."
A Kentucky physician, writing in the Western Medical Reformer, in 1836, on the diseases peculiar to slaves, says.
"They are _imperfectly clothed_ both summer and winter."
Mr. Stephen E. Maltby, Inspector of provisions, Skeneateles, N.Y., who resided sometime in Alabama.
"I was at Huntsville, Alabama, in 1818-19, I frequently saw slaves on and around the public square, _with hardly a rag of clothing on them_, and in a _great many_ instances with but a single garment both in summer and in winter; generally the only bedding of the slaves was a _blanket_."
Reuben G. Macy, Hudson, N.Y. member of the Society of Friends, who resided in South Carolina, in 1818 and 19.
"Their clothing consisted of a pair of trowsers and jacket, made of "negro cloth." The women a petticoat, a very short "short-gown," and _nothing else_, the same kind of cloth; some of the women had an old pair of shoes, but they _generally went barefoot_."