Page 281 - American Stories, A History of the United States

11.1 Watch the Video The Slave Trade

11.2

11.3

PICkING COTTON Although cotton cultivation required constant attention, many of the tasks involved were
relatively simple. On a cotton plantation most slaves, including women and children, were field hands who
performed the same tasks.

cooking, cleaning, and gardening. Some slaves, especially women, also worked within
the slave community as preachers, caretakers of children, and healers. A few slaves,
about 5 percent, worked in industry in the South, including mills, iron works, and
railroad building. Slaves in cities did a wider range of jobs than plantation slaves, and
in general enjoyed more autonomy. They worked in restaurants and saloons, in hotels,
and as skilled tradesmen. Some urban slaves even lived apart from their masters and
hired out their own time, returning part of their wages to their owners.
Most slaves also kept gardens or small farm plots for themselves to supplement
their diets. They fished, hunted, and trapped animals. Many slaves also worked “over-
time” for their own masters on Sundays or holidays in exchange for money or goods, or
Quick Check hired out their overtime hours to others. This “underground economy” suggests slaves’
What were the differences between overpowering desire to provide for their families, sometimes even earning enough to
“gang” and “task” labor?
purchase their freedom.
Slave Families, Kinship, and Community

More than any other institution, the African American family prevented slavery from
becoming utterly demoralizing. Slaves had a strong and abiding sense of family and
kinship. But the nature of the families or households that predominated on planta-
tions or farms varied with circumstances. On large plantations with relatively stable
slave populations, most slave children lived in two-parent households, and many mar-
riages lasted for 20 to 30 years. The death or sale of one of the partners broke up more
marriages than voluntary dissolutions did. Here mothers, fathers, and children were
bonded closely, and parents shared child-rearing responsibilities (within the limits
masters allowed). Masters and churches encouraged marital fidelity: Stable unions
produced more offspring, and adultery and divorce were sinful.
But in areas where most slaves lived on farms or small plantations, and especially
in the Upper South where slaves were often sold or hired out, a different pattern seems
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