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COTTON, SLAVERY,
AND THE
OLD SOUTHChapter 11
Pages 371-397
Presented By: John Blanding, Micah
Patterson, & Sarah Webster
INTRODUCTIONIn the 1800’s the South, like the North,
experienced dramatic growth in the middle years of the nineteenth century. Southerners
fanned out into the new territories of the Southwest and established new communities. The Southern agricultural economy—involving
sugar, rice, tobacco, cotton, etc.—grew increasingly prosperous. The South was thus
tied with the emerging capitalist world, forming its own entity from the United States.
AMERICA
.
THE COTTON ECONOMY
The most important economic development in the mid-nineteenth century South was the shirt of economic power from the upper South to the lower South—the expanding agricultural regions in the new states of the Southwest. The shift above all reflected the dominance of cotton in the southern economy.
THE RISE OF KING COTTON•The Upper South (VA, MD, and NC) depended on tobacco.•Tobacco market was becoming unstable due to frequent depressions. •Shifted their cash crops to the production of wheat.•The Coastal South (SC, GA, and parts of FL) relied on rice. •However, rice needed a 9 month growing season due to the substantial irrigation. •Sugar remained a top crop in the Gulf Coast, but sugar cultivation required intensive labor and similar growing times to rice. •The shift in southern crops came with the cultivation of short-staple cotton instead of long-staple cotton. •Short-staple cotton was hardier and a coarser strain of cotton that could grow successfully in a variety of soils. •The invention of the cotton-gin helped remove seeds from the short-staple cotton since it was a harder process than the long-staple cotton.
COTTON
The Rise of King Cotton (continued)
• In the 1820s, cotton production spread rapidly moving westward into AL, MS, LA, TX, and AR from the Coastal South.
• In 1820: produced 500,000 bales of cotton; 1850: produced 3 million bales; 1860: produced 5 million bales. Periodic fluctuations generally came from overproduction.
• By the Civil War cotton brought in $200 million a year.
• Deep South = Cotton Kingdom• To carry out cotton planting, slave
populations greatly increased. • In AL the growth was 41,000 to 435,000.
Click icon to add picture
In the 1850s cotton had become major producer for the southern economy. Its consumption is displayed in this graph.
Southern Trade and Industry • Activity in Flour milling and Iron and Textile
manufacturing particularly in the Upper South increased• The total value for southern textile manufacturers in
1860 was $4.5 million.
• Brokers, who marketed the planters’ crops, often lived in New Orleans, Mobile, Savannah, and Charleston where they worked to find buyers for cotton and other crops and where they purchased goods for the planters they served.
• Substantial group of professional people in the South—lawyers, editors, doctors, etc.
• Trade usually occurred by means of water since the south had not invested in means of transportation.
James De Bow • Most prominent
advocate of southern economic independence
• Resident of New Orleans
• He published a magazine advocating southern commercial and agricultural expansion, De Bow’s Review
Sources of Southern Difference • Growing concern about “colonial dependency”• Why did the region not develop a larger industrial and
commercial economy of its own? • Why did it remain so different from the North?
• Great profitability of the southern agricultural system. The agricultural economy was booming in the south, as for the Northeast, they relied on manufacturing as the agricultural economy.• Wealthy southerners had so much capital invested in their land and
their slaves that they had little left for other investments.
• Southern failure to create a flourishing commercial or industrial economy was also in part the result of a set of values distinctive to the South that discouraged the growth of cities and industry.
• White southerners thought of themselves as representatives of a special way of life: one based on traditional values of chivalry, leisure, and elegance. Referred to as cavaliers
.
WHITE SOCIETY IN THE SOUTH
In 1860, when the white population was just above 8 million, the number of slaveholders had risen only to 383,637. Only a small minority of southern whites owned slaves.
THE PLANTER CLASS • The Planter Aristocracy—the cotton magnates,
the sugar, rice, and tobacco nabobs, the whites who owned at least forty or fifty slaves and 800 or more acres—exercised power and influence far in excess of their numbers.
• The south was dominated by great plantations and wealthy landowning planters.
• Growing staple crops was just as risky and competitive as the industrial enterprises of the North. If they were to make a profit, they were just as competitive capitalists as the industrialists of the North.
The Planter Class (continued)
• White Southerners like to compare their planter status to the old upper classes of England and Europe: true aristocracies, long entrenched.
• Those who did not become planters often gravitated toward the military, a career for men raised in a culture in which medieval knights were a powerful and popular image.
“Honor”• Southern white males placed enormous stock in
conventional forms of courtesy and respect in their dealings with one another• Way of distancing themselves from the cruelty and disrespect
that were so fundamental to the slave system they controlled
• Honor connected to the idea of ethical behavior and bravery
• Example of “southern honor”:• Preston Brooks • Savagely beat Sen. Charles Sumner of MA with a cane in the
chamber of United States Senate to retaliate for what he considered an insult to a relative. • Brooks was perceived in the North as a savage and in the
South, Brooks was viewed as a popular hero.
• Avenging insults was a social necessity for “gentlemen”; especially insults towards white women.
White males had a complex code of chivalry which allowed them to defend their honor through dueling
The Southern Lady Similarities to Northern
Women • Life centered in home• Companions and
hostesses to husband and nurturing mothers for children• Very rarely did they
engage in public activities or find income-producing employment
Differences from Northern Women
• Men were more dominant than in north• In the South, there
was an importance in defending women—”cult of honor”• In the South “women
have only one right—the right to protection”
The Southern Lady (continued)
•Most lived on farms• Little access to “public world”• Acted as an ornament—trophy—for her husband; did not do anything • Typical roles included•Engaged in spinning, weaving, and other production•Agricultural tasks•Supervise slave force
More on the Southern Lady
• 1/4 completely illiterate
• Few women had more than a basic exposure to education
• A few “female academies” trained women to be good wives
… …The Southern Lady
• Birth rate was 20% higher than national average
• High infant mortality
• 1/2 children born in 1860 died before 5
• Slave labor and women• Prevented them from having to do strenuous work•Husbands had children with slaves. Those children entered the labor force and were a constant reminder of their husbands infidelity
Extraordinary Southern Ladies
• A few were outspoken abolitionists
• Joined northerners to abolish slavery
• Some wanted other reforms in the south
• Most women though did not rebel and convinced themselves of the benefits of their position and defended the southern way of life. Upper class women were avid about defending class lines —> NOT COOL!
Susan B. Anthony Prominent American civil rights leader who played a pivotal role in the 19th century women's rights movement to introduce women's suffrage into the United States.
Other Southern female reformists include: Harriet Beecher Stowe, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Harriet Tubman, Lydia Maria Child, Antoinette Brown Blackwell, and Mary Livermore.
The Plain Folk• Most were a modest yeomen farmer• Owned a few slaves that he worked and lived
with more closely than large plantation owners• 3/4 did not own slaves• Much owned their own land• Devoted mainly to subsistence farming• Some grew cotton or other crops but not
enough to expand business or get out of debt• Most did not move “through the ranks”• Non-slaveholding landowners increased
faster than slaveholding ones
The Plain Folk (continued) • Southern education system had few
opportunities for poor whites —> few opportunities to learn —> limits chances of advancement
• Fewer and inferior elementary and secondary schools to the Northeast
• 500,000 illiterate
• If you were wealthy, there were MANY opportunities to learn• 260 southern colleges and universities. 25,000 enrolled (<1/2 in US)
And the Plain Folk Just Keep on Comin’
• Majority of the whites were modest farmers that were excluded from the plantation class…. Why did they have little power? Why didn’t they rebel?
• Those that opposed were “hill people” • Subsistence agriculture•No slaves• Proud sense of seclusion•…. Disconnected from the cotton industry•Didn’t like slavery because it threatened their sense of independence•Older political ideals•ONLY part that defied trend toward sectional conformity and secession. Refused to support Confederacy
YAY! MORE Plain Folk • Non-slaveholding whites didn’t rebel
because:•Economic boom• 1850s• Could buy more land, be slave-owners… move up!• Others felt secure in their place and loyal to the
South •Democratic society• Many participated in politics which made them
feel connected to the social order• Offices mainly held by the elite
•Felt tied to the plantation system• Dependent on cotton gins, markets, $ aid etc.• Mutual ties: poorest might be related to the
richest so they kept their mouth shut and reduced class tensions
… …Plain Folk (continued) • Male dominated family structure
• House-hold centered economics: everyone plays a role -> stable system of gender roles to ensure order and stability
• Men= master, women and child= family and work force
• Attack on slaver increased thought became that assault on slavery would become assault on patriarchy
Give me a P! Give me some other letters… what does that spell? PLAIN FOLKS!
• Known as “crackers”, “sand hillers”, “poor white trash,” etc. • Not part of plantation economy but still
accepted it• Owned little (infertile) to no land• Foraging and hunting• Some worked as laborers but slave system
limited opportunities• Sickly people • Not against slavery• Too poor to protest•Unifying factor- no matter how poor they were they were still part of the master race
.
THE “PECULIAR INSTITUTION”
White Southerners often referred to slavery as the “peculiar institution.” They meant it was odd but distinctive. The South was the only area in the Western hemisphere where slavery existed. The endeavor of slavery caused the South’s isolation. Slavery had paradoxical results: blacks were isolated from whites socially but a bond was formed between blacks and whites through paternal relationships on plantations.
Slavery
• Isolated South from rest of the US
• Isolation increased so did the desire to defend it
• Because the whites had such a sharp race line, African Americans developed their own culture
•Master slave bond influenced the 2 societies
Varieties of Slavery
• Regulated strictly by law• Slaves could not hold property, leave w/o
permission, out after dark, meet w/ other slaves outside of church, carry firearms, hit a white person
• Whites can’t: teach slaves to read & write, allow slaves to testify against whites
• They didn’t legalize slave marriages or divorces
• If a slave died while being punished it wasn’t a crime
• Slaves could face the death penalty for resisting a white
• Trace of African American ancestry= black (even if rumored)
Types of Slavery (continued) • Law enforcement was not strict• Variety w/in the slave system (punishment, literacy
etc.)• Relationship depended on size of the plantation• Few slaves: greater degree of working alongside each other and supervised directly. Ranged from paternal to tyranny• Preferred to live on large plantations b/c more privacy• Total control of master, total helplessness of slave• Large Plantation: less intimate. • Task system: slaves given one task and once
done were free• Gang system: put into groups and worked until
overseer said they were done
Life Under Slavery
• Enough necessities to live and work
• Adequate diet of cornmeal, salt pork, molasses
• Cultivated gardens for own use
• Given clothing and shoes. Lived in crude cabins (slave quarters)
• Plantation mistress or doctor gave medical care. Slave women (healers) were more important
Life Under Slavery (continued)
• Light work as children. Worked longest and hardest during harvest time
• Slave women worked hardest: fields with men, “traditional” women chores. Often single parent b/c families got divided. Special burdens= special authority
• Less healthy• Large families with much poverty• High infant mortality• Died at younger age than the whites• 1820: 1 in 4• 1840: 1 in 5
• Masters tried to protect health by protecting from hard work until early adolescence
• Hired labor for most dangerous tasks
• Often left to the discipline of the overseers who were paid in proportion to the amount of work they could get out of the slaves
• Overseers didn’t really care about the slaves well-being
… … Life Under Slavery
Domestic Servants • On a big plantation had a somewhat easier life
• Lived closer to master and family
• Ate leftovers, sometimes got to sleep in “big house”
• Familial relationships sometimes developed
• Resented isolation from fellow slaves and lack of privacy
• Received punishments more often
• 1st to leave after emancipation
Domestic Servants (continued)
• Females subject to sexual abuse. “consensual”- rape
• White women punished the women for the liaisons with her husband- beatings, increased workloads, psychological torment
SLAVERY IN THE CITIES Slavery in the city varied greatly from
slavery in the countryside. • IN THE COUNTRY:• Relatively isolated plantations• Little contact by slaves with outside individuals • Intangible freedom
• IN THE CITY: • Slaves moved about to perform various acts •Masters of contracted slaves for tasks such as mining, lumbering, dock work, construction, wagon driving, blacksmithing, etc. • After work hours, they were essentially free to mingle and live their lives.
SLAVERY IN THE CITIES (continued)
• Urban slaveholders sold off most of their male property to the country fearing insurrection and rebellion.•Therefore, black female slaves outnumbered black male slaves in the cities; enabled mulattoes.
• In urban areas, segregation of black slaves and whites was a means of social control that loosened the discipline of slavery.
Free African Americans • About 250,000 African Americans in the slaveholding
states• Some slaves freed by a master who questioned the
morality of slavery or a master’s last will and testament.
• Rise of abolitionists agitation in the North • Would ignite rebellions • Caused southern states to tighten their slave system• Laws made the attaining of freedom harder; made it nearly
impossible for slaveholders to manumit (free) their slaves.
• Some slaves became free through their relatives ownership of them.
• Laws and customs closed many occupations to freed slaves, forbade them to assemble without white supervision, and placed other restraints on them but they attested that it was better than slavery.
The Slave Trade • Domestic Trade:• Slaves sometimes moved in the company of their migrating
slaveholder. • In trading, slaves usually traveled long distances by train, or
river/ocean steamers. For shorter voyages, they traveled by foot in coffles.
• During the actual trade, auction, the slaves were checked like livestock.• The slaves were forced to walk/trot, and their teeth, feet, arms, etc. were
inspected• The prices varied from $500-$1,700
• Foreign Trade:• The importation of slaves was illegal in 1808, so they were
smuggled under harsh conditions. • In the Southern Commercial Conventions, southerners discussed
reopening foreign slave trade. Only the delegates from the upper South opposed foreign trade because they profited from domestic. • William L. Yancey, an Alabama delegate
Slave Resistance Question: “What is the effect of slavery on blacks themselves?”
• Vast majority of Southern slaves were not content with being slaves; they yearned for freedom even though they realized there was little they could do to secure it.
• Reactions to slavery: “Sambo”—a slave who acted out the role that he/she recognized the white world to expect of him—and the Slave Rebel—the African American who could not accept or accommodate slavery.
• Gabriel Prosser (1800)• Gathered 1,000 rebellious slaves in Richmond, VA• Two slaves gave the plot away and it was ceased• Prosser and 35 other slaves were executed.
• Denmark Vesey (1822)• He and about 9,000 followers set up a rebellion; never came into
fruition
Turner’s Revolt (1831)• Nat Turner• Slave Preacher
• Led an army of slaves with guns and axes one night in Southampton County, VA.
• Murdered 60 whites• Stopped by state and federal
troops • Only slave rebellion in the 19th
century South• Created the fear of African
Americans generating violence in whites, therefore they tightened their dictatorships.
Slave Resistance (continued)• Some slaves attempted to gain their freedom by
running away• The Underground Railroad—organized by free
African Americans and sympathetic whites to assists slaves in their “flight” to the North or Canada—came into existence
• Slave Patrols stopped wandering blacks on sight and demanded to see their travel permit. Those without a permit were presumed to be runaways and taken captive.
• Resistance also occurred performance on the plantations.• African Americans defied their masters • Some slaves stole from their masters or neighboring whites • Some slaves lost or broke tools • Some slaves cut off their fingers or committed suicide • A few slaves turned on their masters and murdered them.
.
THE CULTURE OF SLAVERY
Language and MusicLanguage:• In many areas, slaves retained a language of their own,
sometimes, incorporating African speech patterns into English.
• Africans arrived in America speaking many different languages
• On plantations, learned a simple, common, language— ‘’Pidgin”
Music:• Very important • Believed it was an accompaniment to dance • The banjo became an important instrument • Field workers used songs to pass time• Used innocuous words to confuse whites• Expressed religious faith and expressed hope for
freedom.
African American Religion• Almost all African Americans were Christian—Baptists
or Methodists—by the early 19th century. • Masters expected their slaves to worship under the
supervision of white masters; autonomous black churches were banned by law.
• As slavery expanded in the South, missionary efforts increased.
• Some blacks developed their own versions of Christianity—voodoo.
• Prayer meetings routinely involved reverent chanting, spontaneous exclamations, and ecstatic conversion experiences.
• Joyful and affirming; Dream of freedom and deliverance.
• African Americans sat in the balconies during white services and held their own secret services at night.
The Slave Family• The slave family was a crucial institution of black
culture in the South. • The legality of marriage restricted the family • Black women began bearing children around fourteen
or fifteen. • Slave communities did not condemn premarital
pregnancy; however it was custom to marry soon after conceiving.
• Up to 1/3 of all black families were broken apart by the slave trade, thus extended kinship networks.
• African American women were powerless to resist the sexual advances of their masters, and often bore the children of whites.
• Paternal Relationship between slave and master!
.
CONCLUSION
While the North was creating a complex and rapidly developing commercial-industrial economy, the South was expanding its agrarian economy without making many fundamental changes in its character.
Great migrations took many southern whites, and even more African American slaves, into new agricultural areas in the Deep South, where they created a booming “Cotton Kingdom” that raised crops for export around the world. The cotton economy entrenched the planter class as the dominant force within southern society.
The diff erences between the North and South were a result of diff erences in social structure, diff erences in climate, and diff erences in culture.
THE END
