Most slaves were given tasks to perform according to their
physical capability.
A work day consisted of 15-16 hours a day
Women who were well along in their pregnancies, were sent to
work.
In the South there was no rest season, the climate was always
considered good enough to work in and, so, everyone was active all
year round.
Children between the ages of six and ten might be active as
water carriers. Children between the ages of ten and twelve were
organized into gangs and put to weeding.
4. 5.
Treatments were given such as mutilation and murder which were
regulated or prohibited by law.
Whippings, beatings, and hangings were as unpredictable as they
were gruesome.
The plantation owners that slavery cold not survive without the
whip. Males and females were whipped indiscriminately. Fifteen to
twenty lashes were generally sufficient, but they could range much
higher.
Items used for punishments: stocks, chains, collars, and
irons.
Slaves could also be hanged or burned at thestake.
6. 7.
Typical food was a peck of corn meal and three to four pounds
of salt pork or bacon per week per person.
The slaves prepared their own food.
Lack of variety and vitamins made the slaves susceptible to
nutrition related diseases.
8. 9.
Children would dress in long shirts.
Slaves were provided with two shirts, woolen pants, and a
jacket in the winter. Women were provided with an insufficient
amount of cloth and made their own clothes.
The cloth was cheap material, produced in England.
10.
Plantation slaves were housed in slaves cabins. Floors were
packed dirt. They were leaky and drafty and the combination of wet,
dirt, and cold made them diseased environments.
11.
The South was a disease environment for everyone due to the
hotter weather and the swamp and marsh. Physicians were in short
supply, and medical knowledge poor. There was no concept of
bacterial transmission of disease, or insect borne diseases.
12.
Diseases included malaria, Asiatic cholera, dysentery,
pneumonia, tuberculosis, tetanus, pellagra, beri beri.
The deaths in childbirth were killed because of excess
heavy