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Authors: Douglas A. Blackmon
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formed up at night around camp res in the
shadows of train depots and cot on warehouses on the fringes of
towns. In the face of hostile whites—the Ku Klux Klan and members
of other suddenly ourishing secret white societies—they
brandished guns and were wil ing to use them. Beyond gal to their
former masters, these meandering swarms of il iterate men also
expected to be al owed to vote.
The breadth of white venom toward freed slaves—and the
decades of venality that fol owed it—belied the wide spectrum of
perspectives on slavery shared by white southerners before the war.
From the earliest years of the North American colonies, whites
struggled to resolve vastly di ering views even among slaveholders
of the place and position of blacks in the new society.
Colonial America began as a place uncertain of the abject
subjugation of native Indian populations and thousands of African
slaves pouring into the Western Hemisphere. Many were perplexed
by the concept of categorizing humans by race and skin color,
versus the long-standing European tradition of identi cation rooted
in nationality and place of origin. In the rst decades of
in nationality and place of origin. In the rst decades of
colonization in the 1600s, "slave" and "Negro" were not synonymous
in the American colonies. Slaves were as likely to be Indians as
Africans. Some early owners of black slaves were themselves black.
Free Africans in Virginia were permit ed to vote wel into the
1700s. Many indentured white servants were coerced into extending
their labor contracts until death—e ectively making them light-
skinned slaves.
Dispel ing that confusion and ensuring the dominant position of
whites in general—and Englishmen in particular—colonial
legislatures, especial y in Virginia, South Carolina, and, later,
Georgia, began in the 1650s to systematical y de ne residents by
color and lineage. The intentions were twofold: to create the legal
structure necessary for building an economy with cheap slave labor
as its foundation, and secondly, to reconcile bondage with America's
revolutionary ideals of intrinsic human rights. Blacks could be
excluded from the Enlightenment concepts that every man was
granted by God individual freedom and a right to the pursuit of
happiness because colonial laws codi ed a less-than-ful y-human
status of any person carrying even a trace of black or Indian blood.
Instead of embracing the concept that regardless of color "Al men
are created equal," with no king or prince born to higher status than
any other, colonial leaders extended a version of "royal" status to al
whites.
Stil , vast swaths of the region, including the rock-strewn
Appalachians stretching from northern Alabama, across Georgia,
and up through the Carolinas and Virginia, contained virtual y no
slaves at al . Indeed, in some of those places, companies of men had
gathered after secession, armed themselves, and marched north to
join with the Union armies moving upon the South.
In other places, men who owned hundreds or thousands of slaves
nonetheless wrestled without resolution with the subtle moralities
of human bondage and the tra cking of men. Robert Wickli e,
owner of more slaves than any other person in Kentucky and likely
anyone in the United States, argued passionately against the
exportation of slaves from the coastal regions of the United States
exportation of slaves from the coastal regions of the United States
to the comparative horrors of Deep South plantations in Georgia
and Mississippi. The 1860 census counted among four mil ion
blacks in the South more than 250,000 free African Americans in
the slave states, more than fty thousand of them in Virginia. In
Louisiana, a handful of black freedmen owned dozens of slaves. In
the intricately hued tapestry of New Orleans, more than three
thousand free blacks owned slaves themselves.1
But in what came to be known as the Black Belt—a long curve of
mostly
shadows of train depots and cot on warehouses on the fringes of
towns. In the face of hostile whites—the Ku Klux Klan and members
of other suddenly ourishing secret white societies—they
brandished guns and were wil ing to use them. Beyond gal to their
former masters, these meandering swarms of il iterate men also
expected to be al owed to vote.
The breadth of white venom toward freed slaves—and the
decades of venality that fol owed it—belied the wide spectrum of
perspectives on slavery shared by white southerners before the war.
From the earliest years of the North American colonies, whites
struggled to resolve vastly di ering views even among slaveholders
of the place and position of blacks in the new society.
Colonial America began as a place uncertain of the abject
subjugation of native Indian populations and thousands of African
slaves pouring into the Western Hemisphere. Many were perplexed
by the concept of categorizing humans by race and skin color,
versus the long-standing European tradition of identi cation rooted
in nationality and place of origin. In the rst decades of
in nationality and place of origin. In the rst decades of
colonization in the 1600s, "slave" and "Negro" were not synonymous
in the American colonies. Slaves were as likely to be Indians as
Africans. Some early owners of black slaves were themselves black.
Free Africans in Virginia were permit ed to vote wel into the
1700s. Many indentured white servants were coerced into extending
their labor contracts until death—e ectively making them light-
skinned slaves.
Dispel ing that confusion and ensuring the dominant position of
whites in general—and Englishmen in particular—colonial
legislatures, especial y in Virginia, South Carolina, and, later,
Georgia, began in the 1650s to systematical y de ne residents by
color and lineage. The intentions were twofold: to create the legal
structure necessary for building an economy with cheap slave labor
as its foundation, and secondly, to reconcile bondage with America's
revolutionary ideals of intrinsic human rights. Blacks could be
excluded from the Enlightenment concepts that every man was
granted by God individual freedom and a right to the pursuit of
happiness because colonial laws codi ed a less-than-ful y-human
status of any person carrying even a trace of black or Indian blood.
Instead of embracing the concept that regardless of color "Al men
are created equal," with no king or prince born to higher status than
any other, colonial leaders extended a version of "royal" status to al
whites.
Stil , vast swaths of the region, including the rock-strewn
Appalachians stretching from northern Alabama, across Georgia,
and up through the Carolinas and Virginia, contained virtual y no
slaves at al . Indeed, in some of those places, companies of men had
gathered after secession, armed themselves, and marched north to
join with the Union armies moving upon the South.
In other places, men who owned hundreds or thousands of slaves
nonetheless wrestled without resolution with the subtle moralities
of human bondage and the tra cking of men. Robert Wickli e,
owner of more slaves than any other person in Kentucky and likely
anyone in the United States, argued passionately against the
exportation of slaves from the coastal regions of the United States
exportation of slaves from the coastal regions of the United States
to the comparative horrors of Deep South plantations in Georgia
and Mississippi. The 1860 census counted among four mil ion
blacks in the South more than 250,000 free African Americans in
the slave states, more than fty thousand of them in Virginia. In
Louisiana, a handful of black freedmen owned dozens of slaves. In
the intricately hued tapestry of New Orleans, more than three
thousand free blacks owned slaves themselves.1
But in what came to be known as the Black Belt—a long curve of
mostly
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