slavery and the plantation Essay - 2087 Words

slavery and the plantation During the era of slavery in the United States, not all blacks were slaves. There were a many number of free blacks, consisting of those had been freed or those in fact that were never slave. Nor did all slave work on plantations. There were nearly five hundred thousand that worked in the cities as domestic, skilled artisans and factory hands (Green, 13). But they were exceptions to the general rule. Most blacks in America were slaves on plantation-sized units in the seven states of the South. And with the invent of the cotton gin by Eli Whitney, more slaves were needed to work the ever-growing cotton game (Frazier, 14). The size of the plantations varied with the wealth of the planters. There were†¦show more content†¦In most cases, however, slaves were expected to cook the evening meal in their cabins. The food, which was issued once a week, was generally coarse and lacking in variety. The usual allocation was a peck of corn and three o f four pounds of bacon or salt pork. They were also given milk, potatoes, peas and beans, molasses, and fish. Fractional amounts, usually one-half, were allotted to each child in the family. Most slaves supplemented this meager fare by trapping coons and opossums in the fields or by stealing corn from the masters corncribs and chickens from his chicken coops. Slaves made a distinction between taking and stealing. It was considered right to take anything that belonged to white folk but it was wrong to steal the property of other slaves (Olmsted 69-72). While the diet provided to the slave kept them alive and functioning, it lacked many important nutrients, and diet-related diseases plagued slave communities. The diseases and other inflictions that befell slave include hernia, pneumonia, and lockjaw. Because of the lack of proper sanitation, slaves also suffered from dysentery and cholera more severely than the whites (Berkin, 266-267). Twice a year the slave was issued a clothes ration. A South Carolina planter described a typical allowance in his plantation manual: Each man gets in the fall two shirts of cotton drilling, a pair of woolen pants and a woolen jacket. In the spring two shirts of cotton shirting and two pair ofShow MoreRelatedA South Plantation Owners View of Slavery Essay877 Words   |  4 PagesA South Plantation Owners View of Slavery For hundreds of years, slavery has been practiced around the world. At this time, abolitionist Americans have no right to deny this tradition. Our founding fathers, in fact, had slaves of their own. One must concur that slavery is not morally wrong but rather needed for the growth of America. The abolitionists of the North have weak arguments that can be overruled by all the advantages of slavery. 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