Slavery in America: the Montgomery Slave Trade

Home , Domestic slave trade, Equal Justice Initiative, Jubilee (novel), Mercy Street, Moses Roper, Slave market

1 Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 2 19th century Slave Domestic Trade. thecity’sdocumenting prominent role inthe three markers indowntown Montgomery erected Council, theEqual Initiative Justice In 2013, from theBlack withsupport Heritage

Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 4 Enslaved of People Sexual Exploitation Slave Local Trading Practices Exploitative Separation of Families Enslavement and African Free Americans of Kidnapping Slave Practices Trading Brutal Particularly Montgomery’s MONTGOMERY SLAVE TRADE Slave in America Trade Domestic The Fears and Lives The America’s of Enslaved People Was Slavery Different How American Inferiority: Racial Inventing SLAVERY IN AMERICA INTRODUCTION CONTENTS Resistance through Revolt, Escape, and Survival 48–49 Survival and Escape, Revolt, through Resistance 44–45 “To At Auction” Sold Be Family 42–43 Losing of Trauma The Slavery: by Separated Enslavement of 24–25 Economics The 14 Slavery and Religion 40 44 46 38 39 23 15 31 12 8 6 5

THE POST SLAVERY EXPERIENCE 50 The Abolitionist Movement 52–53 After Slavery: Post-Emancipation in Alabama 55 1901 Alabama Constitution 57 Reconstruction and Beyond in Montgomery 60 Post-War Throughout the South: Racism Through Politics and Violence 64

A NATIONAL LEGACY: 67 OUR COLLECTIVE MEMORY OF SLAVERY, WAR, AND RACE Reviving the Confederacy in Alabama and Beyond 70

CONCLUSION 76 Notes 80 Acknowledgments 87 Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 6 INTRODUCTION which isevident inhundreds offormal today andinformal ways. avoided, andisoften creating aracial divide well understood life. Ourhistory isnot cultural, ofracial andpolitical injustice social, dominate to continue anddiscrimination racial inequality explicitof themost forms of butquestions ofracial injustice, slavery. some Greatindeconstructing made progress been has acknowledgeto oraddress theproblemsof by thelegacy created honors slavery’s proponentsanddefenders, principal andrefuses in manythe slavery Southernthatcelebrates communities era, that slavery analternative Infact, narrative created. emerged has the hierarchyracial to sustain effort orthelongstanding ment, slavery oftheslave —there understanding trade,enslave islittle and wasaprimary for humantrafficking site and facilitating gomery, Alabama — which aprominent had role intheslave trade meaning incontemporary life.like Inmany communities Mont ofslavery addressvery thelegacy doneto been has little andits Today, more than150years theEmancipationProclamation, after Amendmenttury in1865. following oftheThirteenth thepassage ending slavery to forembraced, resistance another persisted cen- In theSouth,where the enslavement waswidely ofblack people followingtion theCivilWar. defend slavery. survived Thismythology slavery’s formal- aboli and perpetuate, legitimate, to wascreated ofblack people ority theinferievolved, about andenduring- anelaborate mythology for AsAmericanslavery millionsofAmericans. and prosperity wealth, created opportunity, States inthe United of black people journey.ing theagonizing Overtheenslavement centuries, two dur atsea died anddeath. Nearly millionpeople two starvation underthat Americas horrificfrequentlyconditions in resulted were enslaved, kidnapped, acrosstheAtlantic andshipped to century, inthesixteenth Beginning millionsofAfrican people - - - 7 Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade - Reconciliation with a difficult past cannot without be achieved that is forward way and finding a history confronting truthfully to invite you join us in this effort thoughtful and responsible. We visit this report slavery, on American and sharing by exploring The Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) believes that a more informed Justice informed InitiativeThe Equal that a more (EJI) believes the challenges and history racial understanding of America’s is vitalit creates respectful more and a healthier to developing local, EJI opened state, two In April 2018, national and identity. The National Memorial Alabama: new sites in Montgomery, Peace than 4000 and Justice,for the names of more featuring killed between lynching victims American terror of racial African Enslavement and The Legacy1877 Museum: and 1950; From warehouse tothe site on Built Mass Incarceration. of a former the sale, imprisoned people before black were enslaved where between museum sits Montgomery’s midway 11,000-square-foot station dock and train and the main river market historic slave that transported people at the tens of thousands of enslaved Museum trade. visitors encounter height of the domestic slave technology unique pens that employ to bring to of slave replicas fear, the people narrating enslaved accountsfrom first-person life heartbreak, trade. and inhumanity of the domestic slave Bryan Stevenson, Director Stevenson, Bryan ing the Legacy Museum and National Memorial in Montgomery, ing the Legacy Museum in Montgomery, and National Memorial reflecting on the bonds between historic and contemporary inequalityracial in America, the injustice and confronting your in greater fosters information hope that more We community. own and honest dialogue, and deepens our collective comknowledge - within us the have that we EJI believes mitment to just society. a capacity injustice. shall of racial to we But our history transcend engage in the important if we only overcome work and difficult that lies ahead. Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 8 SLAVERY IN AMERICA IN SLAVERY the brutal voyage. brutal the have to during perished estimated are million more two Nearly America. North or America, Central America, in South slavery into West Africa sold from and childrenwomen, were and transported 10.7 estimated An million men, black 9 Slavery In America In Slavery

These starving people were rescued from a slave ship. Disease and starvation killed 1.8 million enslaved people before they reached the Americas. (The National Archives of the UK: ref. F084/1310.)

The enslavement of black people in the United States lasted for more than two centuries and created a complex legal, economic, and social infrastructure that can still be seen today. The legacy of slavery has implications for many contemporary issues, political and social debates, and cultural norms — especially in places where slavery or the slave trade was extensive.

In the Transatlantic Slave Trade, kidnapped Africans were “bought” by traders from Western Europe in exchange for rum, cotton products, and weapons like guns and gunpowder.1 As Historian John Blassingame describes, the captured Africans were then shipped across the Atlantic Ocean in cramped vessels under horrific conditions: Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 10 men, women, andchildren were transported In thisway, 10.7 anestimated millionblack “Taken ship, onboard thenaked Africans Mortality from undernourishment anddis- Mortality experience for theAfricans. of Anumber Thefirst few 16percent. was about ease weeks of the trip was the most traumatic traumatic wasthemost weeks ofthetrip more weeks to thanthree months).[t]he were onbare wooden shackled together rather theirenslavement.” thanaccept men lying forheat, hours intheirown inthehold,andpacked tightly boards so them went insane and many became so them so went insaneand many became the floor, agreatsickness.caused dealof Duringthe upright. that they notsit could drowning orrefusing ormedicine, food thattheydespondent gave upthewillto andmucuscovering withblood defecation, airofthehold,extremefoul andpoisonous dreaded Mid-Passage offrom trip (a three live. . . . Often they committed suicide, by live. they .Often committed 2 The lessdiverse Southern economy, primarily America, Central America, or North America. orNorth Central America, America, Nearly two million more are estimated to haveNearly to millionmore two are estimated For themillionsofAfricans whowould face enslavement in the United States —either at enslavement States intheUnited as those intheSouthandmany their spent those as and ran theplanters’ homes. perished during the brutal voyage. perished duringthebrutal period. Those enslaved Those period. inthenortheastern experience ofAmerican slaveryparticular rise to large plantations dependent onthelabor large to rise plantations in various positions of unpaid, skilled ofunpaid, labor.in various positions took differenttook time on and formsregion based thecountry —the to inbondage transported the end ofatransatlantic journey from Africa, or from birth as the descendants ofAfricans thedescendants or from as birth from West Africa slavery into andsold inSouth of enslaved Africans, inthefields whotoiled crops, gave andtobacco centered around cotton states were not as confined to agriculturalto werework confined notas states lives in bondage laboring as house servants house as or lives laboring inbondage 6 script Division.) script of Congress, Manu- Alabama. (Library County,in Barbour family nearEufaula Slave and cabin 4 5

11 Slavery In America In Slavery

Imprisoned men at Maula Prison in Malawi are forced to sleep “like the enslaved on a slave ship.” (Joao Silva/The New York Times/Redux.)

In many states where slavery was prevalent, most whites rejected emancipation and used violence, terror, and the law to disenfranchise, abuse, and marginalize African Americans for more than a century.

Largely for this reason, slavery in the two re- Confederate States of America, and sparked a gions diverged. Slavery became less efficient bloody civil war. and less socially accepted in the Northeast during the eighteenth century, and those states In December 1865, just eight months after Con- began passing laws to gradually abolish slavery. federate forces surrendered and the four-year In 1804, New Jersey became the last North- Civil War ended, the United States adopted the ern state to commit to abolition. In contrast, Thirteenth Amendment abolishing slavery and the system of slavery remained a central and involuntary servitude, “except as punishment for necessary ingredient in the Southern planta- crime.” This meant freedom for more than four tion economy and cultural landscape well into million enslaved black people living in the Unit- the nineteenth century.7 By 1860, in the fifteen ed States at the time. However, in many states Southern states that still permitted slavery, where slavery was prevalent, most white resi- nearly one in four families owned enslaved dents rejected emancipation and used violence, people.8 The South so desperately clung to the terror, and the law to disenfranchise, abuse, and institution of slavery that, as the national tide marginalize African Americans for more than a turned toward abolition, eleven Southern states century after emancipation. seceded from the United States, formed the Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 12 Museum ofPhotographyMuseum and Film.) the turmoil oftheCivil War. (George EastmanHouse, International Many enslaved andorphaned children were during unprotected RACIAL INFERIORITY: INFERIORITY: RACIAL AMERICAN SLAVERY AMERICAN INVENTING DIFFERENT HOW WAS WAS The racialized caste system ofAmericanslaveryThe racialized caste Jamestown, Virginia, they held the legal status Virginia,Jamestown, they status heldthelegal American slavery grew from andreinforced American slavery such as asystem. began When thefirst Africans were broughtto the status centrally tied to race. to tied centrally status a permanent, hereditary developed as slavery American of institution The Over thesystem of thenext centuries, two British colonies in1619British colonies onaship thatdocked in example, slavery wasaclass category orform and supervision. In1857, for- example, Missis and morally evolved, were whileblack people racial prejudice. hereditary status centrally tied to race. to centrally tied status hereditary unique from inmany respects theforms of ingrained in the social culture, the institution culture, theinstitution ingrained inthesocial individual status that could befall thatcould anyone and individual status In the Spanish and Portuguese colonies, for colonies, In theSpanish andPortuguese that originated in the British colonies was intheBritish colonies that originated that science andreligionthat science proved racial white tem became increasingly dependent onforced became tem of “servant.” dumb, lazy, child-like, ofguidance andinneed of American slavery apermanent, as developed could be overcome after a completed term of overcome be acompleted could after of indentured servitude —an“accident” of slavery oftheworld. inother parts thatexisted sippi Governorsippi William McWillie denounced hard-working,smart, andmore intellectually under thisview,superiority: were people white labor, more racial andas prejudice became labor or assimilation into thedominantculture. into orassimilation labor 11 But theregion’s as sys- economic 13 Advocates ofslavery Advocates argued 12

9 10

13 “Contrabands” were enslaved

people who escaped from plan- America In Slavery tations and sought protection from Union forces during the Civil War. These men escaped from plantations in South Carolina in 1862. (Collection of the New-York Historical Society, neg # 44751.)

Though the reality of American slavery was often brutal, barbaric, and violent, the myth of black people’s racial inferiority developed and persisted as a common justification for the system’s continuation.

anti-slavery critics and insisted: This perspective defended black people’s life- long and nearly inescapable enslavement in the “[T]he institution of slavery, per se, is as jus- United States as justified and necessary. White tifiable as the relation of husband and wife, slave holders were performing an act of kind- parent and child, or any other civil institu- ness, advocates claimed, by exposing the black tion of the State, and is most necessary to people they held as human property to discipline, the well-being of the negro, being the only hard work, and morality. Though the reality of form of government or pupilage which can American slavery was often brutal, barbaric, and raise him from barbarism, or make him violent, the myth of black people’s racial infe- useful to himself or others; and I have no riority developed and persisted as a common doubt but that the institution, thus far in justification for the system’s continuation. This our country, has resulted in the happiness remained true throughout the Civil War, the 1863 and elevation of both races; that is, the ne- Emancipation Proclamation, and the adoption of gro and the white man. In no period of the the Thirteenth Amendment in 1865. world’s history have three millions of the negro race been so elevated in the scale of Indeed, ending slavery was not enough to over- being, or so much civilized or Christianized, come the harmful ideas created to defend it.15 as those in the United States, as slaves. “Freeing” the nation’s masses of enslaved black They are better clothed, better fed, better people without undertaking the work to decon- housed, and more cared for in sickness and struct the narrative of inferiority doomed those in health, than has ever fallen to the lot of freedmen and -women and their descendants to any similar number of the negro race in a fate of subordinate, second-class citizenship. any age or nation; and as a Christian peo- In the place of slavery, the commitment to racial ple, I feel that it is the duty of the South to hierarchy was expressed in many new forms, keep them in their present position, at any including lynching and other methods of racial cost and at every peril, even independently terrorism; segregation and “Jim Crow”; and of the questions of interest and security.”14 unprecedented rates of mass incarceration. 14 RELIGION AND SLAVERY

As early as the 10th century, slave owners worried they laws soon followed. biblical scripture was used to would lose their enslaved support the claim that Africans property if Africans were no In 1667, the colony of Virginia were a cursed people fit only longer seen as non-Chris- declared that Christian bap- Slavery In America The Montgomery Trade Slave for slavery.16 As scholar Ibram tian heathens. This fear was tism did not exempt enslaved X. Kendi has documented, realized in 1656 when Eliza- black people from bondage, religion became a more com- beth Key, the daughter of an and New York and Maryland mon justification for slavery enslaved black woman and a soon did the same.19 These as national economies grew white Englishman, successful- laws allowed white evangeli- dependent on maintaining the ly sued for her and her child’s cals to share Christianity with system of bondage. To protect freedom by arguing that her black people without the risk of slavery, the American colonies Christianity should shield her forced emancipation, and later and later the United States em- from enslavement. If slavery laws further restricted black braced religious teachings that was to survive, religious teach- Christians’ religious practice endorsed ideas of black inferi- ings would have to adapt.17 and barred interracial worship ority, approved the inhumanity services. After the colonies of chattel slavery, and promised In 1664-1665, a British min- won independence and es- reward to black people who ister named Richard Baxter tablished the United States submitted to enslavement. published a treatise encour- of America, these laws only aging slave owners to convert strengthened. When slavery began in North the enslaved to Christianity America in the 17th century, and arguing that slavery was As the abolitionist movement the lands that would become a righteous institution that al- grew in the North, some the United States were colo- lowed for the saving of African openly challenged the church’s nies held by the British, and souls — without requiring their tolerance of slavery — but British law forbade the en- freedom.18 He told his Puritan Southern churches, largely slavement of Christians. Most readers that slavery was ben- dependent on the support of Africans then practiced Islam eficial to African people, and white slave owners, almost or African folk religions — and paved the way for white people never questioned the morality as Christian missionaries set to buy, sell, and abuse African of owning human beings.20 out to convert enslaved Afri- people while maintaining a cans in the colonies, British Christian identity. Compatible 15 THE LIVES AND FEARS OF America In Slavery AMERICA’S ENSLAVED PEOPLE

Enslaved people had to fear brutal abuse and mistreatment on many plantations in the South. (Donated by Corbis.)

In the decades leading up to the Civil War, confronted with abolitionists’ moral outrage Slavery deprived the enslaved of any and growing political pressure, Southern slave legal rights or autonomy and granted the owners defended slavery as a benevolent sys- slave owner complete power over the tem that benefitted enslaved black people.21 black men, women, and children legally Even today, some continue to echo those claims recognized as his property. in attempts to justify more than two centuries of human bondage, forced labor, and abuse.22 Records from the era paint a much different legally marry, needed an owner’s permission to picture, revealing American slavery as a system enter into non-legal marriages, and could be that was always dehumanizing and barbaric, forced to marry a partner chosen by the slave and often bloody, brutal, and violent. owner. Once married, husbands and wives had no ability to protect themselves from being sold As an institution, slavery deprived the enslaved away from each other, and if “owned” by dif- of any legal rights or autonomy and granted ferent masters, were often forced to reside on the slave owner complete power over the black different plantations. Parents could do nothing men, women, and children legally recognized when their young children were sold away,23 and as his property. Structurally, this weakened enslaved families were regularly and easily sep- enslaved people’s claims to even the most basic arated at an owner’s or auctioneer’s whim, never social bond: the family. The enslaved could not to see each other again.24 16 “ Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade own children thatshe didfor her mistress’s.” her nurse didnothave halftheaffection for her bymoretold thanonelady thatshe wassure groes for oneanother Ihave are been very slight. ofne theaffection South inthe1850s, “that the relatives,”separating to observed onevisitor by Southerners, of ofthecruelty inpalliation eachother. to ties isfrequently “It remarked claiming didnothave blackemotional people by men thiscruelty andwomenWhite justified toes wouldtheground, justtouch andthen with toes highthattheir so themwould upbythewrist, tie “Mr. nearby: living ondifferent plantations Long “staying overwiththeirwives” alittle thetime punishment as bytheirmaster for whipped Ned andJohn,whowere frequently severely thestorywoman young told oftwo black men, Anti-Slaveryican in1839, Society aKentucky In afirst-hand published bytheAmeraccount father, such and is the condition of every slave throughout the United States: any time without awritten permit, he is liable to be flogged. Yet, it is said by from eachfrom other the human as fleshmonger may them. see carry fit to Slaves To be aman, father not and to be without aman—a authority—a husband must all bear things resist and nothing. If he leaves his master's premises at consent of their masters. Aslave's wife or daughter may be insulted before he owns nothing, claim he can nothing. His wife is not his: his children are are recognisedare property as by the law, own can and nothing except by the dare notdare refuse. To raise his hand in their defence is death by the law. He his eyes with impunity. He himself may be called on to torture them, and not his; they be taken him, can from sold and at any minute, away far as and noand protector—is the darkest of fates. Such the was condition of my slave holders their and apologists, that we happy are contented. and John S. 1815-1875, Jacobs, freedom wasenslaved in adulthood. to Carolina inNorth achild as and escaped - 25

- male exploit theenslaved they held,both people slavery, sexually to power the had slaveowners inherent to exploitation thelabor to In addition by thisabuse. Both men young, died from illnessbrought on oneuniform into ofblood.” was lacerated coat victim ofthepoor thewholeback until continue he would ply thecow-hidethushewould again, sufficiently, rested hehad as Assoon and rest. when hewoulddown hewasexhausted, sit until a cow-hide lay thelashnaked upon back, white men likenedbreedinghorses. white to theact woman; whenwasdone,oneofthe theact rapeafree to black black man,atgunpoint, slave owners inMaryland forced anenslaved front audience. In1787, ofawhite white two with enslaved women theirwillandin against black forcedhave men includedbeing to sex 27 andfemale. Sexual ofenslaved abuse

29 26 26

” 28 Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 17 An enslaved man, man, An enslaved was Gordon, Private beaten so frequently that the multiple graphic whippings left depictedscars in this photograph.1863 (Donated by Corbis.) “

Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 18 BACK OF THE POOR VICTIM WAS LACERATED INTO ONE UNIFORM THAT THEIR TOES WOULD MR. LONG WOULD TIE THEM UP BY THE WRIST, HIGH SO COAT AGAIN, AS SOON AS HE HAD RESTED SUFFICIENTLY, HE WOULD PLY THE COW-HIDE UNTIL HE WAS EXHAUSTED, WHEN HE WOULD SIT DOWN AND REST. THEN WITH ACOW-HIDE LAY THE LASH UPON THE NAKED BACK, OF

THUS HE WOULD CONTINUE UNTIL THE WHOLE JUST TOUCH THE GROUND, AND GROUND, THE TOUCH BLOOD.

26 Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 19 ”

BLOOD. SO HIGH TOUCH THE GROUND, AND

OF MR. LONG WOULD TIE THEM UP BY THE WRIST, WRIST, THE BY UP THEM TIE WOULD LONG MR. JUST WOULD TOES THEIR THAT BACK, NAKED THE UPON LASH THE LAY A COW-HIDE WITH THEN REST. AND DOWN SIT WOULD HE WHEN EXHAUSTED, WAS HE UNTIL COW-HIDE THE PLY WOULD HE SUFFICIENTLY, RESTED HAD HE AS SOON AS WHOLE THE UNTIL CONTINUE AGAIN,WOULD HE THUS UNIFORM ONE INTO LACERATED WAS VICTIM POOR THE OF BACK COAT Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 20 girl as punishment, then left her on a table in in punishment, thengirl as lefther on a table an enslavedholder flogged thirteen-year-old in1828,In Charleston,SouthCarolina, aslave disregard for life andhorrific levels ofcruelty. for slavetion; some owners, reckless to thisled an enslaved person’s life protec nolegal had maimingorkilling theenslaved, against bition slaveBecause owners faced noformal prohi- trying prevent to thesaleoftheirrelatives. slowly,too anti-slavery possessing or materials, working read, arguinging to people, withwhite learn - living onanother plantation, ing aspouse away, visit tasks, assigned failing complete to or warning transgressions against like running extreme punishment violenceas physical for Finally, enslaved frequently people suffered ofonechild. in thebirth regularly ever andrepeatedly —resulting since Celiafivechased yearsbefore her and raped slave Awhite som. owner, pur Newsomhad forNew trial killingRobert Celiastood named In 1855, a19-year-old enslaved black woman the law norefuge andhad from sexual violence. enslaved black women were by notprotected children whowere enslaved. also Asproperty, ofbiracial resulted inthebirth often al abuse black women slave bywhite owners —sexu- prevalent most In its form —therapeofenslaved him. withalarge over killing twice stick, thehead 23, 1855, shehim authorities, clubbed Celiatold sex onthenightofJune seeking her cabin to When Newsomcame action. where, Celiatook theslave to treaties owner’s no daughterled convicted Celiaofmurder.convicted jury andan all-male,all-white sexual attack, defendwoman norightto had herself against death, she was hanged on December 21,death, she onDecember washanged 1855. 31 The court concluded anenslaved concluded Thecourt black 30 After en- repeated 32 Sentenced to to Sentenced 34 - - - - - 33 hush crying.” inthe[creek] head held its branch make to it himhefirst please whiptitandthen work its to est child,” she itwould wrote. “[B]ecause notdo month oldchild. “Gross Sook’s killed has young thekillingofa12-18 woman described ing white aslavehold acousin, to - Inaletter abuse. brutal Even very young children were notsafe from Kentucky, wasmurdered and their homede In May 1857, family awhite after inLouisville, relatives. their of sale the prevent to or trying slavery materials, anti- slowly,working too possessing whites, with arguing read, to learning plantation, on another living a spouse visiting tasks, assigned complete to like running away,transgressions failing or warning for against punishment as violence physical extreme suffered Enslaved people frequently dowithit.” to anything had one else property, suffer to andifhechose no theloss, law,quence; under local slave “the was [his] Theslaveand died. holder facednoconse When hereturned, she fallen had from the table a locked roomwithher feet shackled together. fingers and toes beaten off.beaten fingerstoes and from irons, leg hisowner thenailsofhis had andlititafire. Whenescaped Moses intar head himwith100-200whipped lashes; covered his away his owner Carolina, from inNorth bondage enslaved Roper blackMoses ran mannamed 37 36

35 When an - - - 21

stroyed by fire, four enslaved black men were As illustrated by this and many similar accounts, America In Slavery accused of the crime and stood trial. After an enslaved black people faced the constant threat all-white jury found the men innocent of the of attack, abuse, and murder under the system charges, an enraged mob of local white men of American slavery, which devalued their lives, armed with a cannon attacked the jail and over- ignored their human dignity, and offered no pro- took the building. Facing the threat of death at tection under the law. Long after slavery ended, the hands of the bloodthirsty mob, one of the racialized attacks and extra-judicial lynchings four enslaved men cut his own throat in terror; like these continued, fueled by the same myth the mob beat, stabbed, and hanged the other of racial inferiority previously used to justify three black men to death.38 enslavement.

Enslaved black people faced the constant threat of attack, abuse, and murder under the system of American slavery, which devalued their lives, ignored their human dignity, and offered no protection under the law.

Randolph Linsly Simpson African-American Collection, Yale Collection of American Literature, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library. Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 22 To be worked starved and both night day; and The childrenThe scream, they grieve my heart; Oh! Lord, we going are to adistant land, And theseAnd poor souls enjoy their peace? To you bound Iam in the cords of love. To see the wives husbands and part, Oh! Lord, when shall slavery cease, Farewell, ye children of the Lord, Lord, break the slavish power! Go and soundGo and the jubilee, &c. We torn away are to Georgia, Come go and along with me. Come go and along with me. Come go and along with me. O, may the Lord go with us; The Poor Slave’sThe Song Own We sold are to Louisiana, Come, go along with me. Go and sound,Go and &c. Go and, sound, &c. Go and sound,Go and &c. “ ” 39 23 THE DOMESTIC SLAVE TRADE America In Slavery IN AMERICA

In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth cen- whether to abolish slavery. turies, the United States acquired great swaths of land to the south of the original thirteen col- An estimated one million enslaved onies. White settlers in search of cheap, fertile people were forcibly transferred from land began to move to this area from states the Upper South to the Lower South in the Upper South, including North Carolina, between 1810 and 1860.43 By the time Tennessee, Virginia, and Kentucky. These settlers brought with them enslaved black people Alabama became a state in 1819, the to work the land and care for their homes.40 domestic slave trade was booming. By the 1790s, the invention of the cotton gin Over the next forty years, the enslaved allowed for increased production and the rising population in Alabama increased from price of cotton created incentives for settlers to 40,000 to 435,000.44 expand their plantations — and their supply of enslaved workers. In territories that would later The most prominent reason for the forced become the Lower South states of Alabama, transfer of so many enslaved people from the Louisiana, Mississippi, and Florida, the demand Upper to the Lower South was the economy. for enslaved black people skyrocketed.41 Due to the booming cotton industry, enslaved black people were worth more in the Lower After Congress outlawed the Transatlantic South than anywhere else in the country — and Slave Trade beginning in 1808,42 growing they were also a more secure investment in the demand for enslaved black laborers had to rely Lower South, where they had less chance to es- on natural reproduction in the local enslaved cape to freedom in the North.45 Forced abolition population, or the sale of enslaved people from was less of a threat in the Lower South where, one state to another. Over the next half century, in comparison to the Upper South, there was this “domestic slave trade” became ubiquitous much less political will or popular support for across the South and central to the debate over creating legal prohibitions on slavery. 24 THE ECONOMICS OF ENSLAVEMENT

Beyond its benefit to Southern plantation owners, American slavery was a major engine of prosperity throughout the Unit- ed States and worldwide. The Slavery In America The Montgomery Trade Slave labor of enslaved black people in the United States fueled explosive economic growth and wealth accumulation during the 19th century, particularly of Congress Library within the vast cotton and textile trades. Many Northern businesses and families made enslaved human “property” as process. Federal laws like the wealthy in this era still retain collateral when underwriting Fugitive Slave Acts facilitated those riches today, and can loans, and were authorized to the widespread kidnapping for directly trace their fortunes to “repossess” enslaved people if a profit that left all black people the toil of the enslaved. debtor failed to repay the loan. vulnerable. In this way, financial institu- By 1830, one million people in tions became directly involved The bodies of black men, wom- America labored in the cultiva- in the slave trade.46 en and children enslaved in tion of cotton, and almost all America were assigned mon- of them were enslaved. Cotton As the domestic slave trade etary values throughout their constituted more than half expanded to meet the demand lives. An enslaved person’s of the United States’ global created by the booming cot- purchase price was a painful exports. In addition to cotton, ton industry, cotton fueled reminder of how his or her life nearly all American industries America’s emergence as the was commodified, and chang- were dominated by an econo- world’s fastest-growing econ- es in this assigned monetary my dependent upon the work omy. Between 1810 and 1860, value could profoundly affect of enslaved people. Merchants one million enslaved Africans an enslaved person’s destiny. in the North traded cotton, sug- were forcibly transported from Some of the greatest heart- ar, and other agricultural prod- the Upper South to the Low- breaks and inhumanities of ucts grown by enslaved people. er South, and slave traders enslavement arose from the Banks and creditors accepted accumulated vast wealth in the cold valuation of human life.47 SlaverySlavery InIn AmericaAmerica The Montgomery Slave Trade 25 - - 49 50 lution, helped to build Wall lution,helped to Wall build of foundation ignored largely slavery.” school evade bankruptcy, and school bankruptcy, evade people $3.3 black sold 272 for said, “The itself university slavery is a prominent though is a prominent slavery gan Chase, Harvard, Columbia, Harvard, gan Chase, its existence toowes this his- of the United States’ most a microcosm is] [which of tory of American the whole history - two Universi of Georgetown organized presidents early ty’s - and pros wealth this nation’s to buy their own children; to children; buy their own typically these effortswere Insurance Company, JP Mor Company, Insurance universities profited off of the universities including institution of slavery, unsuccessful. million. As one professor later later million. As one professor path for the Industrial Revo path for schools.prestigious Today, Major companies and perity. a massive auctiona massive to help the attempting to money raise Princeton, and Yale. In 1838, In 1838, and Yale. Princeton, Profits from slavery laid the slavery from Profits Street, many and funded Aetna, Inc., and New York Life Life Aetna, York Inc., and New 48 status, by law, enslaved men men enslaved status, by law, childbearing age. A could infancy. be sold from calculated was value child’s describe parents aggrieved or “A1 Prime.” Depending on Depending Prime.” or “A1 much of their value once past of their value much parental rights, and children and skills. health, demeanor, health and strength, enslaved enslaved health and strength, typicallymen high received while enslaved women lost women while enslaved a permanent and hereditary a permanent had no recognizedand women and influenced by annually and skill could beand skill advertised hands” hands,” “full as “prime into well middle age, appraisals Because enslavement was was Because enslavement historicalMany accounts

- Library of Congress of Library slaved men were most prized were men slaved for their physical ability, and their physical ability, for family bonds among enslaved bonds among enslaved family on their “property” holdings the purposes of insurance, for to allow slave owners to report owners to slave allow ing more than $150,000 today. today. than $150,000 ing more men in their thirtiesmen consid- - abilityher En to bear children. people to goals, prioritize profit woman’s an enslaved puberty, more than $5000, represent than $5000, more wills, and taxes. Values for for wills, and taxes. Values and treated as reproduction an economic process. After appraised as human “assets” asappraised human “assets” ered to possessered peak strength enslaved people could reach enslaved Enslaved people were also people were Enslaved value was largely set based largely was on value Slave owners regularly ignored ignored regularly owners Slave Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 26 They heard thescreams andsaw thetearsof The domestic slaveThe domestic trade brought economic Throughout andrural theSouth,urban - commu Slave trading relied onthesaleofhuman fined in pens in alongside fined resembling dungeons, enslaved torn from people theirhomesand andwhipped enslaved chained together people ers andtravelers from thechance had theNorth as they marched hundreds of miles to be sold. they sold. as marched be hundreds ofmilesto enslaved fathers whoslit theirthroats rather worked amidstenslaved publicly- con people master’s clothing, food, shelter, and protection relationship profited from inwhich themaster enjoyed anorganic,people mutually-beneficial slave white myth, owners andenslaved black to the entire South,butitalso chal- benefits nities alike witnessed exhausted and dejected anddejected alike exhausted nities witnessed highlighted the humanity of those inbondage. ofthose thehumanity highlighted tragicscenes butits commodities, as beings ofslavery.reality slave Asthedomestic trade only slave because owners,pute overseers, and the labor andtheenslavedthe labor enjoyed from the to witness thesystem’s witness to inhumanity. day-to-day the enslaved thebrutal, witnessed civilizing influence. than be separated from separated their families.than be grew, however, growing numbers ofSouthern- slavedomestic dis- faced little trade,thismyth documented the heartbreaking stories ofen- stories theheartbreaking documented sold to thehighestbidder. to sold They and shopped slaved mothers from whojumped buildingsand lenged the myth of benign slavery. ofbenign lenged themyth Under that livestock in filthy conditions. in filthyconditions. livestock Pressaccounts Congress, Prints andPhotographs Division, Civil 51 Whitehall Street, Atlanta, Georgia. (Library Georgia. of Atlanta, Street, Whitehall Prior thegrowth to ofthe Slave traders inbuildings near heldauctions War Photographs, [LC-DIG-cw pb-03351].) commercial areas throughout theSouth. 52

Jourden Banks, ablack manwhowasenslaved While being heldforWhile being saleinRichmond, Virginia, he recalled, he recalled, in Alabama freedom, pub before to escaping lished a book in 1861 recounting his experiences. hisexperiences. in 1861 recounting lished a book “...I saw thingsInever again. wish see to [The slave I constructed, jail]wasso [The My attention was diverted from was diverted myselfby My attention at the same auction. Thedistresses Isaw at thesameauction. another day’s orwives one auction; sold either men,able meansoflodging women, way, andhusbands and fathers another, hundred. There orcomfort are nobeds, made a deep impression upon my adeepimpression mind, made upon every place kind. Sales take day. Andoh, the scenes I have witnessed! Husbands Ihave the scenes witnessed! on boards. The food is of the coarsest isofthecoarsest Thefood on boards. or children. They bynight have lieorsit to should think, as to hold some two orthree two holdsome should to think,as sympathy withothers.” andtheirwivessold, and children leftfor 53 - - 27

harsher work conditions to control and disci- America In Slavery pline the enslaved people who remained.58 In the Lower South, enslaved laborers were forced to work long hours under harsh conditions for no pay, allowing landowners to maximize their profits and accumulate unprecedented wealth. Thus, even amid clear evidence of slavery’s inhumanity, the symbiotic economic relationship between the two Southern regions solidified most white Southerners’ allegiance to slavery.59

Throughout the South, defenders of slavery rejected critics’ characterization of the slave trade as barbaric and cruel and instead insisted that the documented horrors of bondage were Enslaved people work in cotton fields outside Montgomery, Alabama, in the 1860s. (Library of Congress.) imagined or exaggerated.60 These pro-slavery advocates took to national platforms to assure Americans that enslaved people were primarily sold locally and had the opportunity to choose their new owners, and that efforts were made to This clearly exploitative treatment of enslaved keep families together. In reality, most enslaved people undermined the claim that slavery bene- people were sold without a single other family fitted the enslaved. member;61 it is estimated that more than half of all enslaved people held in the Upper South Perhaps due to the economic and geographic were separated from a parent or child through differences between the regions, the Upper and sale, and a third of all slave marriages were Lower South developed differing views of the destroyed by forced migration.62 domestic slave trade. In the Upper South, the slave trade was viewed with a mix of support and scorn,54 and a small minority of white people questioned whether the system’s brutality warranted outlawing it altogether.55 In contrast, residents of the Lower South generally accepted It is estimated that more than half of all the slave trade as proper and necessary, and very enslaved people held in the Upper South few expressed any concern for the enslaved.56 were separated from a parent or child Despite these differing attitudes, the slave trade through sale, and a third of all slave benefitted both the Upper and Lower South, marriages were destroyed by forced economically.57 The Upper South received high migration. sales revenue for the enslaved people sold to the Lower South, and used the threat of that region’s Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 28 — and the Southern social system did nothing to — andtheSouthern system didnothingto social While slave myriad traders committed indeed Pro-slavery separate to tried also advocates Proponents ofslavery claimed also thatslave- enslaved were economic people dueto traded of enslaved. only Infact, asmallpercentage people to gain supplemental income. gainsupplemental to people raping enslaved women, escape; hardship to or attempts institution ofslavery slaveinstitution byscapegoating treatment ofenslaved trafficked. being people traders individually as for responsible any brutal the inhumaneslave trade from the“humane” forms theenslaved, against ofabuse including dangerous respond to or to misbehavior bythe owners only enslaved- sold outofneces people discourage this behavior.discourage - theirreputa Despite slave owners enslaved Southsold oftheUpper sity — either to satisfy an insurmountable debt satisfyaninsurmountable —either to sity 65 slave owners didtoo 63 in most cases, cases, inmost 64 South. Transporting enslaved onfoot people theLower them to South andtransporting wealth Slave substantial traders accumulated wealthiest and most influential” citizens citizens influential” most and wealthiest among “the wealthiest and most influential” wealthiest influential” andmost among “the a whip. was considered the“simplest” way because black men inpairs, handcuffedtogether, them by purchasing theenslaved intheUpper it required only ahorse, amule,wagon, and tion fortion brutality, slave traders were generally citizens intheircommunities. citizens Despite their reputation for brutality, brutality, for reputation their Despite in their communities. in their slave traders were generally among “the “the slave wereamong generally traders 67 Thetraders upenslaved lined adult 66 29 Slavery In America In Slavery

Enslaved people on the Smith plantation in Beaufort, South Carolina. (The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, Timothy H. O’Sullivan, “Slaves on J. J. Smith’s Plantation, near Beaufort, SC,” 1864, Albumen silver print, 21.4 x 27.3 cm.)

and then ran a long chain through all of the slashed to pieces by long whips.71 Slave traders handcuffs.68 These arrangements were called often sold enslaved people as they moved from “coffles.”69 Enslaved black women and older one community to another along their route, black children marched behind the men, and and coffles became a common sight across the the smallest children and the sick rode in a South.72 wagon at the rear. Beginning in the nineteenth century, the intro- The overland march was common and brutal. duction of new methods of transportation began One trek could last months and exceed one to alter the routes used by slave traders. The ar- thousand miles.70 The enslaved were forced rival of the steamboat in 1811 allowed traders to to march quickly for hours until they dropped send the enslaved from markets along the Ohio in the road, and those who fell risked being and Mississippi rivers to Natchez, Mississippi, and New Orleans, Louisiana.73 The steam lo- comotive arrived in the 1830s and by the 1840s and 1850s, rail lines stretched across the South. Often cleared, constructed, and maintained by Traders lined up enslaved adult black enslaved labor, these rail lines became a pre- men in pairs, handcuffed them together, ferred method for transporting the enslaved to and then ran a long chain through all of the Lower South. Trips that took weeks by foot the handcuffs. now took less than two days by rail.74 Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 30 These changes in transportation transformed changesThese in transportation Alabama, as a center for acenter as trading inenslavedAlabama, As more andmore slave traders this utilized two days by rail. two than less now took weeks bytook foot that Trips South. Lower enslaved the to the transporting for method a preferred enslaved labor, railbecame lines these by maintained and constructed, Cleared, Montgomery, from Alabama, oneofmany stops established between New OrleansandMont between established along theoverland aprimary route to trading arriving at the Montgomery train station each arriving attheMontgomery train station market. In1847,market. linewas adirect steamboat principal slaveprincipal market inAlabama. andbyrail, Montgomery the by boat became by the State of Alabama constructed arail ofAlabama line constructed by theState black people. rail system, hundreds ofenslaved began people to connect Montgomery to Atlanta, Georgia. Montgomery connect Atlanta, to to gomery, day. 78 Now connected to therest to oftheSouth Now connected 75 allowing Montgomery rival to Mobile, 76 In1851, enslaved bought people 79 77 - principal slaveprincipal market in Alabama. the became by rail, Montgomery and by boat South the of rest the to day. each station Now connected train Montgomery the at arriving enslaved of hundreds people began rail system, this slave utilized traders more and more As Georgia. Atlanta, to Montgomery connect rail line to a constructed Alabama of State the In 1851, by enslaved people bought Library ofCongress Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 31

During theDuring last twenty years of American was market more no slave slavery, central than conspicuous or the in one Montgomery, Alabama.

SLAVE TRADE SLAVE MONTGOMERY Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 32 South, butcensus data regions ofthe trading markets inthe importing thelargest as are slave commonly recognized inAlabama. New OrleansandNatchez space slave trading ery important themost became - slave Montgom inMississippi, tradingcity was theforemost andNatchez inLouisiana ter Newas Orleanswas themajorslave tradecen- D gomery’s prominence amongSouthern slave largest slave-owning states inAmerica. largest slave-owning states slavedomestic oneofthetwo tradeinAlabama, By 1860, ofthe Montgomery was thecapital Montgomery’sed prominence intheslave trade. rich elevat work soil, the fertile, to populations region, where slave owners large amassed slave Montgomery’s Black thefertile Belt proximity to spicuous thantheoneinMontgomery, Alabama. ery, noslave market was more central- orcon uring the last twenty yearsuring thelast twenty ofAmerican slav 81 suggests thatMont 80 Just - - - farmers withasupply ofenslaved workers. slave provide into Alabama traders stepped demand anincreased for to labor, led of cotton Africans price withthem. When thebooming whobroughtCarolinas, enslaved andGeorgia, early settlers fromlands Virginia, attracted the centurythe nineteenth when Alabama’s fertile markets 1840. dramatically after increased now known Alabama. as there were very few Africans living inthearea a dominantplayer slave inthedomestic trade, A century Montgomery’s priorto emergence as 80 percent. County, byapproximately increased Alabama, while theenslaved inMontgomery population 1840 and1860, by38percentcreased between The enslaved inNew Orleansde population In 1820, 41,879 enslaved lived in black people 83 Thatchanged in History, Montgomery, Ala.) Archives and Dep’t. (Ala. Commerce Street. down looking Alabama, downtown Montgomery, SquareCourt in 84 82 -

33 Enslaved Black Population Montgomery Slave TradeMontgomery

City or County, State 1820 1830 1840 1850 1860

Mobile, Alabama 835 1,106 6,186 9,356 11,376

Montgomery, Alabama 2,655 6,450 13,115 19,427 23,710

Natchez, Mississippi 7,299 10,942 14,241 14,395 14,202

New Orleans, Louisiana 7,591 9,462 23,448 18,068 14,484

At least 300,000 of the 435,080 enslaved people living in Alabama in 1860 were in the state as a result of the domestic slave trade. Many of them were sold in Montgomery.

Alabama; by 1860, this number had increased marched enslaved people down the Old Federal tenfold to 435,080.85 Historians estimate that Road,88 which ran from Milledgeville and Ma- 70 percent of the new arrivals resulted from con, Georgia, across the Chattahoochee River slave trading and 30 percent resulted from the near Phenix City, Alabama, then through Mount relocation of white slaveholding families.86 In Meigs, Alabama, and into downtown Montgom- other words, at least 300,000 of the 435,080 ery, where the Old Federal Road became what enslaved people living in Alabama in 1860 were is now Adams Avenue. Montgomery’s slave in the state as a result of the domestic slave market was situated near the Artesian Basin in trade. Many of them were sold in Montgomery. present-day Court Square.

The very Montgomery streets on which thousands of enslaved black people were sold in the mid-1800s remain central to downtown Mont- gomery today. Enslaved men, women, and chil- Enslaved men, women, and children dren arriving by steamboat or rail were paraded arriving by steamboat or rail were pa- down Commerce Street from the Alabama River or railway station to the slave auction site raded down Commerce Street from the or local slave depots.87 Slave traders coming Alabama River or railway station to the to Montgomery from the Upper South by foot slave auction site or local slave depots. Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 34 History, Montgomery, Ala.) (Ala. Dep’t. Archives and (Ala. Dep’t. Cotton scene in Court inCourt scene Cotton Square, Montgomery, tol onMarkettol Street. - capi thoroughfarelocal thestate upto leading Three ofthecity’s four slave the lined depots the same as the number of banks andhotels. ofbanks thenumber the sameas foured slave separate merchants anddepots, The 1859-1860 Montgomery directory city list Market which isnow Dexter Avenue. Street, primarily alongCommerce Streetand located the city’s geography andeconomy. They were major slave traders presence dominated whose agrowingMontgomery of number attracted Alabama, 1870-1899.Alabama, presence dominated the city’s geography and economy. and geography city’s the dominated presence slave whose major number of traders agrowing attracted Montgomery 90 89 -

140 Negroes . . . at public auction, for140 Negroes .atpublicauction, cash at slavecal broker thesaleof“about advertised newspapers; inone,aprominentin local lo auction. for orfor privatesaleatadepot public saleat Montgomery either newspapers, advertising theirsubsequent saleinthe and announced of enslaved from South people theUpper ery. traders These arranged for thepurchase 164slave to licenses traders- inMontgom From 1860, 1848 to granted office theprobate 91 These notices regularly notices These appeared - 35

the Artesian Basin [Court Square] on June 2, Montgomery Daily Advertiser continued to run Slave TradeMontgomery 1860.” Another advertisement gave an observ- “reward” advertisements posted by slave owners er “a sense of what the large traders meant by seeking their runaway “property.” For example, buying for the ‘Southern market’ [finding] in on April 22, 1865, the Advertiser ran the follow- one column of a Montgomery newspaper three ing notice for N.G. Scott: establishments respectively offering at private sale ‘150 likely Negroes, mostly from Virginia, and South Carolina’ and ‘50 likely Negroes just arrived from the Carolinas.’”92

Mason Harwell, one of the most active slave dealers in the 1850s attracted a sizable crowd “about the Artesian Basin, January 2, 1860, to $100 REWARD. witness the public sale of 30 horses, which had My Negro Woman JANE left belonged to a circus, and 165 enslaved black my house, on Tuesday, April 5. people.”93 In a single day, potential buyers could view as many as twenty different slave She is about 5 feet 4 inches high of lots for sale in the heart of downtown Mont- dark copper color, quite fleshy, about gomery.94 Sir Charles Lyell, an English citizen 35 or 40 years old. I will pay the above touring the South, came to Montgomery and reward if delivered to me or in jail recounted observing the sale of humans one where I can get her. She has a husband day and the next day observing an “auctioneer . about 7 miles above Wetumpka . . selling horses in the same place.”95 Another belonging to Mr. Townsend. Englishman visiting Montgomery was struck, seemingly for the first time, at the inhumanity of humans being sold into slavery.96

Slave trading in Montgomery thrived well into the mid-1860s, even as the Civil War raged. As late as 1864, T.L. Frazer & Co. opened a new “slave market” in Montgomery on the south block of Market Street (present-day Dexter From 1848 to 1860, the probate office Avenue) between Lawrence and McDonough granted licenses to 164 slave traders in streets. In April 1864, a new firm of slave deal- Montgomery. These traders arranged ers announced plans to establish an office in for the purchase of enslaved people Montgomery and promised to ‘‘keep constantly from the Upper South and announced on hand a large and well selected stock such as families, house servants, gentlemens’ body their subsequent sale in the Montgom- servants, seamstresses, boys and girls of all ery newspapers, advertising either for descriptions, blacksmiths, field hands.”97 Tell- private sale at a depot or for public sale ingly, even after Robert E. Lee’s surrender, the at auction. Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 36 Several Archives for slave found andHistory, sale.(Ala. be indowntown Montgomery people could Dep’t. depots advertising Montgomery, Ala.) 37

Walking through downtown Montgomery today, Slave TradeMontgomery one can still trace the steps that thousands of enslaved black people took in the nineteenth century as they stepped from boats and railcars to be sold in this capital city. The path from the railroad tracks and the river, up Commerce Street to Court Square, past Dexter Avenue King Memorial Baptist Church, and on to where Dexter Avenue meets the Capitol, reveals a glimpse into that past and a chance to walk in those footsteps. Though the buildings that served as slave depots and offices for slave traders are no longer standing, the streets and plots of land where the domestic slave trade prospered remain.

Indeed, the plot that now holds The Equal Jus- tice Initiative offices at 122 Commerce Street, and The Legacy Museum at 115 Coosa Street, formerly housed a warehouse owned by John H. Murphy, commonly known as the founder of the Montgomery City Water Works and Sanitary Sewer Board and builder of the “Murphy House” at 22 Bibb Street. Murphy was a slave owner involved in the slave trade in Montgomery who housed enslaved people at the warehouse where EJI currently resides.98 And EJI is not alone. Ev- ery inch of Commerce Street, Court Square, and today’s Dexter Avenue witnessed the savagery and brutality of Montgomery’s notorious slave trade — and its role in American slavery — although very little has been done to acknowledge this history.

Even after Robert E. Lee’s surrender, the Montgomery Daily Advertiser continued to run “reward” advertisements posted by slave owners seeking their runaway “property.” Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 38 There, byrail the andshipped hewas sold to Jesse, ayoung,Jesse, free black man,was running an Jesse informedJesse theGoldthwaite family who errand for hisfamily in Maryland when hewas when emancipated as anelderly as man,Jesse when emancipated kidnapped and taken to Richmond, Virginia. to andtaken kidnapped home or help him contact hisfamily.home orhelphimcontact Later, purchased himinMontgomery that hewas a to Maryland,to thefamily send Jesse refused to free man, andasked helphim return them to slave market inMontgomery, Alabama. When MONTGOMERY’S PARTICULARLY BRUTAL PARTICULARLY MONTGOMERY’S SLAVE TRADING PRACTICES find his of relativesbecame ordetermine what was not uncommon. Hisstorywas notuncommon. largely has been them. trading capital of a state withexceptionally ofastate trading capital of apreacher inOhio butwas never ableto forgotten, whileastreet neardowntown Mont andJesse’s practices, disturbing experience family thatowned him. gomery remains for named theGoldthwaite sought to locate his family with the assistance hisfamily withtheassistance locate to sought 99 Tragically, Montgomery wastheslave -

Illustration of Montgomery’s slave market published in 1861. (Donated by Corbis.) 39

were abducted, transported to Huntsville, Al- Slave TradeMontgomery abama, and sold into slavery. Amy, Caty, and KIDNAPPING Caty’s four children eventually brought suit in Madison County to regain their freedom. They were represented by an attorney at a hearing AND ENSLAVEMENT where multiple witnesses testified that the women had previously established their freedom in Prince George County and were seized OF after an erroneous larceny charge. Yet the Madison County Superior Court took no action, FREE AFRICAN continuing the case from term to term for six years. Finally, after years of inactivity, the women dropped their suit and it was dismissed. As AMERICANS a result of the court’s refusal to rule on the case, six free black people were left to resign themselves to a life of slavery.105 Slave markets across Alabama, particularly the one in Montgomery, facilitated the kidnapping and enslavement of free African Americans. Under Alabama law, the color of a black per- Slave traders across the United States son’s skin gave rise to a presumption that he or kidnapped free and enslaved African 100 she was enslaved. In fact, in 1833, the Ala- Americans to sell in the slave markets bama legislature banned free black people from of Montgomery. residing in the state.101 Although the presumption that a black person was enslaved could be rebutted in court, Alabama judges proved resistant to claims of freedom. Courts procedurally barred emancipation claims,102 directed juries to ignore substantial evidence of freedom,103 or simply refused to act in favor of individuals who demonstrated they were illegally enslaved. As a result, slave traders across the United States kidnapped free and enslaved African Americans to sell in the slave markets of Montgomery. One well-organized ring ran a business abducting free and enslaved African Americans in Florida and selling them in Alabama.104

In the early nineteenth century, Amy Butcher and her daughter, Caty — free black women residing in Prince George County, Virginia — Slave depots or pens were usually proximate to slave markets. Slave pen in Alexandria, Virginia. (Library of Congress.) Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 40 vertised thatitkept “constantlyvertised onhandalarge Roughly halfofall theenslaved were separat L. Frazer &Co. Slave inMontgomery Mart L. was Montgomery didnotshy away from theprac ed from andparents aresulted as theirspouses of and well selected stock” ofyoung stock” African Amerand well selected as many 150,000as enslaved were people willing to sell families sell willing to together, iteagerly- ad in Montgomery, recalled: Delia Garlic, enslaved andgirls. once boys ican tice of selling children ofselling tice away from theirmothers the domestic slavethe domestic trade. or fathers. For example, thoughtheThomas separated fromseparated theirfamilies. “Babies wuz snatched from“Babies wuzsnatched dere mother’s awfulness ofit.” an’ never saw eachother Course ag’in. dey wuz separated fromwuz separated sisters an’ brothers breas’ Chilluns speculators. an’ to sold day, but even den you couldn’t guess de cry; you thinkdey notcry when dey wuz sold lak cattle? I could tell you ‘bout tell lak Icould itall sold cattle? 108 106 InAlabama alone, 107 Slave traders in in traders Slave SEPARATION FAMILIES - - - OF Advertisements intheMontgomeryAdvertisements Daily Adver Dry Goods Store, sought to sell a thirteen-year- sell to Dry Store,sought Goods Reynolds ofJ.D. Ware’s Drug inMontgomery even mother. Directly Reynolds’ above adver who were for African notorious tearing Ameri- slave sell to were families traders, to reluctant regard for whether she wasadaughter, sister, or negro girl,from 18 years 10to ofage,” purchasers, resulting intheroutine separation restrained thewhimsofslave merchants and In part, Montgomery slaveIn part, traders were re in the city wasfarin thecity from family W.M.A. oriented. tisement, S.P.tisement, Weeford, oftheOne-Armed Man’s ties ofenslaved longdisappeared. ties had people tiser posted by those seeking to purchase en to - seeking bythose posted tiser old African Americanboy. force, the concern for maintaining thefamilialforce, theconcern for maintaining can familiescan apart. of families. Before 1830, slave some owners slave tradeinMontgomery adominant became sought to purchase “[a] to likely,sought strong andhealthy slaved demonstratethattheslave people trade sponding to clients’ to Nothing sponding requests. specific 109 However, the bythetime 112 111 without without - - 110 - SlaveryMontgomery In America Slave Trade The Montgomery Slave Trade 41 NEW on handon a large and well selectedwell stock. they keep constantlythey keep SLAVE MART SLAVE 13 years old. 13 Bill of sale for fourteen-year-old girl named girl fourteen-year-old Bill sale for of (Ala. $750Ann, bought in Montgomery. for Ala.) Montgomery, Dep’t. and History, Archives NEGRO BOY FOR SALE. FOR BOY NEGRO Ala. Dep’t.Ala. and Archives History, Montgomery, Ala. Montgomery, History, children.

sale of thirty five likely

negroes... men, and women, NOTICE! NOTICE! Slavery In America The Montgomery(Library ofCongress) Enslaved ofCivil War. family atstart Slave Trade 42 The most heartbreaking,The most trau- SEPARATED BY SLAVERY: THETRAUMAOFLOSING FAMILY vide a window into the tragedy thetragedy vide awindow into Emancipation, formerly en- Emancipation, they would be Emancipation, they would be away from children, spouses, Enslavedauction. lived people enslaved people’s communities and the fragile hope that, with with and thefragile that, hope parents, and siblings. Followingparents, and siblings. matizing, andpainful feature notices in newspapers across innewspapersacross notices nect, many searched fornect, de offamiliesnumber didrecon- Althoughreunited. asmall in constant fear of being sold fearsold ofbeing in constant the country. pro notices These withtheirlost reconnect to of enslavement was the slave slave the was enslavement of family and friends, publishing of the forced separation of of theforced of separation cades without success. cades slaved people tried desperately desperately slaved tried people - - Jones. Mother belonged to Mr. to MotherJones. belonged Janie Stokes, her brothers were Joe andGeorge Nelson, who Joe Charles Ebell, ofRichmond, Va. Carter. Mysister’s name was Church. Any information will Cox; am22years old.Address CONCERNING my brothers, October 11th,1883 October November 13, 1915 November Mary andAndrew Car Carter Bettie Cox, Columbus,Kansas. Bettie My nameatpress-ent isBettie whenNancy Nelson, who died Nelson, wholived withinnine er’s name was Jonesbefore en name was Bettie Nelson. en namewas Bettie enlisted intheUnionarmyenlisted was sold, herwas sold, namewas Mary was Ryland Jones,my moth- named Richardnamed andHenry Myfather’smy people. name be gladly received.be river. Ourmother’s namewas miles ofAthens, ontheElk Ga., near Athens, Ala., in1863. We I would like to locate some of some I would like locate to I was two yearsI wastwo old.Mymaid- INFORMATION WANTED ter belonged to the old Baptist the oldBaptist to belonged ter formerly JohnS. to belonged she she andafter wassold, Richard Thompson Richard (Nelson) Cox Bettie 114 113

- South Carolina, 1862.South Carolina, (Library of Congress) Five generations ofanenslaved family in 1150, Nashville, Tenn. feb10-1m When lastheard from was in years whoformerly ofage, Of my Daniel son, 15or16 Memphis, Tenn. I amatpres- Marshal county, Ten., andsub March 31, 1866 ROBERT WILLIAMS.ROBERT ent living atUnionville, Bed- belonged to Clinton Williams, to belonged be ad-dressed, orthedesired ad-dressed, be information can be sent to sentto information be can the Colored Tennessean, Box ford county, Tenn. where Ican sequently to Harveysequently to McRory. Robert Williams Robert 115 - SlaveryMontgomery In America Slave Trade The Montgomery Slave Trade 43 - - - Black family outside former outside former family Black quarters, Georgia, c.1907. slave - 119 118 Martha Cobble ly a slave, has searched forty has searched a slave, ly learned the whereabouts of the whereabouts learned oline. I haven’t called half of her childrens’ names, as I cannot re called childrens’ half of her oline. I haven’t gan Smith in Alabama, and he died in the summer about in Alabama, and he diedgan Smith the summer the year in trader when they eight and they when trader she of age. Recently tenyears I left there I went up to the plantation I went I left there that was called the Monroe I have not found yet. not found soldI have told Stephen were me that they Brother and Mrry. Frank names are and was sold Orleans in New together, make another inquiry for my sister Pinnie and her husband Robin; Robin; sister husband my Pinnie and her for inquiry another make and Car Mame, Emmer and girls are named Richard, Stephen and both made was and happy by a member them; I have four names of cousins: Edmund, Comadore, Comadore, names of cousins: Edmund, four I have member them; and sister after got one brother and I have Ala., near Montgomery, by Frank Smith, and I pray God see may they this. information and I pray Any Smith, by Frank were sold to Orleans a New were as to her whereabouts will be gladly received. Address Valentine Valentine as to Address will be whereabouts received. her gladly December 16, 1886 December 16, and Emanuel brother my out where found — I have MR. EDITOR their eldest sonsRobert are call is his name, but they him Robin; Martha Cobble, of Owensboro, Martha of Owensboro, Cobble, former woman a Colored Ky., Louis Toliver moved to old, and when Mississippi I was 7 or 8 years Louis Toliver and was sold to Mor master, youngest my Toliver, with Nick Place Hudson, usedof them Nelson, all to belong to who lived Joe Green, visit from one of them. visit from Our first owner was Louis Toliver. I was in Georgia, I born and when Toliver. was owner Louis Our first years for her two her sons who for years Stephen are by the help of the SOUTHWESTERN. So please to by the help of the SOUTHWESTERN. Stephen are 1860, and about the last of November 1860 I moved to and about 1860 Louisiana the last of November 1860, Valentine Toliver Valentine August 3, 1889 3, August Toliver, Shreveport, La. Toliver, 117 116 Mrs. Ceillia Sours Emily Robbins Emily girls, Judia and Sillia. We lived lived girls, Judia and Sillia. We children, whom I left in Carroll in Carroll whom I left children, year of Miss., the first county, three miles from Middletown, miles from three took some of my children, and took children, some of my the war. We all belonged to Mr. all belonged to Mr. We the war. the whereabouts of my six of my the whereabouts to Ala-bama and sold her, but but and sold her, to Ala-bama iel, Toby, Nelson and Walker; Nelson and Walker; iel, Toby, is, Emily Robbins, Westfield, Westfield, Robbins, is, Emily Indiana. INFORMATION WANTED OF WANTED INFORMATION me to Texas. The names of me to Texas. boys,- Dan were: children my band, their father, died. Wiley died. Wiley band, their father, kept me, a small child. My me, a small child. kept name and address present were divided, and a Mr. Pratt Pratt and a Mr. divided, were was Patsy. We belonged to We was Patsy. a speculator near who lived Miss., on Mr. Davis’ plantation. Davis’ Miss., on Mr. Parker bought me, and brought bought me, and brought Parker Miss Eugene, daughter of S. of S. daughter Miss Eugene, Burts, took rest. the My hus- Mr. Editor I desire to know to I desire Editor know Mr. November 1883 29, MY MOTH-er. Her the name Her MY MOTH-er. February 26th, 1885 February Graves, San Feilipe, Texas. Feilipe, San Graves, Greensboro, N. C. He took He her N. C. Greensboro, Steven Burts.Steven died and we He Address me, care Mr. C. H. C. Mr. me, care Address Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 44 . where they were numerous, inwhich nottoo Because slaveryBecause andvicious,en- wasbrutal fied fied enslaved likepeople were livestock, com- exploitative features slave ofthedomestic trade exploitative an enslaved person’s orailments, traders age and bruises. Slaveand bruises. traders that understood we putiton.” theenslavedwould decorate increasetheir to marketability. For example,older men were pings orpainfulpunishments thatleftscars whip Thisresultedintorturous practices. baric practices also contributed to the especially theespecially to contributed also practices misleading observers increasing andartificially in mon inMontgomery succeeded andoften increase anenslaved person’s value. To conceal in Montgomery. to cover [greyto hair], andwithablacking brush the purchase ofanenslaved price person. Such case [the slave]case ofblacking aprescription had shaved andtheir“grey hairs were plucked out sale, so traders engaged in cosmetic efforts to to efforts traderssale, so incosmetic engaged would such scarsandevidence ofresistance slaved frequently people cruel andbar resisted lower thevalue ofenslaved Africans offered for SLAVE TRADING EXPLOITATIVE PRACTICES 120 - which objecti practices, These LOCAL - - “TO BESOLDAT AUCTION” The institution ofslaveryThe institution The catalog’s entries,excerpt To maximizetheirpurchase 1854, Montgomery local mer - inthecata Winter boasted Negro.” Negroes, ofthesame num- ed here,ed enslaved reduced able anddesirable agangof “[S]o valu- and attributes. and breeders. Many ofthose were ever before offeredto the public. United to the vivacity thevivacity to public. United lotofhandsthatmanageable rigid control, they are themost ber, never has brought been person byname, description, - Winterprice, prepared acata andspeculated sold, bought, be to “property” as people black men, women, andchil- men, women, andchildren to the humility ofthelow countrythe humility any occasion.” upon together 117 sell enslavedto people their prospects as workers as their prospects of theVirginian, they possess from hisestate. chant JohnG.Winter prepared on inthemarket economy. In enslaved bytreating fortunes owners andslave traders made Slave dren commodities. to sought to reduce enslaved to sought log. “Inured to labor, “Inured to log. subject to enslaved each advertising log 121 - - SlaveryMontgomery In America Slave Trade The Montgomery Slave Trade 45 about 11; about 9; about 7; about 10; about 3; about 8; Louisa— All Children of Judy. Children All Passilla— Martha— Mary Jane— Molly— about 20, Georgia, daughter about 20, Dolphus— boy about old, raised 11 to 12 years Children of Becky and Bill Nell. of Becky Children Viney— of Abram, good field hand, of Abram, been a little picker, smart anything. to enough learn picker, present owner; haspresent fine not a fault, cotton smart as a steel capable of learning trap, anything. His brother, two years older is a older two years anything. His brother, practiced house in the but nothing to speak of; first rate young woman, fine breeder and woman, fine rateyoung of; first first rate blood; she is No. One, raisedrate by the One, blood; No. she is first moulder, for whom $1,800 has been offered. whom $1,800 for moulder, Milus— Milus— on plantation, two been years, for on the road boy old, raised about 11 years Catalogue, man. a valuable will make of Negroes, named Judy, and is in this namedof Negroes, Judy, family, his mother being his mother one of the best family, and a very smart boy, off most excellent off most smart boy, and a very about 23 years old, raised old, raised about 23 years about 26, field hand, field cannot about 26, Shepherd— on road and plantation, good Cotton picker, and plantation,on road good Cotton picker, not one of the choicest. smart anything. to enough learn master might cure her. Cotton picker, Cotton picker, her. master cure might complained some occasionally of a of indisposition, a proper but probably Nancy— recommend her particularly, complains complains particularly, her recommend Randall— in Virginia, goodin Virginia, plantation hand, has upon the whole a very good but negro, upon whole a very the listed were connectedlisted were as and husbands separation at auction and terrified by the unknown future ahead. future unknown rheumatic pain in one of his shoulders; rheumatic pain in one of his shoulders; wives, parents and children, vulnerable to vulnerable and children, parents wives, Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 46 was also common practice amongthetraders practice common was also purchased. raped bytheir owners around raped to andpassed maids,” African American women whowere in Montgomery planters’ filled orders for “fancy supplying to laborers,In addition slave traders trader whosexually awoman inhis assaulted themselves. coffle and allowed his companions to dothe andallowedcompanions coffle his friends and visitors to dothesame. friends to andvisitors slave traders regularly thewomen raped they serve that atrader’s as reported assistant systematic sexualsystematic ofenslaved abuse people 124 123 Another former slave ofa told Oneformer slave forced to SEXUAL EXPLOITATION EXPLOITATION SEXUAL ENSLAVED PEOPLE ENSLAVED 122 The OF Alabama notorious. especially among the traders themselves. traders the among practice common also people was enslaved of abuse sexual Systematic exploitation created by slavery created exploitation central insouth unrestricted character andunregulated featuresunrestricted of Montgomery’s slave the human trade made same for several days before her. selling 125 The

Library of Congress Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 47 11 10 ADDITIONAL SLAVE DEPOTS SLAVE 8 9 OTHER SITES COMPLICIT IN SITES COMPLICIT OTHER TRADE THE SLAVE Business Owner’s 1. Slave Works Iron Winter 2. State Courthouse BANKS AND INSURANCE FINANCING COMPANIES SLAVERY State1. Bank Lehman2. Bros. of Montgomery Bank 3. Co. Insurance Montgomery 4. 7 4 3 6 SLAVE AUCTION AUCTION SLAVE MARKET 15. M. Harwell 15. Edmund Harrison 16. 15 14 2 2 16 11 13 12 1 10 8 7 6 5 9 4 In 1860 in Montgomery in trading there 1860 more slave were In spaces than churches and hotels. 3 SLAVE AUCTIONEERS, TRADERS, AND INVESTORS TRADERS, AUCTIONEERS, SLAVE & Nickels Wilkinson 1. & Co. Brame Hansford, 2. & Benson Cameron 3. G. Lee & N. M. Carter W. 4. A. Grant W. 5. James & Co. Gray 6. Leonard Pitkin 7. H. Bock F. 8. Arnold S. D. 9. & Co. Belshaw James B. 10. & Co. Waltington Orme, 11. Olcott & Harris James E. Davis 12. H. Weaver E. H. Metcalf & J. 13. John Whiting 14. 2 5 4 1 2

SLAVE IMPORTATION ROUTE 3

1 (RIVER) SLAVE DEPOT SLAVE & Co. Gilmer 1. Pens and Slave 2. Warehouse & Co. John H. Murphy Thos. A.3. Powell Lindsey W. Jno. 4. & Bulger Brown 5. Mason Harwell 6. 7. Depot/Invester Slave Lee & Norton Depot 8. Slave Depot/Invester 9. Slave R. Browning Samuel Depot Slave 10. Depot Slave 11.

1 SLAVE IMPORTATION SITE IMPORTATION SLAVE Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 48 Nat Turner byLorenzo Rebellion Harris, 1936. Urging Slavesto the The largest rebellion intheBrit Act of1740,- theas restricting After therevolt, thecolonial After enslaved Africans inHaiti States, like throughout those States, Carolina 1739 inSeptember RESISTANCE THROUGHREVOLT, ESCAPE, ANDSURVIVAL Documented revolts inJamai- Documented Enslaved Africans intheUnited Rebellion, took place in South inSouth place Rebellion, took won theirfreedom in1804 fol- when scores ofenslaved Afri- revolts, escape, andsurvival.revolts, escape, barred importation ofAfrican barred importation ment ofenslaved and people, them. stop to whotried militia icas, used a variety of tactics oftactics avariety used icas, ish known colonies, Cato’s as to resist bondage including resist bondage to andtheAmerthe Caribbean to Spanishto Florida andfought date back to the late 1700s. thelate to back date Puerto Rico,and Suriname ca, cans began anarmed march began cans slaves for years. ten sembly, andmove education, legislature passed theNegrolegislature passed 127

126 - -

- Americans were in executed At 30 least enslaved African 1822 thediscovery after of Carolina. Denmark Vesey’s planned in- Deslondes, was mutilated and and Deslondes, wasmutilated enslaved- 500 inmod people ers’ decapitated heads were heads ers’ decapitated Ninety-fiveern-day Louisiana. extraordinary violence.In1811, as awarningas others- to contem plating rebellion. plating New miles en Orleans route to onpikes 60 mounted spanning were executed; participants militia defeated arevolt defeated militia by revoltspressed domestic with bloody revoltbloody slavery against in ican plantation owners sup plantation ican the revolt’s leader, Charles dismembered; andhisfollow white federal andlocal troops dozens of black people on a dozens ona ofblack people surrection inCharleston,South slaved NatTurner minister led lowing yearsAmer ofbattle, 129 In1833, when en- 128 - - - Throughout themore than240 As early 1793, as Congress en- Southampton, Virginia, white Virginia,Southampton, white years slavery thatchattel exist victed andexecuted. victed violent repression ofanti-slav For re many black people, ery revolts noteliminate could enslavement. enslaved America, inNorth ed to bondage regions fleeing acted its first its fugitive acted slave law, bondage. escape to attempted nearly twenty enslaved nearly twenty people, Afterward, 120people. mated risks ofrunning, approximately resistance orprevent theevenresistance - black people who had escaped escaped whohad black people requiring residents ofallstates for longed freedom and people including Turner, were- con that had outlawedthat had slavery and ofslavery.tual abolition to forciblyto andreturn seize - killinganesti communities, black local forces attacked offered thepromise of freedom. sisting enslavementsisting meant legal obstacles anddangerous obstacles legal 131 Despite the Despite 130 But the - - - SlaveryMontgomery In America Slave Trade The Montgomery Slave Trade 49

138 139 139 ly embedded in African culture culture embeddedly in African sive violence was itself a form was itself violence sive a form of resistance. - of oppres despite the forces - Afri of enslaved generations can-descended people con- in their cabins.dance rituals “A stored in my grief that were communicate and encourage A white sailor who one another. to 1770 remarked 1760 from of their songs [I] cannot say.” the field and story-telling and the field and story-telling the time,the subjects all of that had been perpetrated that tradition by using songs to on board were that Africans hope, helped and com- to forge in munity work-songs through beman cannot well miserable, an in pleasure,” him immersed all the acts of wrong memory, kidnapped Africans continuedkidnapped Africans the sing, to “frequently known answering and woman men when he sees every one about he seeswhen every worked on slave trade voyages voyages trade on slave worked well before the launch of the the launch before well against me.” another, but what is the subject another, enslaved man named Charles man named Charles enslaved Ball later recalled. “I forgot for for recalled. later “I forgot Ball veyed messages of sorrow and messages sorrow of veyed Transatlantic Slave Trade, and Trade, Slave Transatlantic The determination to survive The determination to survive The songs passed through - - - And in 136 Attack and of the Take Crête-à-Pierrot by Auguste 1839. Raffet, 137 In 1855, Alfred Wooby Wooby Alfred In 1855, 135 Harriet Tubman Harriet son died in a Kentucky prison son died in a Kentucky statelines. slavery, but fellow abolitionists but fellow slavery, transporting across runaways to resist through music, faith, music,to faith, through resist Music deep living. was to keep ties tried later to sell him into tie County, North Carolina, for tie County, Indeed, American slavery was Indeed,slavery American manizing system for everyone. everyone. manizing system for rebel developed tools cultural bonds of support, and the will him. hiding an enslaved person on person hiding an enslaved while serving a sentence for a sentence for while serving was sentenced to death in Ber a violent, dangerous, and dehu- a violent, dangerous, arranged to purchase and free to and free purchase arranged a boat headed north. 1857, abolitionist Ander Elijah 1857, Those who could not escape or 132 - An-

133 134 - than 150 run more sheltered cape 1865. to before freedom child in 1824 and, as an adult, in 1824 child other leader, Henry Highland Highland Henry leader, other to provide shelter, transporta- shelter, to provide tion, food, resources and other to thousands of runaways. ishment. caught When jour in Dover, Delaware; authori- Delaware; in Dover, returned to the South at leastreturned home in a single year. neying into the South in 1847, intoneying the South in 1847, abolitionistblack D. Samuel and children managed toes and children an activist network developed aways in his Albany, New York, York, New in his Albany, aways escaped slavery in 1849 and in 1849 escaped slavery effective leaders was Harriet was Harriet leaders effective Burns was jailed for 14 months 14 jailed was for Burns One of its most famous and One of its most famous 200 people to freedom. Garnet, escaped slavery as a escapedGarnet, slavery 15 times than to more guide 100,000 enslaved men, women, women, men, enslaved 100,000 The Underground Railroad’s Railroad’s The Underground Tubman, a black woman who woman a black Tubman, The Underground Railroad was was Railroad The Underground “conductors” risked severe pun- severe risked “conductors” Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 50 THE POST-SLAVERYTHE EXPERIENCE 51 The Post-Slavery Experience The

Two women attend a convention for formerly enslaved people in Washington, D.C., in 1916. (Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, [LC-USZ62-35640].)

Southern states seeking to preserve the institution of slavery seceded from the United States in 1861 and formed the Confederacy — sparking the American Civil War.140 Fol- lowing the Confederacy’s surrender in 1865, the system of slavery that had become a foundation of the Southern economy and society was outlawed. The former slave states were immediately forced to recognize the Emanci- pation Proclamation of 1863, which had freed enslaved people in rebelling territories. The Thirteenth Amendment, ratified in December 1865, soon went even further by prohibiting slavery throughout the United States “except as punishment for crime.” Nevertheless, most white people refused to accept the emancipated status of black people. Three states failed to ratify the Thirteenth Amendment until the twentieth century: Delaware in 1901, Kentucky in 1976, and Mississippi in 1995.141 52 THE ABOLITIONIST MOVEMENT

of the enslaved and called on After enslaved preacher, Nat free and enslaved black people Turner’s, rebellion in Virginia to actively fight against racial in 1831, the Mississippi legisla- oppression and the institution ture barred any African Amer- of slavery. Walker’s Appeal also ican person, free or enslaved, warned white Americans who from becoming a preacher, and were complicit in racial op- the city of Mobile, Alabama pression that their “destruction banned gatherings of more is at hand, and will be speed- than three enslaved people.147 ily consummated unless you Anti-slavery sentiment and Slavery In America The Montgomery Trade Slave repent.”142 activity continued to grow in the North where, in 1830, free Afraid and enraged, Southern black people began organizing Antislavery Broadside (Boston Public Library) white authorities branded the annual abolition conventions pamphlet dangerous and de- to gather and strategize.148 stroyed all copies found within On December 12, 1865, the their borders, and the State In response, the South in- Thirteenth Amendment was of Georgia offered a bounty tensified efforts to suppress ratified, making slavery ille- for Mr. Walker’s capture.143 abolition. On two different gal except as punishment for The next fall, North Carolina occasions in 1854, white “slave crime and ending the system passed two laws banning the patrollers” in Mt. Meigs, Ala- of racialized chattel slav- dissemination of any publi- bama, burned enslaved black ery. This was largely made cation with the tendency to

possible by the abolitionist inspire revolution or resistance Frederick Douglass movement. Led by generations among enslaved or free black of black advocates joined by people.144 Georgia and Missis- some white allies, abolitionists sippi legalized use of the death persistently worked to end penalty against free black peo- slavery in the face of institu- ple caught spreading anti-slav- tional opposition and wide- ery materials.145 And multiple spread, violent resistance. state legislatures prohibited anyone from teaching black David Walker, a free black abo- people to read.146 Anti-slavery litionist from Boston, published publications still persisted, An Appeal to the Coloured Citi- including Frederick Douglass’s zens of the World in September North Star newspaper, and 1829. The pamphlet demanded white abolitionist William the immediate emancipation Lloyd Garrison’s The Liberator. 53

Following the Civil War, the federal government Post-Slavery Experience The recognized it would be necessary to protect recently freed black people and their new cit- people alive for suspicion of izenship rights. Because there was little ex- possessing anti-slavery mate- pectation that Southerners would openly grant rials.149 White abolitionist John African Americans equal rights within their Brown led a biracial, armed communities, federal enforcement was deemed raid at Harper’s Ferry in West crucial. This led to “Reconstruction,” a pro- Virginia, in an attempt to over- cess by which the Northern-controlled federal throw slavery; he was hanged government used federal troops and congres- for treason on December 2, sional authority to enforce emancipation and 1859.150 protect formerly enslaved peoples’ new civil rights and American citizenship. Congress also The abolition of slavery fol- established the Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, lowed the Civil War but re- and Abandoned Lands (“Freedmen’s Bureau”) to sulted from the tireless work provide African Americans support in the areas of many black leaders and of justice, labor, education, medical aid, and others who risked their safety after 1867, political education.152 and sometimes lost their lives to stand against the denial of Racial violence targeting newly freed black their humanity. “Those who people persisted during Reconstruction and profess to favor freedom, and ultimately outlasted the post-war federal inter- yet depreciate agitation,” said vention in the Southern states. Reconstruction Frederick Douglass in 1857, ended less than fifteen years after the war’s end, “are men who want crops with- leaving the vast majority of the nation’s black out plowing up the ground.”151 population still residing in the South, vulnerable to systems and institutions controlled by the very white people who had recently enslaved them and who largely still believed black people were inferior.

Racial violence targeting newly freed black people persisted during Reconstruction.

“Our Brothers in Chains,” an abolitionist poem published in 1837. (Library of Congress) Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 54 A contemporary thefeel observer- described Many African Americans fled plantations to fight withtheUnion Army.Many African plantations Americans fled (Library ofCongress.) ings ofSoutherners immediately intheperiod following thewar: “[There existed] a desire to preserve adesire to existed] slavery“[There . . . [T]he mainagency employed for that . [T]he away from the plantations, orwereaway found from theplantations, slaverya lingering hope pre mightyet be which would make thenegro work (sic) many instances negroes (sic) whowalked (sic) negroes many instances wasforce In purpose andintimidation. in indulged .still .thepeople possible in its originalformin its much longas as andas tem that element of physical compulsion thatelementtem compulsion ofphysical served — or to introduce into thenewsys- into served introduce —orto - This struggle to enforceThis struggle to through violence and South for generations, makingslavery andits in Montgomery, andthe ofAlabama, thestate custom a racial caste system that could no system thatcould aracial caste custom legacy a persistent part of our national identity. ofournational part apersistent legacy bylaw would play out maintained longer be remaining withtheirmasters thatanat undoubtedly attributable to thismotive.” to attributable undoubtedly Alarge destruction. proportion in certain upon theroads, wereupon shot orotherwise tempt to escape from slavery escape to tempt would result to produce the impression among those theimpression produce amongthose to of the many acts of violence committed is ofviolence committed of themany acts severely punished, which wascalculated - 153 55 AFTER SLAVERY: Post-Slavery Experience The POST-EMANCIPATION IN ALABAMA

In 1861, when Alabama seceded from the Union to join the Confederacy, more than 435,000 of its residents — 45 percent of the state’s total population — were enslaved black people.154 Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, [LC-USZ62-110813].)

The end of the Civil War carried with it the lib- tive feeling against the colored race since the eration of formerly enslaved people, but white negro has ceased to be property.”156 This bitter Alabamians had little tolerance for the end of and vindictive feeling, coupled with a desire to slavery. Observers of the time noted that this coerce freed black citizens into remaining en- intolerance and anger was expressed both by slaved, gave rise to a wave of extreme violence. former slave holders and by white Southerners To white citizens of Alabama, “the maiming and who had never owned enslaved people but who killing of colored men seem[ed] to be looked “even previous to the war, seemed to be more upon by many as one of those venial offences ardent in their pro-slavery feelings than the which must be forgiven to the outraged feelings planters themselves.”155 White citizens were of a wronged and robbed people.”157 “possessed by a singularly bitter and vindic- Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 56 The end ofslavery in- brought animmediate Yet change marched on. andpolitical social - African withouttheircon labor Americans to Alabama ‘stink bodies’ ofthose withthedead 1865 through 1874 inAlabama. Duringthatpe Confederate veterans) formed aDemocratic has ceased to beproperty.” to ceased has negro since the race colored the against feeling vindictive and bitter singularly by a were “possessed citizens White violence achieved multiple objectives: coercing objectives:coercing violence achieved multiple Federally-enforced from lasted Reconstruction Reconstruction in southern Alabama indicated insouthernReconstruction Alabama indicated and pathways.” across theSouth thatreached “epidemic pro who tried to flee.” to who tried privileges — political, social, economic.” social, privileges —political, had been killed thattheroads andrivers killed been had insouth withoutany pay.plantations Somany freedmen portions” inthesummer of1865.portions” reform (including onracial many equality based opportunities. andeducational new economic andheldpublicoffice voted black people riod, into patrols, using dogs, to control the roads control theroads to dogs, patrols,using into instrument by which white society preserved its instrument society bywhich white In response, Alabama leaders resistant to social social to AlabamaIn response, leaders resistant to foraccess thefirsttime andhad in thestate the South. White men “organizedthe South.White themselves anddeterring emigration outof the plantations; that “blacks were still forced to stay and work on that “blacks andwork on were forced stay still to described theviolenceinAlabama “particu as - described crease in violence against Africancrease inviolence against Americans sent; preventing African Americansfromsent; leaving larly atrocious.” 159 160 Contemporary observers Anarmy observer overseeing 161 Violence blunt was “the 158 The racial Theracial 162 - - Alabama legislature aDemocrat-controlled had 1874 working inEufaula season, campaign to Spring Hill, Alabama, the League burned the Spring theLeague Hill,Alabama, those who tried to flee.” to tried who those of bodies’ dead the with ‘stink Alabama in south rivers and roads the killed that pay.any been had freedmen many So without work on plantations and stay to forced “blacks were still that indicated Alabama in southern Reconstruction overseeing observer army An voting had led to Republican Party dominance Republicandominance to Party led had voting voters, more andchased thanathousandvoters Democratic candidates were elected to office office wereto candidates Democratic elected - andre-es on“redeeming” intent Party thestate Republican of judge,prevented thecounting and a Democratic governor,and aDemocratic George S. Houston. every candidate. Democratic any Republican anddeclared votes, victory for away after, from Soon thepolls. innearby severaland killed unarmed black Republican was reported inMobile. At theelection’swas reported close, paramilitary group known paramilitary League theWhite as ballot box, killed the teenaged son of a white ofawhite son theteenaged box,killed ballot day,press blackOnelection voting. members in large numbers inAlabama in1874, large tablishing white supremacy. white tablishing throughout Barbour County since the start thestart since throughout County Barbour throughout the alliesincounties their white terror, black voters andfraud intimidate and to formed there throughout andwasactive the A branchof Reconstruction. ofaDemocratic of the White League raided Eufaula, attacked raided Eufaula, League attacked of theWhite andsup meetings disrupt Republican political state. InEufaula, highrates ofblack Alabama, state. ly due to theparty’sly dueto ofviolence,threats, use 163 Similar violence - - SlaveryThe Post-Slavery In America Experience The Montgomery Slave Trade 57 segregated public education; second-class for citizenship document governing state’s state constitution. Their goal The hierarchy. of racial system for generations. for disenfranchised the vast ma- disenfranchised constitution it in the world, it was on which foundation constitution legislative through out the state met in Montgom- rights civil of their newly-won terracial marriage; mandated marriage; terracial - Repeatedly amend today. jority the state, in men of black In 1901, a gathering of white, a gathering In 1901, black people black last that would resulting 1901 Constitution 1901 resulting retains discriminatory many along with the racist provisions - through male delegates from written. Efforts to write a new was to deprive black people black was to deprive and all women; prohibited in- and all women; and created a legal of system adoption the longest and now action or constitutional con- and tore-establish a legalized ed in the decades since its ery, Alabama, to draft a new Alabama, a new to draft ery, vention have repeatedly failed. vention have 1901 ALABAMA 1901 CONSTITUTION 1901 Constitution the remains Alabama’s racially-motivated racially-motivated Alabama’s Alabama Governor Governor Alabama Houston S. George whiterestored and supremacy enslavement-era practices after gaining racial office through and terror. violence Alabama’s Today, countylargest fifth is named in his honor. of Congress.) (Library The goal was to reclaim and resurrect The goal and resurrect was to reclaim 164 land.” slavery and to establish a new system of racial slavery great governing race — the white people governing of the great cal effort to reverse the aims of Reconstruction the aims of cal effort reverse to control of former Confederate leaders and leaders Confederate control of former dominance. the racial hierarchy that had been used to hierarchy justify the racial in Alabama and restore the dominance of “the and restore in Alabama and former congressman, Houston led congressman, a politi- and former ended Reconstruction A Democrat in Alabama. The election of 1874 returned the state The election of 1874 to the control of former Confederate leaders and ended Reconstruction in Alabama. The election of 1874 returned the state returned to the The election of 1874 Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 58 Florida, FloridaFlorida, Memory.) dangerous slave labor. Archives of (State for businesses to blackthen people lease convictand enforced to criminalcodes African selectively Americans byusing re-enslavedConvict thousandsof leasing 59

This was accomplished by passing laws that and our duty to posterity . . . [I]f we should Post-Slavery Experience The stripped black Alabamians of the civil rights have white supremacy, we must establish they had briefly enjoyed during Reconstruc- it by law — not by force or fraud.”167 tion. In the late 1870s and early 1880s, local governments implemented laws and ordinances The resulting Alabama Constitution of 1901 requiring racial segregation on public transpor- mandated racial segregation in public schools, tation. The state also outlawed interracial mar- prohibited interracial marriage, and provided for riage and, despite the Fourteenth Amendment’s the mass disenfranchisement of black people. guarantee of “equal protection of the laws,” the Using the recently-passed disenfranchisement Alabama Supreme Court in 1882 upheld the provisions of the Mississippi, South Carolina, interracial marriage ban as constitutional.165 and Louisiana constitutions as a guide, the con- In 1883, the United States Supreme Court vention adopted a poll tax, a grandfather clause, affirmed that ruling.166 Economic exploitation and felon disenfranchisement designed to in- and re-enslavement of black people re-emerged tensify the effect of racialized law enforcement. through the system of sharecropping, which Any loopholes were closed by the creation of kept black farmers impoverished and indebted arbitrary registration procedures that grant- to landowners from year to year, and convict ed significant discretion to local white male leasing, which “leased” primarily black state registrars. Even when black people managed to prisoners to private companies to perform qualify for voter registration under these dis- dangerous work in inhumane and often deadly criminatory laws, registrars refused to register conditions for state profit. them and courts refused to act.

Violent intimidation of black voters continued Jackson Giles, a black janitor living in Mont- in the decades following the 1874 election, but gomery, had voted in Alabama from 1871 to by the twentieth century Democratic political 1901. Following implementation of the 1901 leaders felt confident enough to declare black constitution, he was refused registration de- disenfranchisement as a policy goal. In May spite meeting all qualifications. He sued the 1901, 155 white male delegates gathered in state in federal court, asserting that the new Montgomery for a constitutional convention. provisions violated the Fifteenth Amendment’s Immediately after his election as president of ban on racial barriers to voting. In 1903, the the convention, attorney John B. Knox of Cal- United States Supreme Court dismissed the houn County delivered a speech summarizing case and authorized Mr. Giles’s continued dis- the convention’s goals: enfranchisement.168 Alabama’s discriminatory voter registration system, combined with con- “And what is it that we want to do? Why it tinued violent intimidation tactics, successfully is, within the limits imposed by the Federal suppressed black voting in the state for several Constitution, to establish white suprema- more generations, with no significant federal cy in this state. This is our problem, and interference until the passage of the Voting we should be permitted to deal with it, Rights Act in 1965. unobstructed by outside influences, with a sense of our responsibilities as citizens Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 60 traveled there faced serious dangers. still On inthecity,stationed black Alabamians who migration. Though federal were troops attracted for African recently emancipated Americans and Montgomery representedopportunity economic wasviolence. primary ofresistance tool Regiment inMontgomery were posted Army’s States United Infantry Fifteenth poor with nutritional assistance. withnutritional poor andprovided thecity’s andahospital schools city. the Freedmen’s inthe Bureau astation had Reconstruction during received significant federal attention Thecity andsocial. political both Alabama, for point post-slaveryfocal developments in Montgomery wasa capital, As thestate the freedmen and-women midst. inits for “refused ofequality” thespectre accept to across theSouth,Montgomerymany cities 171 TheFreedmen’s Bureau established 169 because troops from troops the because 172 RECONSTRUCTION IN MONTGOMERY IN But like AND BEYOND AND 170 173 and The gomery whowere ofextreme victims violence. black residents ofMont twenty almost treating of accounts inMontgomery gave detailed tals August 21, 1865,- hospi separate attwo doctors right as a white man thought heshould.” thought man awhite as right the to far “drive as to hefailed because dead shot driver was wagon A black or chins cutoff. theirears, orhad beards, theirthroats cut; had withclubs; beaten “scalped”;or head; stabbed; shotwomen been inthehand,neck, whohad black men seeing and recounted The doctors tempt of newly freed blacks to come to town.” ofnewly to tempt freedcome blacks to wastheat “provocation for oftheattacks most 175 The doctors reported that the thatthe reported The doctors 176 174 - -

The Ku Klux Klan, a white supremacist group Although violence against free black citizens Post-Slavery Experience The started by Confederate veterans in Tennessee in had been constant since Emancipation, it 1866, resisted Reconstruction efforts by terror- surged in the late nineteenth century. Lynching izing free black people and their allies, including accounted for nearly 2000 deaths nationwide Republican legislators, federal agents, bureau- between 1882 and 1901, and at least three crats, teachers, and any other individuals who black men — Isaac Cook, Oliver Jackson, and were sympathetic to the cause of black equality. Robert Williams — were lynched in Montgom- The Klan was most active in northern Alabama, ery County in the 1890s, sending a tragic and but offshoots of the group also operated in terrifying message to the local black commu- Montgomery. In one incident, after a white nity.178 African Americans in Montgomery were woman reported being insulted by a black man murdered for minor breaches of Alabama’s in downtown Montgomery, Klansmen donned apartheid norms. In one instance a black wag- white sheets and rode through north Montgom- on driver was shot dead because he failed to ery’s black community, terrorizing the residents “drive as far to the right as a white man thought with violence.177 he should.”179 (AP Photos/stf, 500603019) Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 62 bond, sought outMr. sought bond, andshot Johnson, him made passenger the manarrested. Thewhite hisemployer to responsible for themoney, had pay.out andrefused to Mr. whowas Johnson, the passenger’s mangot thewhite destination, drive manhome.When theyto awhite reached driver, ablack Johnson, taxi Mitchell washired In1910, heldaccountable. violence would be of perpetrator chancethatthewhite was little intervened ofablack there citizen, onbehalf In therare where andcourts situation thepolice ofit.” taken murderer ofthewhite the pistol is andnonote by thelaw. Even colored women fall before ofmurderkill Negroes are guilty notadjudged men whoshoot and “White out, pointed time Asthe Black often. newspapers ofthe too murder ofblack Montgomerians occurred all terrorized violence, andthe citizens bywhite provided norelief for courts black The local 180 Eighteen-year-old Washington Jesse was lynched byalarge crowd inWaco, Texas, in1916. byCorbis.) (Donated black electorate. the remainingeliminating black officialsand inMontgomery theirsupporters about set tion, Democrats in1874, through fraud- andintimida thelegislatureto andgovernor’s as mansion After former Confederatesported. were elected —thatthey —black sup andwhite sentatives newly enfranchised black voters andtherepre from control ofAlabama capital andits political seize to Democrats employed the sametactics TheSouthern judicialinstitutions. cially biased groupsto privatevigilante or ra- not confined Fear, violence, andterrorism intimidation, were freeset byMontgomery authorities. Mr.he killed inself-defense Johnson andwas Afterdead. hewas arrested, themanclaimed in [Montgomery] government.” city ficeholders were fromparticipating eliminated “mostand by1877 black voters andallblack of drawn thatexcluded ofblack anumber citizens, 182 In1876, lineswere newcity 183 181 - - - 63

This became a statewide reality in 1901 with the as a tool of racial control and separation, and Post-Slavery Experience The adoption of the new state constitution, which broad laws prohibiting “vagrancy” and “disor- effectively ended African American suffrage. derly conduct” brought black residents into fre- With the black community shut out of the polit- quent contact with law enforcement. The city’s ical process, Montgomery officials enacted a se- vagrancy ordinance made it “unlawful for any ries of laws designed to formalize the apartheid person to loaf, loiter, or idle upon any street or system. As early as 1914, Montgomery’s city public place of the City of Montgomery.”187 The ordinances required black and white citizens to punishment for vagrancy included a fine up to purchase theater and amusement park tickets $500 and hard labor for up to twelve months.188 in separate lines.184 That same year, the city re- These laws were enforced almost exclusively quired segregation of public transportation and against African Americans. cemeteries185 and continued to pass “Jim Crow” ordinances that entrenched segregation and While African Americans ensnared in the restricted the movement of African Americans criminal justice system initially provided forced within the city. This included forbidding black inmate labor for the city, over time this system and white citizens from playing dominoes or grew into the convict lease system. Under con- pool together, segregated theaters and places of vict leasing, black citizens convicted in local amusement, segregated bathrooms, segregated courts were brought under the control of private restaurants, and segregated taxicabs.186 employers.189 The brutal convict leasing system continued to evolve over the years, ensnaring Montgomery’s criminal justice system was used thousands of black Alabamians.190

Montgomery’s criminal justice system was used as a tool of racial control and separation, and broad laws prohibiting “vagrancy” and “disorderly conduct” brought black residents into frequent contact with Montgomery law enforcement.

The execution of James Keaton in Columbus, Mississippi, in 1934. Keaton was indicted, tried, convicted, and executed in seven days. (Univ. North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Wilson Special Collections Library) Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 64 Confederate states created governments created that Confederate states Litwack. Racial violence surgedRacial in theSouthduringthis in MontgomeryEfforts across and to Alabama and political suppression proliferatedand political through- will never be known,” writes historian Leon F.will never known,” Leon be historian writes and women mutilated were flogged, beaten, were set up in response, but resistance remained. were butresistance upinresponse, set murdered inthefirst years of emancipation period, killing many black people and terrorizing killing many black people period, Federalrights. governments Reconstruction supremacy white through violence re-establish In 1869, andbru- Klansmen inGeorgia attacked tion. Between 1864 Between and1866,tion. oftheeleven ten tally whipped fifty-two-year-old whipped Abram Colby,tally countless more.countless “How many black men and andotherdeprived ofvoting civil black people out therest oftheSouthfollowing emancipa - 191 POST-WAR THROUGHOUT POST-WAR POLITICS AND VIOLENCE AND POLITICS RACISM THROUGH RACISM THE SOUTH: THE Shortly before the attack, agroup ofKlansmen beforeShortly theattack, enslaved byenfranchised freedmen. andelected a sitting Republican Congressman, formerlya sitting to bribe Colby to change parties orgive uphis change parties Colbyto bribe to office. andlawyers doctors oftown tried composed committee, themen leftandreturned days later: committee, later described in testimony to aCongressional to intestimony later described “On 29, October 1869, [the Klansmen] They said to me,‘DoyouThey thinkyou saidto willever vote another damned Radical ticket?’ I ticket?’ anothervote damned Radical with sticks and straps that had buckles andstraps thathad on with sticks They set ticket.’ would theRadical vote broke my door open, took me out of bed, meoutofbed, broke took open, my door in and whipped meathousand licks more,in andwhipped three hours ormore andleftmefor dead. me and whipped thewoods meto took the ends ofthem.” said, ‘Ifthere tomorrow, was anelection I 192 When doeither, herefused to Colby as 193 65

In April 1868, white Democrats in Opelousas, Post-Slavery Experience The Louisiana, frustrated with growing local black As W.E.B. Du Bois would later write, the political power, attacked black voters and their potential of emancipation had not been white supporters and terrorized the area for days. The violence left six white people and at realized: “The slave went free, stood a least a hundred black people dead. The parish brief moment in the sun, then moved became one of the first in Louisiana to return back again toward slavery.” to white supremacist control. Surviving local black voters had learned the consequences of opposing Democrats in politics, and in the thorizing economic exploitation through convict November 1868 presidential election, Repub- leasing and mandatory labor contracts; barring lican Ulysses S. Grant did not receive a single black people from holding public office, voting vote within the parish. By the time the 1876 in elections, or serving on juries; and providing gubernatorial elections put a Democrat into no protection from the violent terror of lynch- office and officially ended Reconstruction in ings and Ku Klux Klan attacks. Ku Klux Klan Louisiana, Opelousas had birthed the state’s violence was so intense in South Carolina after first chapter of the White League.194 the Civil War that, in 1871, federal investigators found evidence of eleven murders and more In most Southern states, like in Alabama, after than six hundred whippings and other assaults a brief period of federally-led Reconstruction, in one county alone.196 When local grand juries local white residents used violent attacks to failed to take action, federal authorities urged suppress pro-civil rights votes by terrorizing President Grant to intervene, describing the black voters and their white supporters. As a state as “under the domination of systematic result, Southern state governments gradually and organized depravity,” which created a “car- returned to the control of Democratic “Redeem- nival of crime not paralleled in the history of any ers” intent on restoring racial hierarchy. The civilized community.”197 last federal troops were withdrawn from the South in April 1877, and with them went the Mob violence soon expanded beyond the Klan promise of the freedmen’s new civil rights as as white communities grew increasingly bold Confederate veterans and their supporters and confident in their ability to kill black people returned to power in the South. As W.E.B. Du with impunity. Boyle County, Kentucky, was the Bois would later write, the potential of emanci- site of at least three lynchings of black men in pation had not been realized: “The slave went the decade after Emancipation — including Al free, stood a brief moment in the sun, then McRoberts in 1866; Jerry Trowbridge in 1867; moved back again toward slavery.”195 and Jim Turpin in 1876.198 In Hancock County, Indiana, in the summer of 1875, a black man This movement was hastened by local and state named William Kemmer was lynched before laws that combined to create a second-class a large crowd at the local fairgrounds before citizenship for black people, mandating seg- he could stand trial on charges of assaulting a regation in schools, trains, buses, motels, and white woman; afterward, thousands reportedly restaurants; outlawing interracial marriage; au- gathered to view his corpse.199 Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 66 As the nineteenth century ended, many states centuryAs thenineteenth ended, many states Cook, a white Republican awhite andformerCook, candidate 300 lynchings were documented in states 300 lynchings were instates documented Mississippi, Georgia, and Louisiana. More than andLouisiana. Georgia, Mississippi, Most lynchings occurred intheSouthand From and in1877 theend ofReconstruction women, andchildren alike. In1893 alone,141 mobs composed ofunmasked andprominent composed mobs by were States people lynched intheUnited black people. Opposing this course of action thiscourse ofaction Opposing black people. moved toward creatinglaws andconstitutions ists. Duringthesummerists. of1890, F.M.B. “Marsh” tolls in Oklahoma, Missouri, andIllinois. Missouri, inOklahoma, tolls werethe highestnumbers ofvictims in killed tactics had donefordisenfranchise had decades: tactics that would dolegally whatviolent intimidation outside oftheSouth,withhighestdeath outside racial terror place. documented lynchings took leaders, cheered men, community onbywhite 1950, to continuing more than4300 black could provecould dangerous, even foractiv white for for Congress, atthe a seat campaigned history of any civilized community.” civilized any of history in the paralleled crime of not a “carnival depravity,” organized and created which systematic of domination “under the as state the describing intervene, to Grant President urged authorities federal take action, to failed juries grand local When alone. in one county assaults other and whippings hundred six than eleven more of evidence and murders inthat, 1871, found investigators federal War Civil the after Carolina in South intense so was violence Klan Ku Klux 200 - Zion Baptist ChurchZion Baptist County. inJasper 1890 to 1908,1890 oftheeleven to ten Confederate administered by white registrars. by white administered tests literacy and clauses, grandfather poll taxes, of use the through rights constitutions to restrict voting their rewrote states Confederate From 1890 1908, to eleven the of ten vention, Cook was foundvention, Cook shot nearMount dead No for onewas arrested ortried Cook’s murder earned him threats from local white people, and and earned people, himthreats fromwhite local also encouraged the local black community to to black community encouragedthelocal also and after his death, local enemies that alleged hisdeath,local and after all attempts to limitblackrights. voting to all attempts oppose to and vowed hewouldtheposition use he was a dangerous man who had been inciting he wasadangerous inciting been manwhohad by white registrars.by white nearly allofthestate’s From black electorate. upcoming Mississippi constitutional convention convention constitutional Mississippi upcoming ing rights through the use of poll taxes, grand- taxes, throughing rights ofpoll theuse in a state constitution that instituted literacy thatinstituted constitution in astate ties. tests and poll taxes to effectively to disenfranchise taxes andpoll tests convention movedforwardtutional andresulted - regarding con giving aspeech theupcoming ofJuly 25,on theafternoon 1890, oneday after provisions.Cook’sconstitutional views political organize thecreationofdiscriminatory against father administered clauses, and literacy tests states rewrote their constitutions to restrict vot to rewrote theirconstitutions states - communi white attack to black people local 203 - Meanwhile, consti the1890 Mississippi 204 202 201 Cook Cook - Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 67

AND RACE

MEMORY OF

SLAVERY, WAR, SLAVERY,

OUR COLLECTIVE COLLECTIVE OUR A NATIONAL LEGACY: LEGACY: A NATIONAL Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 68 69 ainlLgc:OrCletv eoyo Slavery, War, Race and of Memory Collective Our Legacy: A National

The Civil War and Emancipation generated significant social and political upheaval that drastically altered the political and social landscape of the South and presented the opportunity to lay a new foundation. But after the brief hope of Reconstruction, racial violence and discriminatory political movements committed to re-establishing white supremacy emerged.

Amidst this racial violence, more than a generation after the Confederacy’s fall, white South- erners also began asserting their social and cultural dominance by embracing a revisionist history that portrayed the Civil War as a conflict in which the Confederate cause was heroic, honorable, and deserving of tribute. The conflict was recast as one unrelated to the institution of slavery, while the lesson of the Civil War and the suffering of generations of enslaved black people was lost. This myth ignored the true brutality of that time period and distorted our national memory of the intermingled links between American slavery, the Civil War, and race.

White Southerners also began asserting their social and cultural dominance by embracing a revisionist history that portrayed the Civil War as a conflict in which the Confederate cause was heroic, honorable, and deserving of tribute. Marchers celebrating the Confederacy in 2011 parade in front of Dexter Avenue King Memorial Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama, where Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., was once pastor. (Photo by Stephen Chu.) Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 70 “conquered and enemies.” nineteenth Inthelate “rebellious andtraitorous” living andits veterans Just as the coming of the twentieth century ofthetwentieth thecoming emJust as - Congress passed resolutions declaring its acts declaring acts resolutions its Congress passed early twentieth centuries, following centuries, early twentieth re-estab attacks, Alabama leaders andorganizations attacks, makers andothers throughout test theSouthto generation arising ofAlabamaboldened law recasting theirforefathers’recasting role inhistory. withlynchingblack andKu people KluxKlan ushered inadifferent rewriting cultural project: In 1901, the same year it ratified a new state In 1901, thesameyear anewstate itratified the narrative oftheAmerican Civil War. Fol- offederal it the bounds civil protections, rights defiantly asserted their social dominance by dominance social their defiantlyasserted ofracial terrorduring acampaign thattargeted lishment supremacy ofwhite and inAlabama, lowing theConfederacy’s surrender anddefeat, REVIVING THE CONFEDERACY ALABAMA AND BEYONDALABAMA - - IN The Confederate Monument inMontgomery, un- 1898, stood eighty-eight feet tall, cost $20,000 cost feet tall, eighty-eight 1898, stood Civil War undertook conclusion its or born after veiled on the state capitol grounds in December capitol veiled onthestate efforts to memorialize Confederate leadersefforts as erate Veterans andDaughters oftheConfeder and insisted theCivil War and insisted to was notconnected acy. Alabamians whowere children duringthe white supremacy,white theAlabama legislature heroes through thecreation oftax-funded mon- national organizations likenational theSonsofConfed- uments. White Southerners began to describe Southerners describe White uments. to began iday. the institution ofslavery.the institution nobleandadmirablethe Confederate as cause the memorialization effort, forming effort, the memorialization chapters of declared Confederate Memorial Day a state hol- declared Confederate Memorial Day astate explicitly re-establish to created constitution 205 White Alabama White residents were in active - 71 ainlLgc:OrCletv eoyo Slavery, War, Race and of Memory Collective Our Legacy: A National

Hundreds of Confederate memorials were erected in Alabama cities and

Montgomery, Alabama 2011. towns over the next several decades.

in public funds, and had its cornerstone laid by and slave-holders. aging former Confederate President Jefferson Davis.206 Hundreds of Confederate memorials It was in Montgomery, and the farming ter- were erected in Alabama cities and towns over ritory adjacent, where many of the largest the next several decades. In 1910, W.T. Hall, editor slave owners lived, and when those faithful of the Dothan Eagle newspaper in Houston Co- slaves were freed they continued to till the unty, Alabama, wrote that “it would be a mighty soil they had known so long. A monument good idea for the people of Alabama to erect a set up on the capitol grounds would be a monument to the old slaves” in Montgomery: fitting remembrance to those old, faithful black mammies and Uncle Remuses.”207 “There is but one place [where such a monument should be built], and that is in the In addition to a state constitution that denied city of Montgomery, the city that crooned them the vote and other basic rights of citizen- a lullaby to the infant confederacy and ship, and a social system that subjected them marked the place of inauguration of the to racial violence and terror, black Alabamians first and only president of the confederate witnessing the creation of monuments and states; a city that still shows handsome proliferation of narratives that romanticized the colonial homes, public buildings, including Civil War and slavery were faced with yet anoth- the state capitol, that were built by slaves er symbol of their oppression. Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 72 The intensity ofAlabama’sThe intensity civil to resistance The claim Confederate in to pridere-emerged April 1963 to urgeApril 1963 to Alabama Governor George C. Wallace hisvow defy abandon to federal to Confederacy, theslave trade,slavery, andracial eral Kennedy Montgomery Robert to came in ed to the inseparable connections between the between theinseparable connections to ed thegrowing inthefaceance ofanewthreat: a Confederate Memorial Day wreath over the and to destroy the legacy of inequality and hate, andhate, ofinequality destroy thelegacy and to was signed “Unreconstructed.” was signed which can be foundwhich be throughout can theSouth. rights forrights African thenine Americansinboth note leftwiththewreath,note explaining- inten its markingwhere Jeffersonbrass star Davis had hierarchy. denials ofthishistory Continued teenth and twentieth centuries isdirectly centuries relat andtwentieth teenth defi- assert to the 1950s and1960sinefforts tion to “keep to tion onthe any enemy from standing 102 of office theoath yearsbefore. taken A civil rights movement. When Attorney Gen- civil movement. rights frustrate efforts to deal truthfullyto deal past withthe frustrate efforts star where Jefferson star Davis inaugurated,” was orders, desegregation school protesters placed 208 - - movement. rights civil growing the a new threat: of face in the defiance assert to efforts 1950s in the 1960sre-emerged and in pride Confederate to claim The tag also has been approved been for has also theSonsofConfederate Veterans.tag on every issued withoutthepayment plate ofextra fees.Aspecial by theAlabama legislature. Today, thephrase islegally required oneveryprinted Alabama pursuant plate license laws to passed ofthecivil strugglein1955, rights ofDixie” “Heart was At thestart the Confederacy indowntown Montgomery in2011. Marchers of thelegacy This page andopposite: celebrate gather to 73

At a memorial celebration of Confederate War and the Confederacy’s “bravery in the face Slavery, War, Race and of Memory Collective Our Legacy: A National General Robert E. Lee held in Georgia in 1902, of federal tyranny.” Divorcing the Civil War from Virginia Governor Andrew Jackson Montague its origins in slavery and recasting it as a “states’ praised “the unanimity of purpose and of sen- rights” struggle gave the Confederate identity timent that actuated the confederate soldiers, renewed political value. In 1948, Southern Dem- whose fervid courage and unselfish patriotism ocrats formed the States’ Rights Democratic dazzled the civilized world,” and denied that Party (the “Dixiecrats”) and opposed Harry Tru- slavery was a main cause of the conflict.209 In man in the 1948 presidential election.211 1890, West Virginia chapters of the Sons and Daughters of Confederate Veterans erected Dixiecrats represented the interests of pro-seg- what is known as the “Faithful Slave memorial” regation white Southerners and “oppos[ed] the to pay homage to “the character and faithful- elimination of segregation, the repeal of misce- ness of thousands of Negroes who, under many genation statutes, the control of private em- temptations throughout subsequent years of ployment by Federal bureaucrats called for by war, so conducted themselves that no stain was the mis-named civil rights program. We favor left upon a record which is the peculiar heritage home-rule, local self-government and a mini- of the American people, and an everlasting trib- mum interference with individual rights.”212 Dix- ute to the best of both races.”210 iecrat rallies held in Alabama and Mississippi in 1948 made reference to Jefferson Davis and Following World War II, and into the 1950s and Robert E. Lee to great applause, featured many 1960s, Southern white resistance to the civil waving Confederate flags, and included somber rights movement on the national stage often memorial tributes to Confederate veterans.213 shrouded itself in defiant references to the Civil

Southern white resistance to the civil rights movement on the national stage often shrouded itself in defiant references to the Civil War and the Confederacy’s “bravery in the face of federal tyranny.” Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 74 “family and“civilizing institution” influence” that Texas state capitol building which insisted “the Texas “the buildingwhich insisted capitol state According to EJIresearch,According to 150new atleast Southern commitment to white supremacy,Southern white to commitment Confederate veterans groups enjoyed renewed Confederate monuments were inthe erected United States between 1950 and1975. between States United Even today,Civil the to recast efforts War and was its underlying cause to sustain slavery.” sustain underlying to was its cause was notarebellion nor thestates war between building. Davidson argued that slavery wasa attheAlabama state stands monument still its origins have continued. TheConfederate origins haveits continued. interest during this time, andnewgroupsinterest were duringthistime, ofcontinued statement In anot-so-subtle turn of the Confederate flag to the state capitol capitol turn oftheConfederateto thestate flag capitol inMontgomerycapitol and,in1996, Alabama dren oftheConfederacy aplaque erected inthe formed. In1959, theTexas chapter oftheChil- state senator Charles Davidson supported are Charles senator Davidson supported state 214

- Southerners are grateful most today.” Gray andwere faithful the cause.” to an inscription reading:County’san inscription “Lamar Tribute oftheConfederateage in flag frontwas erected a Confederate monument including alarge im- holds for but many oftheirblack constituents, raised theConfederate flag over thestate - legis thatthestate May 2000 it wasnotuntil In April1961, theSouthCarolina legislature to recognize the painful connotations the flag thepainful connotations recognize to ofthe the NAACP for boycott called atourist to themen andwomento whowore Confederate tian religion, for which “those converted black religion, converted tian for which “those one year, itremained Inthe1990s, for decades. flyfounding. to Originallyfor just intended for oftheConfederacy’s thecentennial capitol of the Lamar County,of theLamar with courthouse Alabama, gave andtheChris enslaved- education people state to pressure to SouthCarolina lawmakersstate lature moved the flag from atop the capitol to a lature moved theflag capitol from the atop Montgomery. Thismarker in2012. was erected monuments, markers, andmemorials in There are Confederate fifty-nine atleast 216 215 In2006, 75

217 nearby Confederate memorial. In 2015, after a Slavery, War, Race and of Memory Collective Our Legacy: A National white supremacist who embraced Confederate iconography attacked Charleston’s Emanuel AME church and killed nine black worshipers, widespread protests led the state to remove the flag from the capitol grounds altogether.218 To this day, the Mississippi state flag includes the Confederate flag in its upper left corner.

Invocation of Confederate pride and identity ac- companied white resistance to civil rights and racial equality during and following Reconstruc- tion, at the height of the civil rights movement, and well into the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. The legacy of slavery, Emancipation, white supremacy, and revisionism in the South, and throughout this nation, continues to shape discourse about racial history and impede progress toward honest and hopeful engagement with the past.

In 1996, Alabama state senator Charles Davidson supported a return of the Confederate flag to the state capitol building. Davidson argued that slavery was a “family institution” and “civilizing influence” that gave enslaved people education and the Christian religion, for which “those converted black Southerners are most grateful today.”

(Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division, FSA/OWI Collection, [LC-USZ62-130073]) Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 76 CONCLUSION “The great force of history comes from the fact that that fact the from comes history of force great “The James Baldwin, 1965 Baldwin, James suffered from horrific abuses have humanrights learned that re inequality. thathave oftheworld, many societies Inother parts a healthy, thatislessburdened byracial bigotry justsociety and work remains inform andcan create how to ourthinking about ery explain andourhistory can ofracial whymuch injustice so ofslav ofthelegacy understanding EJI believes thatadeeper undermines honestconversation race andracial justice. about fear, thishistory creates distrust, derstand thatoften andanxiety andfelt seen failure inmyriad ways. be Ourcollective can un- to ofslavery, thelegacy States, United racial terror, andsegregation Inthe equality, context. ignore itisirresponsible to thishistorical from ofourpast today’sinjustice issues ofracial fairness and divorce to theracial Whileitistempting many communities. incarcerationmass create enormous anguish in anddisruption and practices creates, andtheracial dynamics ofcriminaljustice children, theracial profiling andmistreatment thispresumption black andbrown to and presumption ofguilt adults assigned The persist. andopportunity education, in health,employment, byproblems today. thatcontinue complicated disparities Racial Talking thatishard accept. thishistory to about is States United ahistoryful andbigotry truths about ofracial inequality inthe allreveal andsubordination racial- segregation pain sanctioned violence thatfollowed andlegally theend ofReconstruction, Slavery,to discuss. topic difficult times terror the racial and America’s history isachallenging ofracial andsome injustice we carry it within us, are unconsciously controlled by controlled unconsciously are us, within it we carry that we do.”that it in many ways, and history is literally present in all present literally is ways, in history many it and 219 - - - Conclusion 77 - - - Slavery in America traumatized in America and devastatedSlavery millions of that still people. about difference racial It created narratives discrimination and racial bigotry fostered Slavery persist today. about more In learning recover. to yet fully have we which from our past, about ourselves, more can and hope learn we slavery, covery from these injustices from on a commitment depends to truth covery of abuse our history confronting and reconciliation. Without serious the acknowledging thoughtfully and without truthfully devastation and harm is no created, unjust practices there have opportunitymeaningful to to the past ourselves reconcile in the hope of a brighter future. support. and your interest your for Thank you In Alabama and communities America, overcome, In Alabama all over shall we efforts engage in meaningful if we but only the to past,address that the hope EJI is persuaded of Ultimately, present, and future. justice and racial in America will be progress racial shaped not by and resistancethe fear of those who doubt its importance but by the commitment and dedication of those who believe. fully, our future. By strengthening our understanding By strengthening of racial our future. fully, discourserace about healthier can a different, we create history, that canin America leadsolutions. effective to and more new and rec history racial hope join us in exploring will that you We ognizing equal in the significanceachieving presents this history justice the legacyinequality, in America. of racial In overcoming have we come when have progress of greatest our moments committed our mistakes to acknowledging and deep ourselves just more a believe We our understandingening of one another. and equitable can be and important but difficult future achieved, must bework done. Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 78 Conclusion 79 People recently freed from slavery slavery from freed People recently of Congress) (Library in the 1860s. Slavery America in traumatized and devastated millions of It created people. narratives about racial difference that still Slavery persist today. fostered bigotry and racial discrimination yet from which have we to fully recover. Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 80 tended to forestall the identification oftheblack manwith slavery, the identification forestall to tended Assuch ofwhichthe victim. it amereanyone be as could accident, viewedslavery centuries, intheseventeenthand eighteenth Portugal 10. York: 65. 1947), Books, Vintage Tannenbaum, (New Americas inthe Slave TheNegro andCitizen: slavery Frank endedthere States. theway they didintheUnited ofinferiorityafter astigma didnotretain freed black people America, 9. Was Slavery Different American How Inferiority: Racial Inventing http://www.census.gov/prod/www/decennial.html. 8. Labor,” November 1858). e.g., See, cotton. increasing the region’s supply labor in the face of growing demand for of intheSouthorder“absolute meet populations to necessity” 7. 6. medfordhistorical.org/newenglandslavery.php. 5. 4. Ibid. downloads/2010estimates-method.pdf. of Transatlantic Slave Trade (2010), http://slavevoyages.org/ 3. South Antebellum 2. slave-trade/ July 11, visited (last 2013). new/en/culture/themes/dialogue/the-slave-route/transatlantic- 1. SLAVERY AMERICA IN NOTES There were strenuous arguments infavor of increasing enslaved For ofSouth colonies example,inthe Spanish andPortuguese

David Eltis&Paul F. SizeandDirection ofthe Estimates Lachance, , 249-83. Blassingame,TheSlave Community U.S. Census Bureau, “Census ofPopulation&Housing, 1860,” JohnW. inthe Life Plantation Blassingame, TheSlave Community: Transatlantic Slave Trade, UNESCO.org, http://www.unesco.org/ Slaves inNewEngland,Medford Society, Historical http://www. Roman law, which like remainedcountries in influential and Spain , “The South Demands More Negro Review, “The DeBow’s (New York: Oxford University Press,1979), 7. 14. Degler, “Slavery Prejudice,” andtheGenesis ofAmericanRace 52. prevailedhad from namely, thebeginning, thatNegroeswere inferior.” which attitude withthesocial infused nothelpbutbe could colonies, it . . . As a result, slavery,decreed when in the English it developed theNegro against allalongandbeforemen practiced any had statutes which white thissamediscrimination essence, ofits apart included as 13. the New World.” Morgan, “Origins ofAmerican Slavery,” 53. features distinctive one of themost slaveryracial factor became in slavery withchattel ed merged withblackness intheNew World. The - associat dishonor, thatwere universally andbestialization humiliation, ofAfricanlinked intheWestern withpeople descent hemisphere. The Slavery,” Winthrop D. Jordan, “Modern Tensions andtheOriginsofAmerican rangement, away ofsociety’s ordering members its own inits mind.” forget, however, oneto tempt thatslavery ar asocial wasatbottom theexternal shaped formic practicalities should ofdebasement not framework.- Thateconom aninstitutional into infact, it, molded took, for inavirgin labor country which guidedthedirection debasement akindofslavery theurgent debasement, need inthemind.)Certainly which slavery have could norationality. (Prejudice, wasaform too, of facet enon; ofageneralwithout itwas thepractical debasement, “Slavery12. phenom - orinstitutional economic wasnotanisolated (Apr. 1950): 203. System,” OriginsoftheSouthern William Q. &Mary Labor dlin, “The &MaryOscar to the1660s.” Han- were downtreated and identified oftheNegroeswasthatservants, they andso status 11. “The gan, “Origins ofAmericanSlavery,” OAH (July 2005): 51. Mag. ofHist. slaves category.” notaneconomic, primarily as asocial, Phillip D. Mor slaves be could —andinseeing —allethnicities condition opportunity differentmentally from modern [American] slaveryequalbeing an in 1959): 50.(Oct. “Yet, ofcourse, ancient [Roman] slavery wasfunda- Prejudice,”the GenesisofAmericanRace &Hist. Stud.inSoc’y Comp. a slave.” be to Carl Degler, he ceased once status ed “Slavery and from ofhisdegrad- thestigma theNegroescape to permitting “thus 20. 19. 18. 17. (New York:of RacistIdeasinAmerica 2016),21. Books, Nation 16. Degler, “Slavery Prejudice,” andtheGenesis ofAmericanRace 49. deepandenduring.” both been has States of theNegro intheUnited century, thecharacter andfuture thattheimpress upon ofbondage of Americanslavery, inthenineteenth itfunctioned as particularly anyone to conversant that“it ispatent Degler noted withthenature 328-29. Writing more thanacentury later, Carl Americanhistorian (Chicago: University ofChicagoPress, inAmerica Democracy 2002): whichgivenisimmovable.” ithas Alexisto birth DeTocqueville, prejudice but“the States, regionson adeclineinsome oftheUnited 15. 11, December 1857. theLegislature oftheState,” to Mississippi, Ibid.,40. “[A]s slaveryand [inAmerica],itreflected evolved status alegal as Ibid.,49. French researcher Alexis DeTocqueville observed thatslavery was Stamped from the Beginning: A Definitive History History ADefinitive fromBeginning: the Ibram X. Kendi, Stamped Ibid.,16.

, 269-70. Blassingame,TheSlave Community , “Extracts from, “Extracts theMessageofGov.The Liberator McWillie, of (Feb.J. 1962): ofS. 30. Hist. “[S]lavery indelibly became - -

81 The Lives and Fears of 36. Blassingame, The Slave Community, 261. Notes America’s Enslaved People 37. “Conditions of Antebellum Slavery, 1830–1860,” Africans in America: PBS.org. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part4/4p2956.html 21. Supra note 14. See also The Liberator, “Extracts from the Message of Gov. Winston, of Alabama, to the Legislature of the 38. Detroit Daily Free Press, “Terrible Mob in Louisville – Three State,” December 11, 1857; Daniel Pratt, “To the Editor of the Journal,” Negroes Hung,” May 19, 1859. Daily Alabama Journal, October 21, 1850. 39. William J. Anderson, Life and Narrative of William J. Anderson, 22. For example, Alabama state legislator Charles Davidson wrote Twenty-four Years a Slave; Sold Eight Times! In Jail Sixty Times!! a speech praising slavery for its civilizing influence on enslaved Whipped Three Hundred Times!!! or The Dark Deeds of American Africans and later defended his remarks. New York Times, “Bible Slavery Revealed. Containing Scriptural Views of the Origin of the Backed Slavery, Says a Lawmaker,” May 10, 1996; see also George W. Black and of the White Man. Also, a Simple and Easy Plan to Abolish Gayle, “Letter to the Editor,” Montgomery Advertiser, May 30, 2007; Slavery in the United States. Together with an Account of the Services Pat Buchanan, “A Brief for Whitey,” March 2008, available at http:// of Colored Men in the Revolutionary War–Day and Date, and Interest- www.buchanan.org/blog/pjb-a-brief-for-whitey-969. ing Facts (Chicago: Daily Tribune, 1857), 80-81.

23. “Nearly two-thirds of all Appalachian slave sales separated children from their families — 70 percent of these forced migrations oc- curring when they were younger than fifteen.” Wilma A. Dunaway, The African-American Family in Slavery and Emancipation, (Cambridge: The Domestic Slave Trade in America Cambridge University Press, 2003), 67-68. 40. Robert H. Gudmestad, A Troublesome Commerce: The Trans- formation of the Interstate Slave Trade (Baton Rouge, LA: Louisiana 24. Heather Andrea Williams, “How Slavery Affected African Amer- State University Press, 2003), 8. ican Families,” Freedom’s Story, http://www.nationalhumanitiescen- ter.org/tserve/freedom/1609-1865/essays/aafamilies.htm. 41. Adam Rothman, “The Domestication of the Slave Trade in the United States,” in The Chattel Principle: Internal Slave Trades in the 25. 25. J. C. Benton, Through Others’ Eyes: Published Accounts of Americas (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2004), 33; Frederic Antebellum Montgomery, Alabama, (Montgomery, AL: New South Bancroft, Slave Trading in the Old South (Columbia: University of Books, 2014), 105. South Carolina Press, 1996), 8, 11.

26. Theodore Dwight Weld, American Slavery As It Is: Testimony of 42. Bancroft, Slave Trading in the Old South, 67; Rothman, “The Do- a Thousand Witnesses (New York: American Anti-Slavery Society, mestication of the Slave Trade in the United States,” 40. 1839), 50. 43. David L. Lightner, Slavery and the Commerce Power: How the 27. “[S]exual assault of enslaved men took a wide variety of forms, Struggle Against the Interstate Slave Trade Led to the Civil War (Chel- including outright physical penetrative assault, forced reproduction, sea, MI: Sheridan Books, 2006), 6; Steven Deyle, “The Domestic Slave sexual coercion and manipulation, and psychic abuse.” Thomas A. Trade in America: The Lifeblood of the Southern Slave System,” in The Foster, “The Sexual Abuse of Black Men Under American Slavery,” J. Chattel Principle: Internal Slave Trades in the Americas (New Haven: of the Hist. of Sexuality (September 2011): 447. Yale University Press, 2004), 93.

28. Ibid., 445. 44. James Benson Sellers, Slavery in Alabama (Tuscaloosa, AL: Uni- versity of Alabama Press, 1950), 147. 29. John S. Jacobs, “A True Tale of Slavery,” The Leisure Hour: A Family Journal of Instruction and Recreation, February 1861. 45. Gudmestad, A Troublesome Commerce, 28-29.

30. Douglas O. Linder, Celia, A Slave, Trial (1855): An Account (2011), 46. Sven Beckert, “Slavery and Capitalism,” Chron. of Higher Educ., http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/celia/celiaaccount.html. December 12, 2014; see also Edward E. Baptist, The Half Has Never Been Told: Slavery and the Making of American Capitalism (New York: 31. Ibid. Basic Books, 2016).

32. Ibid. 47. See Daina Ramey Berry, The Price for their Pound of Flesh: The Value of the Enslaved, from Womb to Grave, in the Building of a Nation 33. Ibid. (Boston: Beacon Press, 2017).

34. “When angry, masters frequently kicked, slapped, cuffed, or 48. Ibid. boxed the ears of domestic servants, sometimes flogged pregnant women, and often punished slaves so cruelly that it took them weeks 49. Ibid., 33-57. to recover. Many slaves reported that they were flogged severely, had iron weights with bells on them placed on their necks, or were 50. Baptist, The Half Has Never Been Told, xxv-xxvi; Atlanta Black shackled.” Blassingame, The Slave Community, 261. Star, “15 Major Corporations You Never Knew Profited from Slavery,” August 26, 2013; Rachel L. Swarns, “272 Slaves Were Sold to Save 35. Weld, American Slavery As It Is, at 54. Georgetown. What Does it Owe Their Descendants?” New York Times, April 17, 2016; Stephen Smith & Kate Ellis, “Shackled Legacy: Histo- Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 82 Press, 2009), 125. TerritoryIndian , 1820-1847 University of Alabama AL: (Tuscaloosa, Worst Road: Travelers’ Accounts ofCrossing Alabama’s Old Creek 72. Carey, 53. 71. , River the Down Sold 70. versity ofAlabama Press, 2011), 53. Valley- Uni Chattahoochee AL: (Tuscaloosa, ofAlabama andGeorgia 69. 68. 67. 66. 65. Ibid. 64. 63. ATroublesome Gudmestad, , 42. 62. Commerce 130.1989), WI:UniversityPress, ofWisconsin Old (Madison, Slaves inthe South MichaelTadman,61. Traders, andSlaves:Masters, Speculators and 60. 59. ATroublesome 44. Gudmestad, rather, thantorture. Commerce itrelied onterror moreslaved perhaps thanthewhip, because people, 58. (New York: Life can Oxford University Press, 2005), 95. 57. 56. 55. 54. M.Rouke,pool: 1861). (Liver , inAmerica Alabama, State, fromCotton Slave, the an Escaped 53. 52. ATroublesome51. Gudmestad, , 9, Commerce 41. for Reparations,” TheAtlantic, June2014. Beast,April24, Daily 2015; Ta-Nehisi Case Start,” ism its “The Coates, , June19,Standard 2014; “How Eric Slavery Herschital, - Gave Capital “Slavery’sJacobs, Economic Inequality,” Based Raced Legacy: Pacific ery theModern Made World,”, February TheNation 24, 2014; Tom 4,, September Media Public 2017;American Greg Grandni, “How Slav ry Shows Slavery Build Many Helped U.S. andUniversities,” Colleges Carry Me Back: The Domestic Slave Trade TheDomestic StevenMeBack: Deyle, Carry inAmeri- Gudmestad, ATroublesome Gudmestad, , 15. Commerce Sellers, Slavery inAlabama, 154-55; Jeffrey The Very C, Benton, Lightner,, 10. Power SlaveryCommerce andthe , 92. , MeBack Deyle, Carry Ibid.,63. Jourden ofJ.H. ofEvents H.Banks, ANarrative Life ofthe Anthony Gene Carey, SlaveryLower inthe River: the Down Sold Ibid.,95. Ibid.,48. Ibid., 184-85; Gudmestad, ATroublesome Ibid.,184-85; Gudmestad, , 75. Commerce Tadman, andSlaves, 129. Speculators ThethreattheLower Southwaskey ofsaleto controllingen- to , 137. Tadman, andSlaves, Speculators The Half Has Never Been Told 67. TheHalf Been Has Never Baptist, , Lightner,, 10. Power SlaveryCommerce andthe Ibid.,92, 109. - - 79. 78. (Montgomery,Heritage Publishing, River City AL: 2001). 7. 7 Nealy, inMontgomery, Historian, Ala. (Jan.30, 2013). 76. 1800-1860 75. 74. Lightner,departure. , 10. Power Slavery Commerce andthe 73. portation to more distant markets in Alabama, Mississippi, and the andthe markets Mississippi, inAlabama, more to distant portation purchasecould enslaved from Southfor people the Upper trans- served atransfer as where point slave traders from western locations Slave markets inGeorgia often evolved aslave state. into exporting region butquickly animporting as the1800s Georgia began Carolinas, northernGeorgiaofTennessee. andmost Ibid., 249. market for accessible themost enslavedcame from labor theupper River, oftherailroad in the mid-1850s theintroduction andafter itbe ontheMississippi wassituated enslaved Thecity people. obtain to Louisiana northernandwesternnortheast nessee, Mississippi, convenientmost for place planters from Arkansas,southwest Ten - roleslave inthedomestic the tradeas Memphis played animportant Old, 311. South Although Tennessee state, wasprimarily anexporting trading markets inSelmaandMobile. Bancroft, Slave Trading inthe Montgomery, andSlaves, 63.to tors Inaddition Alabama slave had markets inAberdeen, andVicksburg. Jackson, Tadman,- Specula urban merous markets had across theSouth.Mississippi additional largest slave regions, there were tradingmarkets intheimporting nu- 82. Returns Eighth ofthe Census (1864), 8, 194, 270. fromOriginal in1860: the Compiled States United ofthe Population 1850 (1853), States 421, United the 447, 473; Bureau oftheCensus, (1841), 52-63; States J.P.United B. DeBow, TheSeventh Censusof ofthe InhabitantsandStatistics ofthe Enumeration Sixth um ofthe No.H.R. Doc. 22-269 (1832),- 32,36, Compendi 39; Dep’t ofState, Census, Abstract ReturnsFifth ofthe ofthe House ofRepresentatives, Censusof 1820 Fourth (1821), 119-20,Of State, 122-23; Clerk ofthe Dep’t andNew Orleans,Louisiana. Mississippi, Natchez, Alabama, ofenslaved thenumber livingby 1860 inMobile, exceeded people in Montgomerybetween 1820and 1860, significantly increased and Census records showing ofenslaved thatthenumber residing people fromStates United trading activity. ondata isbased Thechart afindingthatthere ahigh was volume of supports slave in acounty measure theamountofgrowth ofslaveinanarea, trading activity 81. Thoughcensus numbers donotprovide anentirely accurate www.census.gov/prod/www/decennial.html. Census Bureau, “Census ofPopulation&Housing, 1860,” http:// Alabama and436,631 enslaved in1860. inMississippi people U.S. 80. SLAVEMONTGOMERY TRADE A Sense of Place: Montgomery’s Architectural Jeffrey Architectural Montgomery’s ofPlace: ASense C. Benton, Politics and Power in a Slave Society: Alabama, Alabama, inaSlave Society: and Power J. MillsThornton, Politics Ibid. Ibid.,154; Bancroft,Slave Trading, 298. Old South inthe Ibid.;Sellers, Slavery inAlabama Interview, 152; withMary Ann Enslaved people would be transported in coffles to the port of of port to the incoffles Enslaved transported would be people Sellers, Slavery inAlabama, 153. While Natchez and New Orleans are widely accepted as the the as andNew WhileNatchez Orleansare widely accepted The census reported thatthere were Thecensus reported 435,080 enslaved in people (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, State Rouge: 1978), (Baton Louisiana 275. -

83 Louisiana Territory. None of the slave markets in Georgia achieved Kidnapping and Enslavement of Free the prominence of the exporting markets in Baltimore, Richmond, Notes and Charleston or the scale of the importing markets in Natchez and African Americans New Orleans. Macon, Georgia, did achieve some relative size but struggled to develop into a “first class market,” largely because it was 100. Becton v. Ferguson, 22 Ala. 599 (1853) (“It is undoubtedly true, forced to compete with other markets in Georgia, including Savan- in this State, that the presumption arising from the color of a person nah, Augusta, Atlanta, Milledgeville, and Columbus. Ibid., 245-47. indicating African descent is, that he is a slave.”); Field v. Walker, 17 Ala. 80 (1849) (“All we intend to affirm is, that a person of color held 83. Carey, Sold Down the River, 21. in bondage as a slave in this state is presumed to be a slave.”).

84. Deyle, Carry Me Back, 118. 101. The statute also provided that freed African Americans found in Alabama would have thirty days to vacate the state. After thirty days, 85. Sellers, Slavery in Alabama, 147. the free person could be subject to a penalty of thirty-nine lashes and receive an additional twenty-day period to leave the state. After that 86. Ibid., 171; Lightner, Slavery and the Commerce Power, 7. A small period expired, the free person could be sold back into slavery with percentage of enslaved people may have been bought by Alabama proceeds of the sale going to the state and to those who participated planters in other states and brought back to Alabama. Sellers, Slav- in apprehending him or her. John G. Aiken, A Digest of the Laws of ery in Alabama, 142, 148; Carey, Sold Down the River, 51. the State of Alabama (Philadelphia: A. Towar, 1833), 396-97.

87. Lightner, Slavery and the Commerce Power, 10; Sellers, Slavery in 102. Walker, 17 Ala. at 82 (holding a writ of habeas corpus was an Alabama, 152. improper vehicle for free African Americans to demonstrate they were wrongfully enslaved). 88. Interview with Mary Ann Nealy. 103. Becton, 22 Ala. at 599. The trial court in Selma directed the jury to 89. Deyle, Carry Me Back, 155. find that Mr. Jeter and his wife were enslaved in spite of overwhelming evidence that they were free. The Alabama Supreme Court reversed 90. John H. Napier III, “Montgomery During the Civil War,” Alabama the trial court on procedural grounds, explaining that the question of Review (April 1988): 103-31. Mr. Jeter and his wife’s legal status was for the jury to decide.

91. Bancroft, Slave Trading in the Old South, 295. 104. State v. Adams, 14 Ala. 486 (1848) (“It was further shown, that there existed in adjacent parts of Florida and Alabama, a set of men 92. Ibid., 296. who had confederated to steal and run negroes from Florida to Ala- bama, and that the defendant was one of those concerned.”); see also 93. Ibid. Hearrin v. Savage, 16 Ala. 286 (1849) (discussing the recovery of forty enslaved people stolen in Alabama and sold in Louisiana). 94. Ibid., 295; Sellers, Slavery in Alabama, 154. 105. Sellers, Slavery in Alabama, 157. 95. Sir Charles Lyell, A Second Visit to North America, Vol. 2 (London: Murray, 1855), 42-43. Separation of Families 96. Harper’s Weekly, “Slave Auction in the South,” July 13, 1861. 106. Carey, Sold Down the River, 51. 97. Lightner, Slavery and the Commerce Power, 178. 107. According to the 1860 census, there were 435,080 enslaved 98. The E. Barnard & Co. Slave Depot advertised in the 1859-1860 people living in Alabama. Sellers, Slavery in Alabama, 147. At least Montgomery City Directory: “Will keep constantly on hand mechan- 300,000 of the 435,080 enslaved people in Alabama in 1860 were in ics, field hands, cooks, washers and ironers, and general house ser- the state as a result of the domestic slave trade. Ibid., 171; Lightner, vants. Particular attention paid to Buying and selling Slaves on Com- Slavery and the Commerce Power, 7. Half of them (approximately mission . . . References: Lee & Norton, John H. Murphy, F.M. Gilmer 150,000 people) were separated from their families. Carey, Sold Jr., Montgomery.” (emphasis added). An 1852 map of Montgomery Down the River, 51. demonstrates that Murphy owned and operated a warehouse on and around present-day 122 Commerce Street. Ferdinand Okelomski, 108. Library of Congress, Born in Slavery: Slave Narratives from the Plan of the City of Montgomery, Alabama Department of Archives and Federal Writers’ Project, 1936-1938, Alabama Narratives Volume 1 History, http://alabamamaps.ua.edu/historicalmaps/counties/mont- (1937), 129. http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=mesn& gomery/montgomery.html. fileName=010/mesn010.db& recNum=0.

109. 123. Gudmestad, A Troublesome Commerce, 64-65.

Montgomery’s Particularly Brutal Slave 110. Ibid.

Trading Practices 111. Montgomery Daily Advertiser, Sept. 22, 1864. 99. Sellers, Slavery in Alabama, 159. 112. Ibid. Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 84 128. Stage,” rageous Chiefs’ ontheAtlantic andthe‘Sacred of Liberty’ Standard 127. NJ: Markus Wiener Publishers, 2007). 126. 125. 124. Tadman, andSlaves,184. Speculators 123. Ibid. 165 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2004), 165. InternalSlave Trades Principle: inTheChattel States,” Americas inthe Slave andtheDomestic Commodification, Rape, Trade intheUnited Edward “‘Cuffy,’122. E.Baptist, ‘Fancy Maid,’and ‘One-Eyed Men’: Enslaved of People Sexual Exploitation gomery, JobOffice, 1854). and Gazette Advertiser AL: 23d onthe instant inMontgomery Sold at 10 be o’clock, (Mont to a.m., JohnG.Winter, Wagons,121. Carts, Mules, &C., ofNegroes, Cataloge 120. Sellers, Slavery inAlabama, 152. Practices Slave Local Trading Exploitative Slavery athttp://informationwanted.org/items/show/2140. 16,ans), December Family Finding 1886,After Seen: byLast compiled 119. “Valentine Toliver,” (New Orle Advocate Christian Southwestern After Slavery athttp://informationwanted.org/items/show/2820. Paul, MN),August 3, Family(St. 1889, Finding Seen: byLast compiled 118. org/items/show/2382. Family Finding AfterSlavery athttp://informationwanted. Seen: Last (New Orleans),November Advocate 29,Christian 1883, by compiled 117. informationwanted.org/items/show/812. Family Finding 1885, AfterSlavery athttp:// Seen: byLast compiled 116. (Phila.), “Emily February Robbins,” Recorder TheChristian 26, at http://informationwanted.org/items/show/900. March 31, Family Finding 1866, AfterSlavery Seen: byLast compiled 115. informationwanted.org/items/show/2958. Family Finding 1915, AfterSlavery athttp:// Seen: byLast compiled 114. informationwanted.org/items/show/770. Family Finding 1883, AfterSlavery athttp:// Seen: byLast compiled 113. volt,” volt,” “Ceillia Sours searching for her children,” six Southwestern (Phila.), October 11, (Phila.), October (Nelson)Cox,” Recorder TheChristian “Bettie “Robert Williams,” “Robert TheColored Tennessean (Nashville, TN), “Martha Cobble finds her two sons after 40-yeartwosons after Cobblefindshersearch,” “Martha Appeal Jenna “Toussaint, Gibbs, Gabriel, andThree Finger’d Jack:‘Cou- Ibid.,184-85. “Richard TheRichmond (Virg.) Thompson,” Planet, November 13, BobbieBooker, Takes “Historian Fresh atEpic Slave Look Re See Philadelphia Tribune, January 7, 2011. Early American Studies; Philadelphia (Summer 2015). Studies; Early American (Princeston, Rico Baralt,SlaveinPuerto Guillermo Revolts A. - -

143. (Baltimore: Black ofAmerica Classic Press,States 1993). World,the but inParticular, andVery Expressly, United ofthe Those to 142. 2013.recorded until for years, nearly eighteen thestate’s so notofficially was ratification theappropriatefederal to authorities paperwork wasnot submitted ratifyin 1865. to the amendment voted in1995. It Thenecessary 141. Dept ofArchivesMississippi andHistory, 1923), 286. MS: (Jackson, andSpeeches Papers, HisLetters, Constitutionalist: Feb. 13 and14, 1850, onSlavery intheTerritories,”Davis, inJefferson from Revelation.” Genesisto “Speech ofJefferson Davis inSenate Testaments, inboth intheBible, issanctioned .It of AlmightyGod. “[Slavery] Jefferson bydecree asserted, Davis, also established was (1866), 721. TheConfederacy’sand Speeches first andonly president, Letters moral with truth.”Alexander andPrivate H.Stephens,Public and thisgreat philosophical upon physical, history oftheworld, based This,ournewgovernment,and normalinthe isthe first, condition. man; thatslavery thesuperior raceishisnatural to subordination thegreat rests, upon truththattheNegro thewhite isnotequal to foundations are Its laid,cornerstone idea. its exactly theopposite “Ourander Stephensannounced, newgovernment isfounded upon 140. THE POST-SLAVERY EXPERIENCE 133. Western (Vol. Journal ofBlack Studies 35:3, 2011): 208–217. 132. MASTERS,” 861. https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/2-2/h85 ANDPERSONSTICE ESCAPING SERVICE FROMOFTHEIR THE 131. andBiography (Vol. ofHistory Magazine 116:2, 2008). 130. 2000),110. Books, Vintage America’s It(New York: SlaveManWho andthe Rebellion Led Largest 129. 139. (NewShip: York: History AHuman 282. Penguin 2007), Books, of Freedom,” Mercy StreetRevealed citing,Marcus Rediker, TheSlave 138. 137. Carolinaof North Press, 2001), 147. 136. 135. 134. Ibid.,149. Press,sity 1969), 146 “TO PASS “TO S. 42,ANACT RESPECTING FUGITIVES FROM- JUS The Mississippi legislature rejected the Thirteenth Amendment legislature theThirteenth TheMississippi rejected , 162. Quarles, Black Abolitionists The Half Has Never Been Told TheHalf Been Has Never Baptist, 145-147., Ibid.,162. Black Abolitionists (New BenjaminYork: Quarles, Black Abolitionists Oxford Univer Denmark Vesey: The Buried Story of of Vesey: Denmark Story David M.Robertson, TheBuried ReeseRenford, (2011). “Canada; ThePromised for Slaves,” Land Kenyatta D. Kenyatta Berry, “Singing inSlavery: SongsofSurvival, Songs The Half Has Never Been Told TheHalf Been HasNever Baptist, 197., Anthony Santoro, “The Prophet Anthony Santoro, “The inHisOwnWords,” Virginia At theConfederacy’s founding, inaugural president vice Alex David Walker, Walker’s David of Citizens Coloured the Appeal to David S. Cecelski,TheWaterman’s (ChapelHill:University Song - - 85 144. “Slaves and Free Persons of Color. An Act Concerning Slaves and 166. Pace v. Alabama, 106 U.S. 583 (1883).

Free Persons of Color,” NC General Assembly, 1831. Notes 167. Official Proceedings of the Constitutional Convention of the State 145. Baptist, The Half Has Never Been Told, 196-197. of Alabama, 22 May 1901 to 3 Sept 1901.

146. Ibid., 197. 168. 168. Giles v. Harris, 189 U.S. 475 (1903).

147. Ibid., 210.

148. Quarles, Black Abolitionists, 92. Reconstruction and Beyond in Montgomery 149. Marshall Rachleff, “An Abolitionist Letter to Governor Henry W. Collier of Alabama: The Emergence of ‘The Crisis of Fear’ in 169. Reconstruction is an extremely broad and complicated subject, Alabama,” J. Negro Hist. (Fall 1981): 246-53. comprising conflicting motivations and actors as well as distinct peri- ods. See Eric Foner, Reconstruction: America’s Unfinished Revolution, 150. See Franny Nudelman, John Brown’s Body: Slavery, Violence, and 1863-1877 (New York: Harper Collins, 2011); Richard Bailey, Neither Car- the Culture of War (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2004). petbaggers Nor Scalawags: Black Officeholders During the Reconstruc- tion of Alabama, 1867-1878 (Montgomery, AL: New South Books, 2010). 151. Frederick Douglass, The Portable Frederick Douglass (New York, NY: Penguin Books, 2016), 288. 170. See Sarah Woolfolk Wiggins, The Scalawag in Alabama Politics, 1865-1881 (Tuscaloosa, AL: University of Alabama Press, 1977), 40. 152. William Warren Rogers, et al., Alabama: The History of a Deep South State (Tuscaloosa, AL: University of Alabama Press, 1994), 234. 171. Elizabeth Bethel Source, “The Freedmen’s Bureau in Alabama,” J. of S. History (1948), 62. 153. Andrew Johnson, “Message From the President of the United States,” (1865), 17. 172. Ibid., 80.

173. Howard Overton Robinson, Desegregating Montgomery: The Evolution of an Alabama African American Community (University of After Slavery: Post-Emancipation in Akron: Thesis, 1999), 151.

Alabama 174. Schurz, Report on the Condition of the South by 1865, 70. 154. Encyclopedia of Alabama, “Slavery,” August 5, 2009, http:// www.encyclopediaofalabama.org/face/Article.jsp?id=h-2369. 175. Ibid., 70-71.

155. Carl Schurz, Report on the Condition of the South by 1865 (39th 176. Feldman, The Irony of the Solid South, 4. Congress, 1st Session, 1865), 20. In the period immediately following the Civil War, Congress ordered Mr. Schurz, a Union general, to assess 17 7. See Robinson, Desegregating Montgomery, at 172 (describing a the conditions in the South. group of Klan members terrorizing an African American section of Montgomery in response to an alleged insult of a white woman). 156. Ibid. 178. Ibid., at 169; Colored Alabamian, November 5, 1910; William 157. Ibid. Loren Katz, Thirty Years of Lynching in the United States, 1889-1918 (NAACP: 1969), 43-45. 158. Glenn Feldman, The Irony of the Solid South: Democrats, Repub- licans, and Race, 1865-1944 (Tuscaloosa, AL: Univesity of Alabama 179. Robinson, Desegregating Montgomery, 169. Press, 2013), 5. 180. Ibid.; Colored Alabamian, November 6, 1910; The Weekly Citizen, 159. Ibid., 6-7. October 11, 1884.

160. Schurz, Report on the Condition of the South, 18. 181. Colored Alabamian, July 23, 1910.

161. Ibid. 182. Robinson, Desegregating Montgomery, 163.

162. Ibid. 183. Ibid.

163. Hartford (Conn.) Courant, “Election Riots in Alabama: Ballots 184. Montgomery, Ala. Code Ch. 9 § 13 (1914). Destroyed — Unarmed Negroes Shot — A Democratic Legislature Elected,” November 6, 1874. 185. Montgomery, Ala. Code Ch. 13 § 500, Ch. 15 § 576 (1914).

164. New York Times, “The Alabama Democrats: Their Platform as 186. Montgomery, Ala. Code Ch. 22 §§ 603-04 (1938); Ch. 10 § 14, Ch. Adopted by the State Convention,” May 31, 1878. 13 §§ 25, 30, Ch. 20 § 24, Ch. 25 § 5, Ch. 33 § 30, Ch. 34 § 2 (1952).

165. Pace & Cox v. State, 69 Ala. 231 (1882). 187. Robinson, Desegregating Montgomery, 175. Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 86 Press, 2001). 1888-1908 South, in the Carolina (ChapelHill,NC:University ofNorth 204. 1890. 203. 25, 1890.). 202. New York Tribune, “Assassination July 27, inMississippi,” 1890. 201. Terror ofRacial Legacy (3d 44-45. Ed., 2017), 200. Mrs. Vaaghn,” July 1, 1875. Forcible HangingoftheNegro Man,Kemmer,“The forof theRape grounds (Greenfield, IN:Coiny , Publishing, Democrat 2002); Hancock 199. 199. Williams, Thomas ALynchingFair County atHancock the “AnKentucky (Danville, KY), Advocate Outrage,” April14, 1876. (Raleigh,NC), Standard “KentuckyDaily Regulators,” August 3, 1967; Kentucky 1774-1992 (Danville, KY: 1992), Books, 47-48; Bicentennial 198. 197. Trials, 1871-1872 (Athens, GA: University ofGeorgia Press, 38. 1996), 196. (New York: Free Press, 1998), 30. 195. W.E.B., 1860-1880 inAmerica DuBois, Black Reconstruction (Vol Ass. 17: Hist. Violence,”Reconstruction J. 1976), La. ofthe 41-49. AForgotten Incident of Landry Riot: St. “The 194. Carolyn E.DeLatte, 193. Ibid. 374-75. Wordsin the (New York: Americans ofAfrican DaPress, Capo 1994), 192. Slavery (New York: 1979), Books, 276-77. Vintage F. Leon Long: 191. So of TheAftermath Storm inthe Been Litwack, Violence and Politics Through Racism South: the Post-War Throughout inAlabama).leasing York: Doubleday, ofconvict theoperation 2008) (describingindetail 190. 189. 188. Ibid.,44-45. Ibid. Trouble They Seen: The Story of Reconstruction Dorothy Sterling, Trouble ofReconstruction TheStory They Seen: Richard C. Brown,ofDanville andBoyle County AHistory Falkner Lou Williams, TheGreatKu Carolina South Klux Klan Ibid.

Chicago Daily Tribune Daily Ibid.;Chicago ARepublican, “Killed Speaker,” July See See Equal Justice Initiative, Lynching Equal the Initiative, Confronting Justice inAmerica: “The Cook Assassination,” July 27, Assassination,” Cook 1890; “The Atlanta Constitution, Chicago Daily Tribune, Daily ReasonFor JulyChicago 26, KillingCook,” “Their See Douglas A. Blackmon,Douglas A. Slavery By Another Name(New Struggle for Mastery: Disenfranchisement MichaelPerman, forMastery: Struggle - Carolina inVictory Capitol for TheGuardian Activists,” , July 10, 2015. 218. 217. Monument Placed InFront Tuesday,” ofCourthouse June14, 2006. 216. Slavery, Says aLawmaker,” May 10, 1996. Alabama also NewYorkto Legislature); see Backed, “Bible Times 215. wallbuilders.com/libissuesarticles.asp?id=92. The SouthWent To War,” WallBuilders 2008). http://www. (Dec. 214. Wallace Pickets: ThirdGroups,” July Party DixiecratsBoo 17, 1948. July 17,Delegates,” , “Reb 1948; News Flags TheBirmingham Greet , “Around Post The Birmingham theHall—Wallace Pickets Greet Fever Great Grips Throng,”, July 18, News TheBirmingham 1948; 213. July 18, 1948. 212. 211. Memorial,” 210. JanuaryHonor Lee,” 21, 1902. 209. Governor Issue,” NewYork onRace , April26, Times 1963. 208. 207. June 5, 2011. 206. 28, 2008. 205. Beyond and in Confederacy Alabama the Reviving WAR, RACE AND MEMORY SLAVERY, OF COLLECTIVE A NATIONAL LEGACY: OUR 219. CONCLUSION S.C. Ann.§1-10-10 Code (2000). Virginia Van Der Verr, “Orators Have OwnWay AsRevival-Like Charles Davidson, Slavery (1996) (Written Submitted Speech JamesBaldwin, Man’s “White Ebony, August Guilt,” 1965.

Amanda Holpuch, “Confederate Flag Removed from South David Barton, “Confronting David Barton, CivilWar Revisionism: Why PaulShackel, “Heyward A. Shepherd: TheFaithful Slave Encyclopedia ofAlabama, “Dixiecrats,” FebruaryEncyclopedia 22,2008.

The Lamar Democrat andTheSulligent “Confederate Democrat News The Lamar Kennedy Budge “Robert Alabama ClaudeUnableto Sitton, New York, “Text Platform Rights Times Voted ofStates’ inSouth,” Dothan Eagle, Dothan Encyclopedia ofAlabama, “ConfederateEncyclopedia Memorial Monument,” , “Virginia Day in Georgia: Both States , “Virginia DayAtlanta inGeorgia: BothStates Constitution Encyclopedia ofAlabama, “ConfederateEncyclopedia Memorial Day,” August (Vol. Archaeology 37:Historical 2003), 138-48.

“Erecting Things,”October, 22,1910.

Acknowledgments 87

Bryan Stevenson, Director Stevenson, Bryan This report designed, is written, and produced researched, by to specially like thank would Justice Initiative.the Equal We and editing. writing, Special research, for Taylor Jennifer designthanks to Becker, and illustration; Ryan Hanna Kim for and editing; Ben research for Urell and Aaryn Sia Sanneh, Jones GeDa’ Woodson, Elizabeth Mollman, Alison Schaefer, Madeline Jonathan Kubakundimana, Herbert, Murphy, Adam for Daniels and Gabrielle Brown, Milligan, Eric Evan Kane, editing for and photo Baharanyi Zawadi and writing; research to grateful are We photography. for Chu and Stephen research; and Sonia Kapadia, Ansley, Susskind, Boone,Randy Eva Kiara editing support; for and project G. and to Bryan Young Bethany Brittany Feldman, Mark and Maxymuk, Ben Stevenson, Francis, additional for photography. Human Pictures ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 88 opened inMontgomery, opened Museum,From EnslavementThe Legacy Incarceration to inApril2018. Alabama, EJI’S RACE AND POVERTY PROJECT Individual donations are greatly appreciated and tax deductible. Individual are donations greatly andtax appreciated www.eji.org. visit please EJIisaprivate,nonprofit organization. inequality. Forandotherfrom materials ofthisreport copies EJI, issues. We ofracial joinusinourwork you onthelegacy invite to on a range of of structural poverty in America and the impact tice which examinesthehistory project, ofracialracial injus- justice Slave TheMontgomery TradeSlavery inAmerica: ofEJI's ispart Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 89 tem. Compelling and data-rich visuals exhibits a one-of-a-kindprovide opportunity to investi- injustice of racial and its history gate America’s connectionslegacy dynamic — to across draw impacted of Americans generations by the tragic inequality. of racial history uses interactive Museum The Legacy Located where warehouse on the site former of a in Montgomery, enslaved peopleblack were Alabama, media, sculpture, videography, and exhibits to media, sculpture, videography, visitors in the sightsimmerse and sounds of the the Jim terrorism, racial Trade, Domestic Slave prison- sys largest world’s South, and the Crow Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 90 Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 91 Slavery In America The Montgomery Slave Trade 92 without express permission ofEqual Initiative. priorwritten Justice inany form ordistributed orbyany means reproduced, electronic ormechanical modified, ©2018 All may byEqual be Initiative. reserved. rights ofthispublication Justice No part www.eji.org 334 2691803 Montgomery, Alabama 36104 122 Commerce Street