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Slavery remains one of the most contentious issues in history. While its atrocities are universally condemned, many of us have only a superficial understanding of its complexities. Contrary to popular belief, slavery wasn't limited to one race; it also ensnared white individuals.
Despite efforts by slaveholders to legitimize the institution, such as the creation of a specialized Slave Bible, enslaved people continually sought freedom. Their courageous attempts to escape were often met with brutal recapture, aided by dogs specifically trained for hunting them down.
10. Slaveholders Employed a Modified Bible to Rationalize Slavery
Certain slaveholders provided education and religious instruction to their enslaved individuals, converting them to Christianity. However, they prohibited them from reading the full Bible, as it contained verses that opposed slavery. To circumvent this, slaveholders removed large sections of both the Old and New Testaments.
This resulted in a condensed version known as “Parts of the Holy Bible, selected for the use of the Negro Slaves, in the British West-India Islands,” commonly referred to today as the Slave Bible. Slaveholders strategically retained passages that normalized slavery, such as the story of Joseph’s enslavement in Egypt.
However, they omitted sections like the Israelites’ escape from Egyptian oppression, fearing such stories might inspire rebellion. This fear was not unfounded, as enslaved people in Haiti had already revolted and expelled their oppressors three years prior to the Slave Bible’s publication.
The authorship of the Slave Bible remains a mystery. Some believe it was created by plantation owners to suppress uprisings, while others attribute it to missionaries who selectively taught passages that justified slavery, making it appear as a natural condition.
9. Ferocious Dogs Were Specifically Bred to Chase Down Escaped Slaves
Escaped slaves were notoriously hard to locate and posed significant risks when approached. Plantation owners devised a solution: breeding aggressive dogs exclusively to hunt, attack, and apprehend runaway slaves.
These 'Negro dogs' were fierce breeds such as bloodhounds and bulldogs, capable of inflicting severe harm. Slaveholders often let the dogs brutally attack captured runaways, only intervening to prevent fatal injuries.
One notorious breed was the Dogo Cubano (also known as the Mastin Cubano, Cuban Mastiff, or Mastin de Cuba). Created by crossbreeding Spanish war dogs with English mastiffs and scent hounds, this dog was designed to capture escaped slaves. It also served as a livestock guardian and participated in dogfighting. Predictably, the breed vanished after slavery ended in Cuba.
Negro dogs were trained using actual slaves. These dogs were not exposed to black slaves until their training required them to chase one. They tracked the slave’s scent by picking up their unique odor from clothing items, then pursued and violently attacked the individual. Dogs that performed well were given pieces of meat as rewards.
8. The First Slave Owner Was Actually a Black Man
It’s commonly believed that slavery in the US began with the arrival of 20 individuals in Virginia in 1620. However, this is only partially accurate, as these people were not slaves but indentured servants—individuals bound to serve a master for a set period before earning their freedom.
Indentured servitude was widespread during that era. Many, including impoverished whites, voluntarily entered into such agreements. Black individuals, however, were often forced into servitude but were typically freed after completing their terms.
Anthony and Mary Johnson, among the early indentured servants who arrived in the US during the 1620s, eventually married and even owned their own indentured servants.
One of their servants, John Casor, became the subject of a legal dispute in 1654 or 1655. Casor argued that his servitude had ended after fulfilling the agreed seven or eight years, plus an additional seven. Anthony Johnson, however, insisted Casor remained bound to him.
The court ruled in favor of Anthony, condemning Casor to lifelong servitude, effectively making him a slave. This precedent allowed other owners to convert their indentured servants into permanent slaves. By 1661, Virginia had formally legalized slavery.
It’s worth noting that prior to Casor’s case, John Punch had already been sentenced to lifetime servitude by Virginia courts. Punch, a black man, was punished more severely than his white counterparts for escaping before completing their contracts.
7. White Individuals Were Also Enslaved
Slavery is often associated with the transatlantic trade, where Africans were forcibly transported to the US via ships crossing the Atlantic Ocean. However, this was just one facet of slavery. Other forms existed globally, with white individuals also falling victim to enslavement.
One such system was operated by the Barbary corsairs, notorious slave raiders of the Ottoman Empire who thrived along North Africa’s coasts around AD 1600. While many were Muslims, the corsairs also included English and Dutch pirates.
Unlike the transatlantic trade, the Barbary corsairs showed no bias in their targets. They captured anyone, including fellow Muslims. Men were enslaved, women were sold as concubines, and male children were forcibly converted to Islam and later enlisted in the Ottoman army’s slave corps.
Initially, the Barbary corsairs targeted ships in the Mediterranean. Later, they expanded their raids to coastal villages in England, France, Italy, Ireland, Spain, and Portugal. In 1631, they enslaved the entire population of Baltimore, Ireland. The raids grew so relentless that many coastal residents fled inland to avoid the pirates.
The Barbary slave trade began to decline in the 17th century as European navies launched attacks against the pirates on the open seas. By the 19th century, both US and European forces were targeting the pirates directly in their strongholds. This pressure forced them to halt the enslavement of European Christians, though they continued raiding other regions.
6. Slave Owners Engaged in Slave Breeding and Used Slaves as Currency
The 1808 ban on the transatlantic slave trade was intended as a victory for enslaved Africans and the abolitionist movement in the US. Ironically, it benefited pro-slavery advocates more. Prior to the ban, slaveholders relied on individuals captured or bought from Africa. Afterward, they shifted their focus to breeding slaves within the US.
Slave breeding involved forcing enslaved individuals to produce as many children as possible. Many slaveholders operated breeding farms, housing a small number of male slaves with numerous females. Children born into these conditions were enslaved from birth and remained on the farms until they were old enough to labor.
Slave breeding became the backbone of states like Virginia, which emerged as a leading supplier of slaves to other colonies. Enslaved individuals became the state’s primary commodity, surpassing even gold in value. By 1860, the total worth of slaves in the US was estimated at $4 billion.
To put this into perspective, the total US currency in circulation was valued at $435.4 million, and all gold and silver combined amounted to $228.3 million. Some slaveholders even mortgaged their slaves, establishing banks that converted these mortgages into bonds sold globally—even in areas where slavery was outlawed.
5. Escaping from a Slaveholder Was Labeled a Mental Illness
Samuel Cartwright, a pro-slavery doctor in the South, used medical and scientific arguments to defend slavery. In 1849, he was appointed to lead a Louisiana state committee dedicated to studying diseases among African-Americans.
Cartwright presented his findings in a report titled “Diseases and Physical Peculiarities of the Negro Race.” He argued that blacks were inherently inferior to whites, citing smaller brains, underdeveloped nervous systems, and sensitive skin as traits that supposedly made them ideal for slavery. He further claimed that blacks could only find contentment in enslavement.
Cartwright also introduced the concept of drapetomania, a supposed mental illness that caused slaves to flee their masters. Derived from Greek words meaning “crazy” and “runaway slave,” he attributed this condition to masters treating their slaves too humanely.
Cartwright asserted that slaves contemplating escape often became “sulky and dissatisfied without cause.” He proposed that both potential and captured runaways could be “cured” through severe whipping and the amputation of their toes.
4. Laziness Was Also Deemed a Mental Illness
Cartwright didn’t limit his claims to drapetomania. He also invented another fictional mental disorder, dysaesthesia aethiopica, which he claimed caused laziness in slaves. According to him, this condition arose when the skin lost sensitivity, leading slaves to work sluggishly, as if in a daze.
Cartwright argued that dysaesthesia aethiopica was more common among free blacks than slaves, as the former lacked masters to oversee their well-being. He suggested that the illness could be treated by washing the affected skin with soap and water, followed by an oil cleanse, and then forcing the individual to labor under the sun. He claimed this would leave the slave deeply grateful.
3. Africans Participated in the Enslavement of Other Africans
Africans played a role in selling fellow Africans into slavery. Slave ships heading to Africa sourced their captives from coastal tribes, who often sold prisoners of war captured during conflicts with rival groups.
Coastal African kings traded enslaved individuals for European weapons, enabling them to expand inland. There, they seized new territories and captives, perpetuating a vicious cycle of warfare and enslavement. This trade fueled numerous deadly conflicts among West African tribes centuries ago.
Initially, African-European trade in the 16th century focused on ivory and gold, not slaves. However, this soon shifted as African rulers began exchanging enslaved people for European goods.
2. Free Blacks Were Often Kidnapped and Re-enslaved
The Underground Railroad emerged years before the Civil War as a network of safe houses and routes operated by free blacks and white abolitionists. It helped enslaved individuals escape from the pro-slavery South to the free North.
The Underground Railroad faced opposition from the Reverse Underground Railroad, which operated in the opposite direction. Free blacks and escaped slaves were abducted in the North and sold into slavery in the South. Many free blacks struggled to prove their status, as courts often dismissed their documents over suspicions of forgery.
Free blacks were further disadvantaged because they couldn’t testify in court against whites to confirm another black person’s freedom. Only a white individual could provide such testimony, but many refused, fearing backlash for supporting a black person and potentially sending a white person to prison.
1. Convict Leasing Emerged as Slavery’s Successor After the Civil War
Following the US Civil War, slavery was entirely outlawed, destabilizing the South’s economy, which had relied heavily on it. Former slaveholders turned to the Thirteenth Amendment, which, while abolishing slavery, allowed involuntary servitude as punishment for crimes.
Southern states began arresting blacks en masse, often for absurd reasons like the crime of unemployment. Unable to pay the hefty fines imposed, these individuals were jailed and then leased to private companies for forced labor, marking the rise of the convict-lease system.
More than 200,000 blacks suffered under the convict-lease system, enduring conditions as brutal as those during slavery. They performed hazardous tasks under cruel treatment, facing beatings, chains, and stabbings. The association between “convicts” and “negroes” became so strong that the terms were used interchangeably.
