Essay about Slavery in the United States and Slaves

Submitted By mallieillen
Words: 993
Pages: 4

Slavery & Abolition A Southern man is boarding a train with his slave. But slaves weren’t allowed on the train. The slave was in a different train cart because slaves and their owners can’t be in the same train cart. His owner was with other men talking about cotton and slave trading. Later the slave and his horrible owner got off and went to a fancy hotel in Savannah. Meanwhile two black slave couples were boarding the train. The lady was light skin and could pass for being a white person and couldn’t be alone with a black male slave. So she married William Johnson. They planned their disguises to get to Philadelphia. They made it there in 3 hours. Slavery has been apart of America for a long period of time for the South. People would sell and trade slaves. They even sold kids. Slaves lived in a small shack with about 20 or more other slaves. They lived an untold brutality and suffering from there masters. In1434, Portuguese started to explore the West Africa coast where they found black African people. Slave owners come to Africa to buy slaves or capture them. Robert Walsh had set out to Africa and when he came back he had 562 slaves aboard. In the 1790, there were 657,526 African slaves in the south but 40,370 in the North. In the 1860 there were 3,953,696 slaves in the south and 64 in the North. The South depended on slaves. Slaves did the planting from daily toil. To white owners cheap labor meant slave labor. The Pennsylvania Society for the Abolition of Slavery was found in 1784. The leaders of this society were Benjamin Franklin, Alexander Hamilton, and John Jay. In 1817, the American Colonization Society had a brand new idea for ending slavery. Great Britain banned slave trade on May 1, 1807 and the U.S. followed on January 1, 1808. On August 30, 1800 Prosser prepared to strike for slaves. But his plan failed when it was raining that night. Prosser and his chief lieutenants were arrested and were suppose to be hanged. He died October 20, 1800. Former President Thomas Jefferson always hated slavery. Proslavery and antislavery argued for two long years. They finally settled it and made the Missouri Compromise of 1820. This law is a new state of Missouri and western territories slavery would be illegal. This compromise didn’t work for the North and the South. Most of the Northern didn’t want slavery anymore and the Southerners had no intentions of giving up on slavery. Nat Turner was a slave. On August 22, 1831 Nat broke out of his shed with some of his friends and killed all the members of his slave owners. By the next day, Nat and his friends nearly killed 60 slave owners. White owners were scared about this so they gather up men and killed Nat’s followers. They didn’t catch Nat until October 3. He died November 11, `1831. Joy and peace was rare for slaves. If slaves act badly, they get punish by being tied up on a tree and being whipped. Another punishment was that they would put slaves in a barrel with nails inside and will roll you down a hill. Sometimes you might fall into a river and drown. Abby Kelley was one of the first women to lead the Anti-Slavery Society. Later on Susan B. Anthony and Lucy Stone was brought into this society. Frederick Douglass could speak and write about slavery with great details. He was born as a slave in 1817. He escaped in 1838 to the north. Frederick Douglass also wrote an autobiography Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave. The Underground Railroad was a route for the slaves to cross to the north. The most famous person to help cross the railroad was Harriet Tubman. She has a brave motto,” I can’t die but once.” At night Harriet snuck slaves