English 3349F/G Lecture Notes - Lecture 8: Henry Box Brown, Triangular Trade, Cotton Gin
4 Jan 2021
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History of Slavery
- 17C — became part of triangular trade system
- Cotton, tobacco, sugar — profits from these would finance European textiles
- Popular because it enabled ships to always go across the Atlantic with a full shipload
- About 15M Africans arrived alive in the Americas, but more than that died on the
passage over
- 1750s — 100 000 slaves in Virginia alone
- 3M in the South overall
- Morality of slave trade and slavery was starting to be looked down on — Mississippi river was
important to American domestic slave trade
- Why would American colonists decide to consider freeing slaves and deciding not to?
- Commercce
- Cotton gin — could take the seeds out
- Increased from 190Pounds to 45M pounds
- Invention basically reversed trend of slave trade going away
- Land acquisition became important
- Could add plantation
- By 1850, tradition of adding free state for slave state was gone — would leave
newly acquired or existing states free to decide whether or not they would be
slave states
- Fugitive Slave Act — involved Americans who weren’t reporting slaves made
them complicit to slave runaway = federal offence
- Everyone was required to uphold slavery — led to fights between those
who didn’t like slavery
- Slaves were counted as people for tax purposes only — gave south more power
- 1808 — slave trade was abolished but slavery/interior transportation of slaves was still legal
- Argued that this led to violence against women — “reproduction” for domestic slaves
- Displacement of Indigenous people
- War between Mexico and United States after annexation of Mexico
- Many transcendentalists became political activists — Emerson was an abolitionist speaker, other
people started arguing against slavery
Narrative in the Life of Fredrick Douglass — Slave Narrative
- Slave narrative as a form of abolitionist fiction
- 19C — slave narratives became a popular genre of abolitionist literature
- Abolitionist writers were trying to capture imaginations of readers and make them see that
slavery was immoral — anti-slavery authors used slave narrative to appeal to audiences and see
realities of slavery
- Purpose was to end slavery but also to engage with self reflection
- Black people were not seen as human — became a way that they were people with their
own ideas and they could assert their own humanity
Document Summary
17c became part of triangular trade system. Cotton, tobacco, sugar profits from these would finance european textiles. Popular because it enabled ships to always go across the atlantic with a full shipload. About 15m africans arrived alive in the americas, but more than that died on the passage over. 1750s 100 000 slaves in virginia alone. Morality of slave trade and slavery was starting to be looked down on mississippi river was important to american domestic slave trade. Cotton gin could take the seeds out. Invention basically reversed trend of slave trade going away. By 1850, tradition of adding free state for slave state was gone would leave newly acquired or existing states free to decide whether or not they would be slave states. Fugitive slave act involved americans who weren"t reporting slaves made them complicit to slave runaway = federal offence. Everyone was required to uphold slavery led to fights between those who didn"t like slavery.
