Washington and slavery

Sunny

Sunny

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Maryland
I mentioned this in the Games thread where I told about my visit to Mount Vernon a couple of days ago. But I think it's worth a discussion in itself.

The Virginia mansion which was the home of George and Martha Washington is fascinating to visit. I love seeing how people lived at various times in the past. The home is large, especially by the standards of those days, and furnished with some attractive colonial furniture. It has fresh, clean wallpaper, not the original, of course, but they said they tried to duplicate the original wherever possible. It was not a Versailles-type mansion, it was a place where real people obviously lived real lives.

The bad part is, of course, the fact that that one home used hundreds of slaves. It was not just a home, it was a pretty large plantation. Most of the slaves were obviously field hands. A lot of the original work buildings are still standing or have been restored. At the laundry building (a little cottage), we learned that two slaves, they gave their names, were responsible for all the backbreaking washing, starching, drying, and ironing of clothes.

Washington freed his slaves in his will - but only after his death. I would have liked it a lot better if he just had an epiphany and freed them, period, while he was still alive! How could otherwise good, decent people enjoy living in such luxury provided by someone else's slavery?

One thought occurred to me: if he had been alive during the Civil War, which side would Washington have been on?
 

I know slavery is used and written almost entirely about Non - whites.. particularly Black people... but really what you're describing as Back breaking work carried out on behalf of a large home owner or landowner was similar to what happened here in the UK but with whites against whites. Where people who were half starved couldn't afford to keep their children and would basically ''sell'' them to the upper classes, where these kids some as young as 10 years old, but mostly around 12 or 13 were put to work sometimes for 14 hours a day of back breaking work, with , a couple of hours off in 7 days if they were lucky. Some were paid a tiny amount 'pennies per year''..and others nothing at all.

These girls and even boys suffered serious sexual assaults in many, many cases, as well as regular beatings not just by their employers /owners.. but also by the hierarchy within the downstairs staff of the house...

The children were kept half starved, they couldn't go home to their parents because the parents couldn't afford to keep them, many hundreds were shipped off to countries like Australia and those still in this country couldn't run away because a Bad ''servant/slaves'' name would soon be spread around and they would never find anywhere to work or live apart from on the streets as beggars. This was still going on right up into the 1930's and 40's...

I understand Black slaves were shackled and kidnapped from their homes, in many, many cases, and no-one can imagine that today..no-one... being hunted like an animal by a race of people they may never even have known existed in some cases.., the fear and horror would have been terrible.

So I'm always interested in reading of the slavery trade, regardless of creed or colour!!

Did you take pictures of the house Sunny?
 
Didn't Washington agree to release his slaves after the death of his wife Martha?

It was my understanding that Martha Washington freed the slaves early because that clause in her husband's will caused her to fear that she would be killed by the slaves.
 

Aunt Bea said:
Didn't Washington agree to release his slaves after the death of his wife Martha?

It was my understanding that Martha Washington freed the slaves early because that clause in her husband's will caused her to fear that she would be killed by the slaves.
Click to expand...

Yes, that's correct. Her decision was based on self-preservation and not on any moral epiphany!
 
The slaves were captured in Africa by other blacks, often Muslims, and sold to the sea captains who transported them to the new world. All this happened long before they reached the plantations. Nothing is ever said about their living conditions before capture.
 
Holly, I posted a couple of pictures in Games, under the thread Guess the Title. It's post # 6205. I'll scrounge up a few more when I get a chance, rushing out the door in a few minutes. (The picture of the house looks pretty bad because the grass is so worn away, but actually it is a lovely house, though not up to the standards of European royal elegance, or even the mansions in Newport, RI.)
 
Good point, but we really have no way of knowing how the goods we buy are manufactured, or what the working conditions are. The only solution would be to never buy anything.

Living in a lovely home on a plantation, where you are surrounded by slaves all the time, day and night, you speak to them, have a close relationship with them, etc. is kind of different. And these people were slaves not because of poverty, it was because of race, period. There was no hope for them, except to be freed as individuals.

As I've mentioned here already, I wonder what Washington would have done during the Civil War if he was still alive. I imagine by then he would have just freed all his slaves, and not only after he was dead. He struggled and suffered to help the Union get its start, and was its first major leader. The Civil War was, basically, over dissolving the Union, over the issue of slavery. I don't think he would have sided with the Confederacy.

But the slave issue is certainly a blot on him and Jefferson.
 
The consequences of slavery that happened many, many
years ago are being felt here in the UK today!

In the universities mainly, adventurers who had a shady
life, shipowners who carried slaves, etc., etc., etc., are
being singled out and if there is a statue of that person,
the students demand that it is removed, a portrait the
same, a building named for a person who probably paid
with badly earned money to have it built in his memory
has to be renamed.

The students demonstrate until something is done to
satisfy them, then all goes quiet till they kick of in a
university in some other city.

It is all very sad that children are forcing the change
of history! Good or Bad events did happen and they
did determine how people lived, many were despicable,
but they all added up to history and if they are expunged
from the history books, then it could all happen again.

Mike.
 
Mike said:
The consequences of slavery that happened many, many
years ago are being felt here in the UK today!

In the universities mainly, adventurers who had a shady
life, shipowners who carried slaves, etc., etc., etc., are
being singled out and if there is a statue of that person,
the students demand that it is removed, a portrait the
same, a building named for a person who probably paid
with badly earned money to have it built in his memory
has to be renamed.

The students demonstrate until something is done to
satisfy them, then all goes quiet till they kick of in a
university in some other city.

It is all very sad that children are forcing the change
of history! Good or Bad events did happen and they
did determine how people lived, many were despicable,
but they all added up to history and if they are expunged
from the history books, then it could all happen again.

Mike.
Click to expand...

Exactly Mike!! ''Lest we forget' is one of the most profound phrases in life, I have always believed that, with the Expungement of much of our ''bad history''... I'm afraid for our children's future..
 
How about we worry about the human trafficking that is going on NOW instead of what went on 250 years ago? We can't change the past. But maybe we can save some people now. Slavery still exists in Africa and in the third world -- oops, change that to developing nations for the politically correct crowd. Human trafficking is going on now, at our border, and plenty of drug trafficking, too. Enslavement to drugs is just as bad. Let the past take care of itself. It was a different time with different values. Let's live in the now.
 
In this country, there is much controversy about all the statues of Confederate generals all over the south, as well as towns, streets, colleges, etc. named after them. There was even a big flap about the name of our local football team (Redskins), though that seems to have died down. Some of it is probably valid, some of it is carried to the point of silliness.

I lived in Germany for a year in the mid-1950's (husband was in the Army). I remember hearing the Germans talk about streets named Adolf Hitler Strasse having been hastily renamed when the war ended. I doubt that there was much controversy about it. But statues, place names, etc. in honor of military and political figures on the wrong (and losing) side over 150 years ago? Not sure where I stand.
 
In the 1700s, *****es were considered as trainable apes , or at best, some sort of subhuman species. While we, now, are disgusted by 400 year old notions: there still is a mountain of residual prejudice left to erase.
I've been a Civil War nut since I was a kid. The way they fought battles back then,just amazes me. They lined up and marched at each other in a hail of bullets. Both sides showed great bravery. I believe you can honor that bravery and dedication by all in the War. But it is impossible to honor a system of slavery, human deprivation, and blatant racism. There were over 100,000 Black Americans, who fought in the War. Some even fought for the South. If Civil War monuments in the old Jim Crow South were meant to commemorate valor and bravery during that War, where are the monuments to those brave Blacks. And as racism is not an exclusively a Southern feature, where are all those Black monuments in the North.
 
In the 1700s, *****es were considered as trainable apes , or at best, some sort of subhuman species. While we, now, are disgusted by 400 year old notions: there still is a mountain of residual prejudice left to erase.
I've been a Civil War nut since I was a kid. The way they fought battles back then,just amazes me. They lined up and marched at each other in a hail of bullets. Both sides showed great bravery. I believe you can honor that bravery and dedication by all in the War. But it is impossible to honor a system of slavery, human deprivation, and blatant racism. There were over 100,000 Black Americans, who fought in the War. Some even fought for the South. If Civil War monuments in the old Jim Crow South were meant to commemorate valor and bravery during that War, where are the monuments to those brave Blacks. And as racism is not exclusively a Southern feature, where are all those Black monuments in the North.
 
You are correct, the persons on both sides of the issue were bad people. After the Africians were sold into slavery they were treated as unhuman. The Civil War was fought and took 600,000 plus human lives which abolished slavery. The fact that who sold the victims into slavery was the beginning of a wrong that will never be forgotten. History has recorded many injustices that humans have done to other humans.
Manatee said:
The slaves were captured in Africa by other blacks, often Muslims, and sold to the sea captains who transported them to the new world. All this happened long before they reached the plantations. Nothing is ever said about their living conditions before capture.
Click to expand...
 
Mount Vernon's grounds and view of the Potomac are so beautiful!

In answer to your Civil War question, I think Washington would've fought for the Union. To make provisions to free slaves in his day in Virginia wasn't the norm. I remember from a visit years ago that Washington also provided occupational training for his slaves beyond the needs of the plantation so that they would have good livelihoods when emancipated.
 
Surprising to me given the rush to destroy historical monuments that have anything to do with slavery, I almost expect a movement to destroy that residence..
 
Slavery has always been around, since the very beginning of humanity. The Romans and many other countries took slaves during wars, even the bible mentions slaves. The gladiators were slaves, their only chance of freedom was victory after many brutal battles if they managed to stay alive. The Aztecs and the Mayans and even the American Indians had slaves. The black slaves of Africa were sold to the white traders by blacks living along the western coast, without their help the white slave traders would have never been able to capture them. I'm sure even now there are slaves in the world. As far as the children working slave hours and wages in Asian countries, it's abominable BUT without those jobs they and their families would starve and the parents would sell them to slavery, so their cruel jobs are the lesser of two evils.
 
I once read a book which was of the day to day doings of the Continental Congress as they tried to form our founding documents...documents that all 13 colonies could agree on and ratify. Slavery was one of the issues raised by the northern colonies, but the southern colonies had no interest in ending it since it was essentially the basis of their agricultural economy. In order to appease the southern colonies and get ratification, it was agreed to kick the can down the road, and address the issue in some following year. As usual, kicking the can down the road meant never, and it took the civil war to end the practice.
 
hollydolly said:
I know slavery is used and written almost entirely about Non - whites.. particularly Black people... but really what you're describing as Back breaking work carried out on behalf of a large home owner or landowner was similar to what happened here in the UK but with whites against whites. Where people who were half starved couldn't afford to keep their children and would basically ''sell'' them to the upper classes, where these kids some as young as 10 years old, but mostly around 12 or 13 were put to work sometimes for 14 hours a day of back breaking work, with , a couple of hours off in 7 days if they were lucky. Some were paid a tiny amount 'pennies per year''..and others nothing at all.

These girls and even boys suffered serious sexual assaults in many, many cases, as well as regular beatings not just by their employers /owners.. but also by the hierarchy within the downstairs staff of the house...

The children were kept half starved, they couldn't go home to their parents because the parents couldn't afford to keep them, many hundreds were shipped off to countries like Australia and those still in this country couldn't run away because a Bad ''servant/slaves'' name would soon be spread around and they would never find anywhere to work or live apart from on the streets as beggars. This was still going on right up into the 1930's and 40's...

I understand Black slaves were shackled and kidnapped from their homes, in many, many cases, and no-one can imagine that today..no-one... being hunted like an animal by a race of people they may never even have known existed in some cases.., the fear and horror would have been terrible.

So I'm always interested in reading of the slavery trade, regardless of creed or colour!!

Did you take pictures of the house Sunny?
Click to expand...
If you are interested in reading about slavery, see the movie Twelve Years a Slave or read the autobiography of the gentleman enslaved. The book closely follows the movie. Another is the autobiography of Booker T. Washington. He was freed as a teen as a result of the Civil War, and never really experienced the toil of older slaves. The first desire of his was to get an education, and later the education of other former slaves. The back of the book has shorter accounts of the slave experience written for the freed illiterate slaves. I like fist person accounts since they are probably not sanitized versions.
 
Slavery was so wrong, but what about the treatment of the original occupants of America, the Indians. I once live in a town where the Indians were herded through on their way to their new home in the west. Some of the older residents reportly remembered when the Indians were marched through. I don't understand how any survived, 1000's did die. A law was passed by our government and this made the removal of the Indians perfectly legal. I know this is off subject, but it was just as wrong.
 
Talking about slavery in the past, or even in Third World countries of today is not only a distraction from the issue, but puts one in the position of being an apologist for the custom here in the United States. After all, our country was founded in relatively modern times, during the Age of Enlightenment. There were enough people who abhorred the practice at the time to make it the aberration that we view it as today.

Using the argument that it happened in the past or still may occur elsewhere today does not excuse the practice in our nation of certain people being allowed to own other people and the Jim Crow laws, etc. that followed.
 
Every so often there is another case of slavery in
the UK usually in London and not normally black
people, more likely to be Eastern Europeans being
exploited by people smugglers.

Mike.
 

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