Slave Life in Georgia - African American History

Slave Life in Georgia 102
number is usually set to watch the overseer, and when he sees them coming,
they give a signal, and all hands fall to again as fast as
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they can. Some days he is not in a flogging humour, and then he will ease off
the hands a little. On others it is just the reverse. Then, again, there is all the
difference in the work. Some fields are easy; some hard; some have more grass;
others more roots; and it very often happens that the hands are hardest pressed
where the land is most difficult to clean, and that they are eased off when the
work is comparatively light. In picking cotton, an ordinary fair day's pick is a
hundred pounds. In Georgia, a day's task picking is a hundred and fifty pounds:
in Mississippi about two hundred. In hoeing corn, thirty-five rows of ten acres
across is a task. The hoers are generally led by the fastest hand, and the rest are
compelled to strain their utmost to keep up with him. I have no hesitation in
saying that the task system is very bad indeed for the negroes; and any one who
considers the facts I have given, must, I think, come to the same conclusion.
Having alluded to the food and lodging of slaves, I may, perhaps, put in a word
here about their raiment. We get two suits a year, consisting of a cotton shirt of
coarse cloth, and pantaloons of the same; the whole cost of which does
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not exceed half a crown. We get a blanket once a year, and sometimes only once
in two years; value not more than from one shilling and six-pence to two
shillings. I should say that the cost of a negro's clothing does not exceed eight
shillings a year, and that his rations do not cost more than a shilling a week; so
that Three Pounds sterling will cover his keep and clothing. There is then his
first cost to be considered. But the calculation of the master is, that in two years
one slave earns enough to buy another; that is, that he pays for himself, and
henceforward all he earns, over and above the expense of keeping him, is clear
profit.
Before I close this chapter, I wish to add a remark or two about the slave-trade.
It is supposed that there are no slaves imported into the South from Africa. I am
quite sure that the reverse is the case. There was a planter lived on an estate
adjoining my old master, Stevens. His name was Zachariah Le Mar, and he was
called Squire. That man had, to my knowledge, five hundred of them, all fresh
from Africa, and I know that new ones were constantly brought in. We call
24.03.2006