Slavery during the Civil War


I picked slavery for my report. I picked slavery because I thought it was an interesting topic to learn about. I wanted to learn more about slavery and the treatment of slaves. I also wanted to learn about the slave trade and how it effected the lives of the slaves.

Slavery is when a person is owned by another person. A person who was owned was know as a slave. Slaves were overworked and most of the time not paid. The owner of a slave provided the slaves with little food, clothing, and shelter.

The Southern States needed and used slavery more than the Northern States. In Southern States they grew cotton and needed a lot of people to grow, care, and pick the cotton. The Northern States had factories so white people worked in them. People in the south believed they civilized the slaves. In 1860 there were 3,500,000 slaves in the Union. In some of the states, like South Carolina, there were two black people to every white person.

Slaves could be bought, sold, or be given away as gifts. Their families were torn apart. Some slaves were even beaten. Slaves received punishments like lashings, and short rations. There were even threats to sell their families if they did not do as their master told them to do. Slaves that worked in the fields worked from sunrise to sunset. Some slaves lived in huts. There were usually ten to twelve slaves that lived in a single hut. Slaves could not testify in court, or earn their freedom.

In some states there was slavery, and in others there was not. A state had the power to choose if they wanted to be a free state or a slave state. In order for a state to enter the Union there had to be another one. One state had to be a slave state and the other had to be a free state. They did this because they did not want a slave state to have more power over a free state, and vice-versa.

Slaves first arrived in America in Jamestown, Virginia in 1619. There were only about twenty slaves that arrived there. In the sixteenth through nineteenth century about eight to fifteenth million more slaves arrived in America. Six million slaves arrived in the eighteenth century. In the 1800’s there were 893,602 slaves in America. In the 1820’s there were 1,538,022 slaves in America. In the 1860’s there were 3,953,760 slaves in America.

After Eli Whitney invented the cotton gin slavery was in an even greater demand. People started selling slaves more and more. The slave trade was really important. In the early 1830’s a young strong male cost $500.00. In the late 1850’s a young strong male cost $1800.00.

The Underground Railroad was a way slaves could find freedom. This was a way for northerners to help escaped slaves to find a place to live in free states or Canada. Slave owners could recapture their escaped slaves. Free black Americans were usually the ones to help and plan with the Underground Railroad. About 50,000 to 100,000 people are believed to have used the Underground Railroad to escape to their freedom. The Underground Railroad was used mostly in Ohio, Indiana, and Pennsylvania.

Some people opposed slavery were called abolitionists. Some people who opposed slavery let everyone know that they were against slavery. Other people opposed slavery, but did not do anything to stop it. Some people believed that slavery violated what was in the Declaration of Independence. Some famous abolitionists were Benjamin Franklin, Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and Thomas Paine. Some abolitionists formed groups. One of those groups was called the American Anti-Slavery Society. The abolitionists held rallies and spoke out against slavery. They also wrote newspaper and pamphlets.

The Civil War was fought partly over the issue of slavery. The people that lived in the North opposed slavery move than the people in the South. The people in the North did not need slavery as much as the South did. The people that lived in the North owned, operated, and worked in factories and mills. The South needed slavery. In the South they grew cotton and needed a lot of people to work in the fields for very little or no money. The slaves of the Confederacy were free because of the Emancipation Proclamation When the thirteenth Amendment was passed slavery was banned in the United States. The Thirteenth Amendment was passed in 1865. The Thirteenth Amendment said that neither slavery or involuntary servitude should exist in the United States.
I learned that not all slaves were beaten. The owner of the slaves were beaten. The owner of the slave had to give them permission to marry and have kids. The slave owners could sell any family member that they wanted to. The slaves that worked in the houses did not have to work as long and as hard as the slaves that worked in worked in the fields did. The slaves that worked in the houses usually got to live in the houses. I learned a lot about slavery and the treatment of slaves.

Work Cited

Cruden, Robert. The Negro in Reconstruction. Englewoods Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1969.
Biel, Timothy L.. The Civil War. Calfornia: Lucent Books, Inc., 1991.
Cammiade, Audrey. Lincoln and the American Civil War. New York: Roy Publishers, Inc., 1967.

San Francisco-Sourthern Encyclopedia. Slavery page 288 - 299. Chicago: Britanannica, Inc., 1994.

Slavery in America.By Ed. Grolier Electronic Publishing, Inc. . In 1995. Grolier Electronic Publishing, 28/04/00.
Born a Slave
By Ed. Booe, Ron . June of 1999. . 20/04/00.
USA:(5) Westward Expansion and Regional Differences - 2. By Ed. Department of Humanities Computing

Date created May 9, 2000

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