The slaves thought night and day about ways that they could achieve just one thing: freedom. Angela Davis speaks about how women in the slave times didn’t have it as easy as people may have thought. Sure, the slave owners worked the black men the hardest but it was no walk around the block for the women. Most people think that the female black slaves had it easy because they were
It also teaches us about the events which have occurred that have made society the way it is today. The information given in these diary entries make readers appreciate what they have now, and become aware of the changes which were made to make our lives easier. Most importantly, a major benefit from these Historical diaries, I believe is the knowledge obtained, because Knowledge Is Power. Slave diary entries are probably the most touching and intriguing historical diary entries ever written. We can learn many things from these entries like the hardships faced by African Americans, Racism, Morality and much more.
Often in debt or longing for passage to America would bring people to this kind of agreement. After their time of service was settled, indentured servants were free to continue their lives. The difference between slavery and indentured servants were often unclear. Some masters treated their servants as slaves, beating and threating them, and forcing them to work long horrendous hours. Other masters held up their agreement excellently and treated their servants well.
Harriet Jacobs for instance used the thought of someday freeing her children to drive her throughout the book and decide on what is best for them as a whole, maybe not immediately but eventually. She views slavery as worse than death, thus she feels disgusted that she brought her children into the world of slavery, “It seemed to me I would rather see them killed then have them given up to his power.” (Jacob’s 68) Frederick Douglass on the other spectrum of slavery was a man who had no children, and never had to suffer the physiological abuse of rape, and sexual harassment, but this did not make his slavery or his journey to freedom any easier. But it seems as though the small tastes of freedom he had experienced in Baltimore were the driving motives for Frederick Douglass. He always had a desire for more, “The fact that he gave me any part of my wages was proof, to my mind, that he believed me be entitled to the whole of them. I always felt worse for having received anything; for I feared that the giving me a few cents would ease his conscience, and make him feel himself to be a pretty honorable sort of robber” (Douglass 108) It is this ongoing understanding by both characters that they are unique and deserve much more, as in Frederick Douglass’ case these samples of freedom he was given were not taken as a sign of improvement but instead a reminder that he was a man and deserved
One story that goes in depth about these things is about a slave who worked his way up towards a house-slave. These slaves got to stay in the house, and more often than not, these slaves would be REALLY hated by the other slaves. Anyway, this slave, even though a house slave didn't just betray his fellow slaves to the master. This slave self-taught himself to read so that whenever the master and another helper were talking, he could understand them. You see, whenever the master and someone else were speaking, and they didn't want the house slave to know, they would spell out whatever they're trying to say.
He's going to ameliorate their conditions, he's going to make their slavery on his plantations so effective, so good, such an even joyous form of labor, that he will be doing God's work by improving slavery” (Blight). Therefore, “there are plenty of pro-slavery writers who also, to some extent, whether out of guilt or out of awareness, saw slavery as wrong, but they saw it as a problem more for white people than for black people. Their concern was not the conditions of blacks but what slavery did to whites, and usually they ended up in the same situation as Colcott Jones.”
This went on for a while until her husband, Hugh Auld, scolded her and warned her of the dangers of teaching a slave. It wasn’t until after Mr. Auld scolded her that Sophia began to treat Frederick less like a human and more like a slave. At this time Fredrick realized the only power his white masters had over him was the power of knowledge. It can be argued that his realization of the power of having an education marks the beginning of Douglass’s true fight toward freedom, but his most important battle is yet to come. Frederick’s physical fight with Mr.
Slaves didn’t have to be geniuses to have a concept of freedom. He stated it as a matter of just observing the master to understand the meaning and advantages of freedom. When slaves submitted to their masters they did so because they saw no other practical choice. (Stampp 292) The love of freedom is hard to crush and slaveholders had a serious problem of discipline. Slaves had no incentive whatsoever to work so slaves did everything in their power to slow down work routines and the quantity of service in many ways usually by underrating their intelligence,
The fewer slaves the owner had the greater effect of the slaves exodus. It made it worse for the owner if the slave did not return, because it was equivalent to loss of property and loss of profits. For this reason, it was in the best interest of an owner to treat his slaves with some form of respect, and why petit marronage served such a tremendous purpose for the slaves. An overseer’s whip was one of the biggest threats to the slaves. Their master’s knew that the slaves had a tremendous pain threshold, but felt this extreme form of punishment was needed in order to maintain order among them.
The owners of these servants treated them as if they were not of “white color,” which meant that they were treated the same as African slaves. This resulted in many indentured servants joining arms with Bacon and his army of planters and going against Governor Berkley. As a result of this, many people of the ruling class in the Virginia colony became alarmed of the unification of the servants. This led many people of power to leave the indentured servitude form of labor, and adopt an easier form of control over their work force, which then resulted in the emergence of the slave labor. Slave labor was an easier form of labor for many plantation owners, especially since many of the slaves were