On July 11th Nashville Public Television aired its documentary Wessyngton Plantation: A Family’s Road to Freedom. The film was inspired by my book The Washingtons of Wessyngton Plantation: Stories of My Family’s Journey to Freedom and the Tennessee State Museum exhibition Slaves and Slaveholders of Wessyngton Plantation. The documentary highlighted the life of my great-great-great-grandmother Jenny Blow Washington. Jenny along with her sister Sarah was brought from Sussex County, Virginia to Tennessee in 1802 by Joseph Washington who founded Wessyngton Plantation. Jenny married Godfrey a slave from a neighboring plantation and became the matriarch of one of the largest families on Wessyngton. Godfrey and Jenny later had nine children, including my great-great-grandfather Emanuel Washington (1824-1907). Today there are thousands of their descendants throughout the United States. Click link to view the documentary: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bdce9dud1c0
Posts Tagged ‘Overseer’
WESSYNGTON PLANTATION: A FAMILY’S ROAD TO FREEDOM
Saturday, July 12th, 2014Slave Life On Southern Plantations
Saturday, October 17th, 2009
Slaves' Tobacco on Wessyngton Plantation 1846
Enslaved African Americans on Wessyngton Plantation worked under a task system. The plantation owner assigned a task to each individual. Once the task was completed the slave was free to work on his own crops of tobacco if he chose to do so. The owner usually assigned tasks that would take the entire day to complete. However, some of the fastest workers were able to complete the assigned tasks and work for themselves. The slaves were not required to work on Sunday and were off half days on Saturdays. Many of the slaves used this time to cultivate their own crops. The task system required less supervision by overseers than gang labor and gave slaves more control of their time.
The owner kept a list of how much tobacco each person raised and paid them after the crops were sold in New Orleans. The slaves used the money from the sale of the crops to purchase various items not provided by the plantation owner. The document above lists the names of men on Wessyngton Plantation in 1846 who raised their own crops and the items they purchased for their families.
Slave Housing on Southern Plantations
Monday, October 5th, 2009
Wessyngton Slave Cabins
Housing for slaves varied from plantation to plantation depending on the owners. Most slave quarters were generally arranged in avenues or streets and located behind the mansion or ‘Big House.’ They were strategically placed to give the owner or overseer a clear view of the slaves, so their activities could be easily monitored.
The slave settlement at Wessyngton Plantation, however, did not fit this pattern. The lack of a clustered settlement pattern at Wessyngton was somewhat unusual during antebellum times. This was primarily due to the hilly topography of the plantation. The scattered pattern gave the slaves at Wessyngton more freedom and made it far more difficult to keep them under constant surveillance.
Typically, slave housing at Wessyngton consisted of hand-hewn one-room log cabins measuring 20 by 20 square feet with brick end chimneys. Some cabins were 18 by 36 square feet. Each cabin had log flooring and a loft, where children slept.
Each cabin housed an average of six individuals. Family sizes varied depending on the number births, deaths and marriages.