"Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely"
Sir John Dalberg-Acton
The teachings of White Supremacy was accompanied by harsh and cruel treatment of the people controlled by the supremacist:
Treatment of Slaves :
Tortured:
He ran away, Was captured, beaten more then tied into the cotten gin where he died 3-4 days later. "I could tell of more slaveholders as cruel as those I have described. They are not exceptions to the general rule. I do not say there are no humane slaveholders. Such characters do exist, notwithstanding the hardening influences around them. But they are "like angels' visits -- few and far between."
Medical Experimentation:
1830's-1850s Slaves are used as subjects in human experiments
Alabama 1830's Dr Joseph May experimented with Quinine
1838 Charleston South Carolina a doctor advertise in a news paper to purchase sickly slaves for testing his experimental medicines
" No place in the United states offers as great opportunities for the acquisition of anatomical knowledge. Subjects being obtained from among the colored population in sufficient number for every purpose, and proper dissection carried on without offending any individuals in our community" - advertisement for the South Carolina Medical College circa 1831.." Reference:here
"The Medical school at Richmond , founded in 1838 as the Medical Department of Hampden-Sydney College, was the largest consumer of clinical material in the Old Dominion. This school, which in 1854 became the Medical College of Virginia (MCV), required living subjects upon which professors could demonstrate operative techniques and the course and treatment of diseases, as well as corpses for anatomy dissections. Blacks comprised a substantial proportion of the former and almost all of the latter. The four other antebellum Virginia medical schools- University of Virginia (1825-present), Prince Edward Medical Institute (which became the Medical Department of Randolph_Macon College in 1847 [1837-64]), Winchester Medical College (1825-29 and 1847-61?), and the Scientific and Eclectic Medial Institute of Petersburg (1846-47?)- had similar but less extensive needs."
Medicine and Slavery: The Diseases and Health by Todd L. Savitt 1978 page 282
1840's SC Dr James Marions Sims conducted experiments- gynecological surgeries on slave women (no anesthetic)
1840's In Georgia Crawford William Long experiments with amputations on slaves (no anesthetic)
Use of slaves alive and dead for dissection while dead and display including display in cages with wild animals when alive.
"In 1989, workers restoring the Medical College of Georgia in Augusta made a grisly discovery: over 9000 human bones?remains of bodies autopsied by medical students and faculty?were buried in the building's basement. Blakely (director, Ctr. for Applied Research in Anthropology, Georgia State Univ.) began coordinating a study of the basement's contents by a multidisciplinary team of archaeologists, anthropologists, historians, anatomists, and enthnographers. They determined that more than 75 percent of the bones were African American, silent testimony to the marginalization of Augusta's slave and free black communities."
Editorial review by the Library Journal of Bones in teh Basement: Postmortem Racism in Ninteenth Century Medial Training 1997 Blakely and Harrington
"...But anatomy depended on confiscation of the dead--mainly the plundered bodies of African Americans, immigrants, Native Americans, and the poor."
A Traffic of Dead Bodies: Anatome and Embodied Social Identity in Nineteenth-Century America 2004 Sappol :
Families torn apart, little to no consequences for killing a slave :
"The slave trade in North Carolina separated countless husbands, wives, parents and children. On the whole, slaveholders cared little about the kindred bonds of slaves, and tore families apart by selling slaves for profit. Because the large plantations of the Lower South needed more slaves than the smaller farms of North Carolina, it was not uncommon for slaves in the state to be sold to slave traders who took them south to Georgia, South Carolina, Mississippi, Louisiana or Alabama. Once a family member was sold and taken to the Deep South, they became almost impossible to locate or contact. Slaves had no way to legally protest their masters’ harsh treatment and abuse. A black person had no means of bringing a complaint to court, and could not even testify against a white person who had committed a crime against him or her. In fact, before 1774 it was not a crime in North Carolina to assault or even kill a slave. After 1774, a white person who murdered a slave would receive only 12 months in prison if it was their first offense. However, according to the 1774 law, if the slave was killed while the white person was using “moderate correction” to punish him or her, there would be no criminal charge."
Learning NC The Life of a Slave:
Black Babies were used as Alligator bait in parts of Florida:
“Possibly a tall tale, but there is more:
There is also an account of this practice in Sharon Draper’s “Copper Sun” (2006). It is a work of fiction about a slave girl written for schoolchildren, but the book is meant to be as true to life as possible based on what we know commonly went on back in those days.
In 1923 Time magazine carried this story:
From Chipley, Fla., it was reported that colored babies were being used for alligator bait. The infants are allowed to play in shallow water while expert riflemen watch from concealment nearby. When a saurian approaches his prey, he is shot by the riflemen.
The Chipley Chamber of Commerce said the story was “a silly lie, false and absurd.” Maybe so, but it was widely reported in the American press, so it was at least believable among White Americans of the time.
Film: The practice has appeared in at least two films: “Alligator Bait” (1900) and “The ‘Gator and the Pickaninny” (1900). Two tales of boys used as alligator bait were told in “Untamed Fury” (1947).
Language: Probably from at least the 1860s up until the 1960s “alligator bait” was a racial slur among whites for little black children. In Harlem in the 1940s it was applied to blacks of any age from Florida.
Imagery: From at least the 1890s to the 1960s black children were often pictured as alligator bait, particularly on postcards. One man in Florida had a picture framed and put on his wall showing nine naked little black boys with the words “Alligator Bait” written below:” “
https://abagond.wordpress.com/2010/08/11/alligator-bait/
“Possibly a tall tale, but there is more:
There is also an account of this practice in Sharon Draper’s “Copper Sun” (2006). It is a work of fiction about a slave girl written for schoolchildren, but the book is meant to be as true to life as possible based on what we know commonly went on back in those days.
In 1923 Time magazine carried this story:
From Chipley, Fla., it was reported that colored babies were being used for alligator bait. The infants are allowed to play in shallow water while expert riflemen watch from concealment nearby. When a saurian approaches his prey, he is shot by the riflemen.
The Chipley Chamber of Commerce said the story was “a silly lie, false and absurd.” Maybe so, but it was widely reported in the American press, so it was at least believable among White Americans of the time.
Film: The practice has appeared in at least two films: “Alligator Bait” (1900) and “The ‘Gator and the Pickaninny” (1900). Two tales of boys used as alligator bait were told in “Untamed Fury” (1947).
Language: Probably from at least the 1860s up until the 1960s “alligator bait” was a racial slur among whites for little black children. In Harlem in the 1940s it was applied to blacks of any age from Florida.
Imagery: From at least the 1890s to the 1960s black children were often pictured as alligator bait, particularly on postcards. One man in Florida had a picture framed and put on his wall showing nine naked little black boys with the words “Alligator Bait” written below:” “
https://abagond.wordpress.com/2010/08/11/alligator-bait/
This treatment was allowed based on the teachings of white supremacy and to provide evidence to further support the same :
"The medical profession was encouraged to prove these statement to be true : "According to physicians, blacks were just plain different. They felt less pain than whites, their difference in color enabled them to better endure the heat of the sun, they were less susceptible to fever but more susceptible to cold, respiratory ailments, fevers and yaws, they were less prone to diseases such as yellow fever and malaria but more liable to suffer from other diseases, such as tetanus. Blacks’ cases of yellow fever tended to be less severe and more treatable than those of whites. Continuing the list of supposed physical or medical differences, blacks slept more when given the opportunity but when deprived of sleep they suffered less. Their skins were thicker, they reached puberty earlier and they were inferior in intellect.15 Tidyman outlined what he considered the major differences in an article published in 1826 article in the Philadelphia Journal of Medical and Physical Sciences. According to Tidyman, differences existed in the bone system, the skull dimension, in internal organs and the nervous system. Physicians searched for empirical evidence to support their beliefs that whites and blacks were affected differently by diseases and other health conditions." Reference here
"Southern medical students were encouraged to train and practice in the south to avoid exposing them to the truth concerning black intelligence and bodies :It is obvious that, as John Harley Warner suggests, southern physicians were among other southerners who were sensitive to charges of their “economic and political inferiority, immorality, and social backwardness.”23 They needed southern medical institutions to prove themselves. In an 1853 article in the Virginia Medical and Surgical Journal, James B. McCaw argued for more southern medical colleges " Reference here
The goal of the Confederacy in reference to its' absolute power over the African?
Constitution of the Confederate States March 11, 1861
Slavery may never end:
Article 1 Sec 9 (4) No bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or law denying or impairing the right of property in negro slaves shall be passed.
A slave may neither escape nor be freed:
Article IV 2 Sec. 2. (I) The citizens of each State shall be entitled to all the privileges and immunities of citizens in the several States; and shall have the right of transit and sojourn in any State of this Confederacy, with their slaves and other property; and the right of property in said slaves shall not be thereby impaired.
Article IV Sec 2 (3) No slave or other person held to service or labor in any State or Territory of the Confederate States, under the laws thereof, escaping or lawfully carried into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor; but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such slave belongs,. or to whom such service or labor may be due.
How did the Confederacy treat black troops during the war?
No pay.
"The black troops, however, faced greater peril than white troops when captured by the Confederate Army. In 1863 the Confederate Congress threatened to punish severely officers of black troops and to enslave black soldiers."
"In perhaps the most heinous known example of abuse, Confederate soldiers shot to death black Union soldiers captured at the Fort Pillow, TN, engagement of 1864. Confederate General Nathan B. Forrest witnessed the massacre and did nothing to stop it."
Reference Here
Black Babies used as alligator bait in Florida
Possibly a tall tale, but there is more:
There is also an account of this practice in Sharon Draper’s “Copper Sun” (2006). It is a work of fiction about a slave girl written for schoolchildren, but the book is meant to be as true to life as possible based on what we know commonly went on back in those days.
In 1923 Time magazine carried this story:
From Chipley, Fla., it was reported that colored babies were being used for alligator bait. The infants are allowed to play in shallow water while expert riflemen watch from concealment nearby. When a saurian approaches his prey, he is shot by the riflemen.
The Chipley Chamber of Commerce said the story was “a silly lie, false and absurd.” Maybe so, but it was widely reported in the American press, so it was at least believable among White Americans of the time.
Film: The practice has appeared in at least two films: “Alligator Bait” (1900) and “The ‘Gator and the Pickaninny” (1900). Two tales of boys used as alligator bait were told in “Untamed Fury” (1947).
Language: Probably from at least the 1860s up until the 1960s “alligator bait” was a racial slur among whites for little black children. In Harlem in the 1940s it was applied to blacks of any age from Florida.
Imagery: From at least the 1890s to the 1960s black children were often pictured as alligator bait, particularly on postcards. One man in Florida had a picture framed and put on his wall showing nine naked little black boys with the words “Alligator Bait” written below:
Black confederate Troops were used by the Condederacy as servants and attendants they were NOT given weapons.
"In short, if one sticks solely to the historical record for primary evidence of the black soldier picking up arms and fighting for the South, one can only conclude that the support for such a claim is scanty at best – merely anecdoctal – and entirely unsubstantiated at worst."
..."an honest look at the historical record leads one to the conclusion that as little as under a hundred to as many as several hundred blacks may have actually engaged in combat for the South during the Civil War by actually carrying and discharging a weapon. "
"According to historian and Professor James I. Robertson, Jr., “Approximately 180,000 blacks served as Federal soldiers. This figure represents 9 percent of the North’s fighting force. One-third of the blacks (68,178) died in the service, with sickness causing thirty times more deaths than battle.” Soldiers Blue and Gray: p. 35."
"Though early black troops were not aggressively deployed as bearers of arms, it is the case that by the middle of the war, at least, more and more black Union troops were entrusted to carry arms and to perform in combat action."
"... between 250-300 black soldiers may have served in the Confederate Army, and of those an even much smaller percentage would have been entrusted to take up arms."
"This might seem surprising but a leading Civil War historian, Professor James McPherson, who won a Pulitzer prize for a Civil War book he wrote, has gone on record to say that of the more than 25,000 soldiers’ letters he has personally read over the years, he has only found evidence that perhaps 6-12 black Confederate soldiers were even mentioned."
""CWG also asked Civil War author and historian Wiley Sword about blacks serving in the Confederate army as soldiers:"
“The majority of black Confederates who actually fought were essentially with the army as servants or personal attendants for officers. This was especially true in the initial part of the war (1861-62), I have read occasionally about these slave/servants taking up a rifle and fighting in the ranks with their master. Otherwise, various mulattoes or persons with light complexions may have been directly enrolled in the army. Since it was against C.S.A. policy to enlist blacks in the fighting army (until the very last
in 1865), I doubt if formal records will show the extent of black combat participation. I’m convinced some did fight, but how many is a very subjective guess.”"
"CWG has discovered that historians and staff –- Robert Krick – atSpotsylvania National Battlefield Park have sifted through about 100,000 soldiers’ records to see how many non-whites were represented. Non-whites could be blacks, Native Americans, and mulattoes. They found that only 20-30 non-whites were found out of 100,000 soldiers’ records. That is less than 1/300th of one percent. "
"Additional quotes supporting the position that very few blacks (free or enslaved) fought in combat for the Confederacy:
While large numbers of black men thus accompanied every Confederate army on the march or in camp, those men would not have been considered soldiers. Only a few black men were ever accepted into Confederate service as soldiers, and none did any significant fighting. –Encyclopedia Virginia – Black Confederates: http://encyclopediavirginia.org/Black_Confederates
John Beauchamp Jones, a high-level assistant to the secretary of war, scoffed at rumors that the Confederacy had units made up of slaves. “This is utterly untrue,” he wrote in his diary. “We have no armed slaves to fight for us.” Asked to double-check, Confederate Secretary of War James Seddon confirmed that “No slaves have been employed by the Government except as cooks or nurses in hospitals and for labor.”
Gen. Ewell’s longtime aide-de-camp, Maj. George Campbell Brown, later affirmed, the handful of black soldiers mustered in Richmond in 1865 were “the first and only black troops used on our side.“"
Reference: https://civilwargazette.wordpress.com/2008/03/13/did-blacks-fight-in-combat-for-the-confederacy/
"Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its corner- stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition."
"The new constitution has put at rest, forever, all the agitating questions relating to our peculiar institution African slavery as it exists amongst us the proper status of the negro in our form of civilization.
Alexander Stephens
NOTE: Expansion of slavery in the U.S. was desired by the Confederates,. Some desired espansion beyond the borders of the U.S.
"Slaveholders were not modest about the perceived virtues of their way of life. In the years leading up to the Civil War, calls for expansion into the tropics reached a fever pitch, and slaveholders marveled at the possibility of spreading a new empire into central America:
Looking into the possibilities of the future, regarding the magnificent country of tropical America, which lies in the path of our destiny on this continent, we may see an empire as powerful and gorgeous as ever was pictured in our dreams of history. What is that empire? It is an empire founded on military ideas; representing the noble peculiarities of Southern civilization; including within its limits the isthmuses of America and the regenerated West Indies; having control of the two dominant staples of the world's commerce—cotton and sugar; possessing the highways of the world's commerce; surpassing all empires of the age in the strength of its geographical position; and, in short, combining elements of strength, prosperity, and glory, such as never before in the modern ages have been placed within the reach of a single government. What a splendid vision of empire!
How sublime in its associations! How noble and inspiriting the idea, that upon the strange theatre of tropical America, once, if we may believe the dimmer facts of history, crowned with magnificent empires and flashing cities and great temples, now covered with mute ruins, and trampled over by half-savages, the destiny of Southern civilization is to be consummated in a glory brighter even than that of old, the glory of an empire, controlling the commerce of the world, impregnable in its position, and representing in its internal structure the most harmonious of all the systems of modern civilization.
Edward Pollard, the journalist who wrote that book, titled it Black Diamonds Gathered In The Darkey Homes Of The South. Perhaps even this is too subtle. In 1858, Mississippi Senator Albert Gallatin Brown was clearer:
I want Cuba, and I know that sooner or later we must have it. If the worm-eaten throne of Spain is willing to give it for a fair equivalent, well—if not, we must take it. I want Tamaulipas, Potosi, and one or two other Mexican Stats; and I want them all for the same reason—for the planting and spreading of slavery.
And a footing in Central America will powerfully aid us in acquiring those other states. It will render them less valuable to the other powers of the earth, and thereby diminish competition with us. Yes, I want these countries for the spread of slavery. I would spread the blessings of slavery, like the religion of our Divine Master, to the uttermost ends of the earth, and rebellious and wicked as the Yankees have been, I would even extend it to them.
I would not force it upon them, as I would not force religion upon them, but I would preach it to them, as I would preach the gospel. They are a stiff-necked and rebellious race, and I have little hope that they will receive the blessing, and I would therefore prepare for its spread to other more favored lands."
"Slaveholders were not modest about the perceived virtues of their way of life. In the years leading up to the Civil War, calls for expansion into the tropics reached a fever pitch, and slaveholders marveled at the possibility of spreading a new empire into central America:
Looking into the possibilities of the future, regarding the magnificent country of tropical America, which lies in the path of our destiny on this continent, we may see an empire as powerful and gorgeous as ever was pictured in our dreams of history. What is that empire? It is an empire founded on military ideas; representing the noble peculiarities of Southern civilization; including within its limits the isthmuses of America and the regenerated West Indies; having control of the two dominant staples of the world's commerce—cotton and sugar; possessing the highways of the world's commerce; surpassing all empires of the age in the strength of its geographical position; and, in short, combining elements of strength, prosperity, and glory, such as never before in the modern ages have been placed within the reach of a single government. What a splendid vision of empire!
How sublime in its associations! How noble and inspiriting the idea, that upon the strange theatre of tropical America, once, if we may believe the dimmer facts of history, crowned with magnificent empires and flashing cities and great temples, now covered with mute ruins, and trampled over by half-savages, the destiny of Southern civilization is to be consummated in a glory brighter even than that of old, the glory of an empire, controlling the commerce of the world, impregnable in its position, and representing in its internal structure the most harmonious of all the systems of modern civilization.
Edward Pollard, the journalist who wrote that book, titled it Black Diamonds Gathered In The Darkey Homes Of The South. Perhaps even this is too subtle. In 1858, Mississippi Senator Albert Gallatin Brown was clearer:
I want Cuba, and I know that sooner or later we must have it. If the worm-eaten throne of Spain is willing to give it for a fair equivalent, well—if not, we must take it. I want Tamaulipas, Potosi, and one or two other Mexican Stats; and I want them all for the same reason—for the planting and spreading of slavery.
And a footing in Central America will powerfully aid us in acquiring those other states. It will render them less valuable to the other powers of the earth, and thereby diminish competition with us. Yes, I want these countries for the spread of slavery. I would spread the blessings of slavery, like the religion of our Divine Master, to the uttermost ends of the earth, and rebellious and wicked as the Yankees have been, I would even extend it to them.
I would not force it upon them, as I would not force religion upon them, but I would preach it to them, as I would preach the gospel. They are a stiff-necked and rebellious race, and I have little hope that they will receive the blessing, and I would therefore prepare for its spread to other more favored lands."