- Historical Eras > Antebellum America (1816-1860) (x)
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Former Slaves Remember Resistance
While the harsh punishments meted out under slavery meant instances of open resistance were rare, many slaves nonetheless defied their masters in day-to-day life. The following excerpts are from interviews with former slaves, conducted as part of [...]
A Plantation Burial
Funerals were sad occasions in the slave quarters, but they gave African Americans a chance to confirm their community identity. They were often held at night, so that friends and family members from neighboring farms could attend.
A Maryland Slave Runs Toward Freedom
Runaway slave advertisements offer a wealth of information about the movements and motivations of escaped slaves. This advertisement offers a reward for the capture and return of Sam MacKall, a Maryland slave who ran away from his master in Prince [...]
Runaway Slave Advertisement from Antebellum Virginia
In this handbill from 1854, a Virginia slaveowner advertises a large reward for the return of a 33 year-old enslaved man. Historians have noted the use of woodprint images, such as the one seen here, as evidence of the frequency of runaway [...]
Background Essay on the Historiography of Slavery
This essay explains the shift in slavery historiography and how this continuing shift influenced the development of the Doing as They Can documentary.
Background Information on Slavery in the U.S.
These tables and statistics give basic facts about the growth and spread of slavery in the United States and some tables of statistics about slave populations.
Staffordshire Teawares from Five Points Neighborhood
This tea set, manufactured in England, was uncovered during an archaeological dig of the former Five Points neighborhood, at the site of a former tenement building at 472 Pearl Street. While the neighborhood was known for its poverty and vice, this [...]
Artifacts from Irish Tenements and Saloon in Five Points
The archeological excavation of the Foley Square Courthouse at 500 Pearl Street, located near the former intersection that once comprised the Five Points neighborhood, yielded over 850,000 artifacts, some of which are depicted below. The artifacts [...]
A Member of the Ladies' Home Missionary Society Visits a Five Points Family
The Five Points Mission grew out of several Protestant missionary organizations that aimed to improve conditions in the Five Points. At first they attempted to convert residents from Catholicism; later the Mission obtained pledges from Five Pointers [...]
Visitors Describe the Five Points Neighborhood
Many visitors—journalists, reformers, middle-class tourists hoping to brush up against the masses—traveled through the Five Points neighborhood in Manhattan in the nineteenth century. They left these observations.