House slave
Emma Vigen
A slave family on a cotton field in Georgia. (Repro-duced from an old photograph)
I want to find out how life was like for the house slaves.
Why did the white owners have house slaves?
What were their duties in the house?
Were they treated better than the field slave?
Did the white owners like the female house slaves as sex objects?
What happened to the female slave children?
Why did the white owners prefer female instead of male slaves in the house?
When white people - first the Spanish and later all sorts of Europeans including the Danes - settled down in the new world they needed slaves to work for them – first digging up gold and later labouring on the big farms among other things. The Spanish quickly found pout that the local Indians did not last long in the hard work. They died too fast. Instead, they decided to import African Negros, which seemed ideal because they could stand the strain and survived on very small rations. In The Southern America, the need for hard, working slaves to harvest the cotton fields, tobacco, sugar and rice was big. The slave trade from Africa to Northern America was mostly run by the British who started this trade from the middle of 1500 and forward until it was forbidden in the middle of 1800. Around 4.5 million slaves were imported.
When the black slaves arrived the white servants’ jobs was taken over by the blacks on the rich farms.
The slaves life most of the time was very hard because they were treated as slaves and not as human beings. There were two types of slaves: House slaves and field slaves. The house slaves were usually treated better than the field slaves.
Field slaves had a very tough time working in the fields under the burning sun from early morning to late nights and they were often flogged if they did not work fast enough. Most of them were sleeping outside in a little shack.
House slaves were normally treated much better. They worked inside and around the owner houses and became a part of the family. They became nannies, nurses, cooks, cleaners, washing the clothes, gardening and doing all the work, the owners couldn’t be bothered to do. Hereby they pushed out the lower classes of white people who until now had taken care of the same jobs and who now had to look for other jobs, which was difficult.
Sometimes the house slave nanny would be like a second mother for the children. If the house slave had any children, herself (often some of the men in the house were the fathers) she was not allowed to look after them. Her children usually were removed from the house and sold especially if she had been disobedient and she would never see them again.
When the slaves were cooking for the white people, they were supervised by a white person, who controlled the making and who checked they were not stealing. During the meal, the white people were served by several slaves. After the meals, the slaves had to clear out and dish wash. They were not allowed eat the leftovers but had to eat what the owner decided.
The quality of the foods depended of the way the owner was and sometimes they did not get any food at all. It all depended of the mood of the owner. Some were very cruel and if they were not happy with the slave work, they sometimes flogged them until they almost died. Other owners were helpful and taught them to speak proper English and read and write. It was normally the white women who helped them but it was illegal because by law the slaves were supposed to live in ignorance. Trusted house slaves who had provided great service over a long period of time were sometimes were promised their freedom when their master died. However, there are many cases where this promise was not kept.
Because the black women didn’t have any rights especially the pretty ones risked to be raped by their owners or maybe other white people from the family and staff. They didn’t have any choice and risked be punished if she didn’t please him. She risked pregnancy but alternatively she was treated better by the owner because he might like her and give her a better status in the house.
On the other hand, the white women who knew what was going on were very unhappy and angry and it could hurt the black woman in a bad way. However, often the husband got away with it and the wife had to live with the knowledge.
The slaves could be dangerous, especially the male house slaves. Therefore, the owner felt safer if the house slaves only were women. They were easier to control and didn’t cause the same risk as black men in the house who might try to escape maybe after wounding or killing the owner.
One thing are the female slaves who can be used as mistresses or as nanny’s and become a part of the family but for black men the rules are different can be punished just for locking at a white woman.
We know a lot about the life of the slaves because some of the house slaves have been telling about the life from their own experience.
A house slave call Harriet Jacobs from Edenton in North Carolina tells that on Sunday her mistress “would station herself in the kitchen, and wait till it was dished, and then spit in all the kettles and pans” so they did not eat left overs.
Another house slave Lewis Clarke believed that some house slaves were worse off than field slaves: “There were four house slaves in the family including himself. Even though they were treated better than the field slaves, the white owner’s expectations to have a servant night and day were very high. “We were always required to sit up until all the family had retired; then we must be up at early dawn in summer, and before day in winter”.
The movie Django Unchained – this clip shows the actor Samuel Jackson as the house negro, Steven. He acts like a white man even though he is black. He calls Django a motherfucking nigger and complains that if the black-assed motherfucker sleeps in the house he will have to burn all the sheets.
This clip tells us a lot about how much power a house slave can get as long as his master lets him. They are very close and he actually behaves like the master himself – even worse - as long as he is talking about other black slaves or other low classes like the slave trader who is supposed to rank higher even though he is black. That is not good enough for Steven.
Conclusion:
The research shows that in general the house slaves lived a better life than the field slaves. Often they got a high status in the family as nannies for the children but at the same time life could very difficult. A mean owner meant a bad life and some of the women had to sleep with their owners and often they were raped. If they had children, they risked to lose the child, as soon it was born – sold as a slave. On the other hand, life could be very good as long as the owner was a nice person.
The bad thing was that whatever happened they were slaves.
Sources:
I have with my family visited the Gettysburg Museum this summer. It explains that the civil war in the USA mainly was about slavery. http://www.gettysburgmuseum.com/
Django Unchained – I have seen the movie. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qLup3ye_gIo
The Slave experience: Living conditions http://www.pbs.org/wnet/slavery/experience/living/history2.html Nicholas Boston is a writer and assistant professor or journalism and mass communications at Lehman College of the City University of New York.
House Slaves http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USASdomestic.htm © John Simkin, September 1997 - June 2013