Samuel Hall (1818-? ) was born a slave in Iredell County, North Carolina. After his master died, he was inherited by Hugh Hall, his master's brother. In Hugh Hall's house, slaves were treated as if they were free and they were educated. After that Samuel moved away from his family and was sold to a plantation owner in Tennessee. During the Civil War, Hall served in the Confederate army and aided the Union troops. After the Emancipation Proclamation, Hall served in the Union Army and later he moved to Washington where he settled there and owned his own farm.
Samuel Hall - 47 Years a Slave - A Brief Story of His Life Before and After Freedom Came to Him - Samuel was about twelve years of age when the separation of the ownership of his family, as above noted, occurred. He and his half brother, Caesar, were inherited by Thomas Hall. Samuel Hall's full brother, Abe, was inherited by Hugh Hall, who also inherited Samuel Hall's half brother, Isaac. Joseph Hall, the oldest of the sons of the father, Alex Hall, the original head of the family, inherited Samuel Hall's uncle, Peter Hall. Hugh Hall, owning Abe Hall, wanted Samuel Hall, the subject of this sketch, in order to keep the brothers together, so he traded Isaac Hall and wife to Tom Hall for Samuel Hall, and thus it was that Samuel Hall and Abe Hall, colored, full brothers, came into the family of Hugh Hall, white, as slaves. The life of Samuel Hall and his brother in the home of Hugh Hall was a happy life. Samuel was about 12 years of age when he became the property of Hugh Hall and he grew to manhood in this family and had the best of opportunities to educate himself and improve his intellectual condition. He took advantage of some of those opportunities and others he ignored against the advice of his master. This master, Hugh Hall, was a humane man. He did not believe in slavery and he reared his Negroes as "free niggers." They were known far and wide for their high degree of intelligence and their capacity to do work and to do it intelligently, but the regular slave holders looked upon them as spoiled Negroes. Samuel and his brother, Abe, were never abused by Hugh Hall, nor would he allow others to abuse these slaves, or any other of his slaves. He was a champion of the black man's natural rights.
The original story of Samuel Hall, a Slave for 47 years. He survived the Civil War and moved to Washington, Iowa where he enjoyed freedom, land ownership and provided a good life for his family.
NOTE TO THE READER: THIS IS THE LARGE PRINT EDITION OF: Samuel Hall, 47 Years a Slave. IT HAS been the good fortune of the writer of these lines to become rather intimately acquainted with Samuel Hall, colored, of Washington, Iowa. When I was in the grocery business Mr. Hall used to peddle vegetables and occasionally he would unload a few bunches of onions, radishes, early beets, new potatoes, tomatoes, celery, etc., at our store. On such occasions, it was always a pleasure to "jolly" the old man for he was old then--a dozen years ago. He was an old man thirty and even forty years ago, old as boys and girls look upon age, but always he has been young in spirit and even as a little child in his simple, Christian faith. But, it was by means of those little business associations that I first got acquainted with Samuel Hall and later that acquaintance grew deeper and more cordial when Samuel Hall and John Wagner used to sit by the stove in the grocery on cold winter days and "argue religion." Those arguments used to grow quite animated at times, and Mr. Hall was frequently much put out because he had to stop and spit out a large quantity of Old Kentucky juice before he could safely give vocal expressions to his argumentative thoughts. He was always a ready arguer, however, and he and Mr. Wagner often made otherwise dull days quite endurable for those who were permitted to hear their controversies.
IT HAS been the good fortune of the writer of these lines to become rather intimately acquainted with Samuel Hall, colored, of Washington, Iowa. When I was in the grocery business Mr. Hall used to peddle vegetables and occasionally he would unload a few bunches of onions, radishes, early beets, new potatoes, tomatoes, celery, etc., at our store. On such occasions it was always a pleasure to "jolly" the old man for he was old then--a dozen years ago. He was an old man thirty and even forty years ago, old as boys and girls look upon age, but always he has been young in spirit and even as a little child in his simple, Christian faith. But, it was by means of those little business associations that I first got acquainted with Samuel Hall and later that acquaintance grew deeper and more cordial when Samuel Hall and John Wagner used to sit by the stove in the grocery on cold winter days and "argue religion." Those arguments used to grow quite animated at times, and Mr. Hall was frequently much put out because he had to stop and spit out a large quantity of Old Kentucky juice before he could safely give vocal expressions to his argumentative thoughts. He was always a ready arguer, however, and he and Mr. Wagner often made otherwise dull days quite endurable for those who were permitted to hear their controversies.
It is impossible to separate histories of sexual violence and the enslavement of Black women in the antebellum South. Rape permeated the lives of all who existed in that system: Black and white, male and female, adult and child, enslaved and free. Shannon C. Eaves unflinchingly investigates how both enslaved people and their enslavers experienced the systematic rape and sexual exploitation of bondswomen and came to understand what this culture of sexualized violence meant for themselves and others. Eaves mines a wealth of primary sources including autobiographies, diaries, court records, and more to show that rape and other forms of sexual exploitation entangled slaves and slave owners in battles over power to protect oneself and one's community, power to avenge hurt and humiliation, and power to punish and eliminate future threats. By placing sexual violence at the center of the systems of power and culture, Eaves shows how the South's rape culture was revealed in enslaved people's and their enslavers' interactions with one another and with members of their respective communities.
This book sheds new light on domestic forced migration by examining the experiences of American-born slave migrants from a comparative perspective. It analyzes how different migrant groups anticipated, reacted to, and experienced forced removal, as well as how they adapted to their new homes.
In The Slaves' War, the acclaimed historian Andrew Ward delivers an unprecedented vision of the nation's bloodiest conflict. Woven together from hundreds of interviews, diaries, letters, and memoirs, here is a groundbreaking and poignant narrative of the CivilWar as seen from not only battlefields, capitals, and camps, but from slave quarters, kitchens, roadsides, and fields as well. Speaking in a quintessentially American language, body servants, army cooks, runaways, and gravediggers bring the war to life. From slaves' theories about the causes of the CivilWar to their frank assessments of such major figures as Lincoln, Davis, Lee, and Grant; from their searing memories of the carnage of battle to their often startling attitudes toward masters and liberators alike; and from their initial jubilation at the Yankee invasion of the South to the crushing disappointment of freedom's promise unfulfilled, The Slaves' War is a transformative and engrossing chronicle of America's Second Revolution.
