The negroes were brought to Savannah in small lots, as many at a time
as could be conveniently taken care of, the last of them reaching the
city the Friday before the sale. They were consigned to the care of Mr.
J. Bryan, Auctioneer and Negro Broker, who was to feed and keep them
in condition until disposed of. Immediately on their arrival they were
taken to the Race-course, and there quartered in the sheds erected for
the accommodation of the horses and carriages of gentlemen attending
the races. Into these sheds they were huddled pell-mell, without any
more attention to their comfort than was necessary to prevent their
becoming ill and unsaleable. Each "family" had one or more boxes or
bundles, in which were stowed such scanty articles of their clothing as
were not brought into immediate requisition, and their tin dishes and
gourds for their food and drink.
It is, perhaps, a fit tribute to large-handed munificence to say that,
when the negro man was sold, there was no extra charge for the negro
man's clothes; they went with the man, and were not charged in the
bill. Nor is this altogether a contemptible idea, for many of them
had worldly wealth, in the shape of clothing and other valuables, to
the extent of perhaps four or five dollars; and had all these been
taken strictly into the account, the sum total of the sale would have
been increased, possibly, a thousand dollars. In the North, we do not
necessarily sell the harness with the horse; why, in the South, should
the clothes go with the negro?
In these sheds were the chattels huddled together on the floor, there
being no sign of bench or table. They eat and slept on the bare boards,
their food being rice and beans, with occasionally a bit of bacon and
corn bread. Their huge bundles were scattered over the floor, and
thereon the slaves sat or reclined, when not restlessly moving about,
or gathered into sorrowful groups, discussing the chances of their
future fate. On the faces of all was an expression of heavy grief;
some appeared to be resigned to the hard stroke of Fortune that had
torn them from their homes, and were sadly trying to make the best
of it; some sat brooding moodily over their sorrows, their chins
resting on their hands, their eyes staring vacantly, and their bodies
rocking to and fro, with a restless motion that was never stilled;
few wept, the place was too public and the drivers too near, though
some occasionally turned aside to give way to a few quiet tears.
They were dressed in every possible variety of uncouth and fantastic
garb, in every style and of every imaginable color; the texture of
the garments was in all cases coarse, most of the men being clothed
in the rough cloth that is made expressly for the slaves. The dresses
assumed by the negro minstrels, when they give imitations of plantation
character, are by no means exaggerated; they are, instead, weak and
unable to come up to the original. There was every variety of hats,
with every imaginable slouch; and there was every cut and style of
coat and pantaloons, made with every conceivable ingenuity of misfit,
and tossed on with a general appearance of perfect looseness that is
perfectly indescribable, except to say that a Southern negro always
looks as if he could shake his clothes off without taking his hands out
of his pockets. The women, true to the feminine instinct, had made, in
almost every case, some attempt at finery. All wore gorgeous turbans,
generally manufactured in an instant out of a gay-colored handkerchief
by a sudden and graceful twist of the fingers; though there was
occasionally a more elaborate turban, a turban complex and mysterious,
got up with care, and ornamented with a few beads or bright bits of
ribbon. Their dresses were mostly coarse stuff, though there were some
gaudy calicoes; a few had ear-rings, and one possessed the treasure
of a string of yellow and blue beads. The little children were always
better and more carefully dressed than the older ones, the parental
pride coming out in the shape of a yellow cap pointed like a mitre, or
a jacket with a strip of red broadcloth round the bottom. The children
were of all sizes, the youngest being fifteen days old. The babies
were generally good-natured; though when one would set up a yell, the
complaint soon attacked the others, and a full chorus would be the
result.
The slaves remained at the Race-course, some of them for more than a
week, and all of them for four days before the sale. They were brought
in thus early that buyers who desired to inspect them might enjoy that
privilege, although none of them were sold at private sale. For these
preliminary days their shed was constantly visited by speculators.
The negroes were examined with as little consideration as if they had
been brutes indeed; the buyers pulling their mouths open to see their
teeth, pinching their limbs to find how muscular they were, walking
them up and down to detect any signs of lameness, making them stoop
and bend in different ways that they might be certain there was no
concealed rupture or wound; and in addition to all this treatment,
asking them scores of questions relative to their qualifications and
accomplishments. All these humiliations were submitted to without a
murmur, and in some instances with good-natured cheerfulness--where the
slave liked the appearance of the proposed buyer, and fancied that he
might prove a kind "Mas'r."
The following curiously sad scene is the type of a score of others that
were there enacted:
"Elisha," chattel No. 5 in the catalogue, had taken a fancy to a
benevolent-looking middle-aged gentleman, who was inspecting the stock,
and thus used his powers of persuasion to induce the benevolent man to
purchase him, with his wife, boy and girl, Molly, Israel and Sevanda,
chattels Nos. 6, 7 and 8. The earnestness with which the poor fellow
pressed his suit, knowing, as he did, that perhaps the happiness of his
whole life depended on his success, was touching, and the arguments he
used most pathetic. He made no appeal to the feelings of the buyer; he
rested no hope on his charity and kindness, but only strove to show how
well worth his dollars were the bone and blood he was entreating him to
buy.
"Look at me, Mas'r; am prime rice planter; sho' you won't find a better
man den me; no better on de whole plantation; not a bit old yet; do mo'
work den ever; do carpenter work, too, little; better buy me, Mas'r;
I'se be good sarvant, Mas'r. Molly, too, my wife, Sa, fus'rate rice
hand; mos as good as me. Stan' out yer, Molly, and let the gen'lm'n
see."
Molly advances, with her hands crossed on her bosom, and makes a quick
short curtsy, and stands mute, looking appealingly in the benevolent
man's face. But Elisha talks all the faster.
"Show mas'r yer arm, Molly--good arm dat, Mas'r--she do a heap of work
mo' with dat arm yet. Let good Mas'r see yer teeth, Molly--see dat
Mas'r, teeth all reg'lar, all good--she'm young gal yet. Come out yer,
Israel, walk aroun' an' let the gen'lm'n see how spry you be"--
Then, pointing to the three-year-old girl who stood with her chubby
hand to her mouth, holding on to her mother's dress, and uncertain what
to make of the strange scene.
"Little Vardy's only a chile yet; make prime gal by-and-by. Better
buy us, Mas'r, we'm fus' rate bargain"--and so on. But the benevolent
gentleman found where he could drive a closer bargain, and so bought
somebody else.
Similar scenes were transacting all the while on every side--parents
praising the strength and cleverness of their children, and showing
off every muscle and sinew to the very best advantage, not with the
excusable pride of other parents, but to make them the more desirable
in the eyes of the man-buyer; and, on the other hand, children
excusing and mitigating the age and inability of parents, that they
might be more marketable and fall, if possible, into kind hands. Not
unfrequently these representations, if borne out by the facts, secured
a purchaser. The women never spoke to the white men unless spoken to,
and then made the conference as short as possible. And not one of them
all, during the whole time they were thus exposed to the rude questions
of vulgar men, spoke the first unwomanly or indelicate word, or
conducted herself in any regard otherwise than as a modest woman should
do; their conversation and demeanor were quite as unexceptionable as
they would have been had they been the highest ladies in the land, and
through all the insults to which they were subjected they conducted
themselves with the most perfect decorum and self-respect.
The sentiment of the subjoined characteristic dialogue was heard more
than once repeated:
"Well, Colonel, I seen you looking sharp at Shoemaker Bill's Sally.
Going to buy her?
"Well, Major, I think not. Sally's a good, big, strapping gal, and can
do a heap o' work; but it's five years since she had any children.
_She's done breeding, I reckon._"
In the intervals of more active labor, the discussion of the reopening
of the slave trade was commenced, and the opinion seemed to generally
prevail that its re√ɬęstablishment is a consummation devoutly to be
wished, and one red-faced Major or General or Corporal clenched his
remarks with the emphatic assertion that "We'll have all the niggers in
Africa over here in three years--we won't leave enough for seed."