1700s: Growth of slavery, the power to punish, and white fears (jan 1, 1700 – jan 1, 1800)

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"If you're a white authority,
you're constantly trying
to figure how tightly you
want to impose the lid
with respect to people
running away. How fierce
should the punishments be?
Should it be a whipping?
Should it be the loss of a
finger or a hand or a foot?
Should it be wearing
shackles perpetually?"
- Peter Wood, historian

Carolina authorities developed laws to keep the African American population under control. Whipping, branding, dismembering, castrating, or killing a slave were legal under many circumstances. Freedom of movement, to assemble at a funeral, to earn money, even to learn to read and write, became outlawed.


At times the cruelty seemed almost casual. A Virginia slaveowner's journal entry for April 17, 1709 reads: "Anaka was whipped yesterday for stealing the rum and filling the bottle up with water. I said my prayers and I danced my dance. Eugene was whipped again for pissing in bed and Jenny for concealing it."
On the 9th of September last at Night a great Number of Negroes Arose in Rebellion, broke open a Store where they got arms, killed twenty one White Persons, and were marching the next morning in a Daring manner out of the Province, killing all they met and burning several Houses as they passed along the Road.
- Wm Bull

White fears of the people they kept enslaved were entirely justified. On September 9, 1739, an African man named Jemmy, thought to be of Angolan origin, led a march from Stono near Charleston toward Florida and what he believed would be freedom on Spanish soil. Other slaves joined Jemmy and their numbers grew to nearly 100. Jemmy and his companions killed dozens of whites on their way, in what became known as the Stono Rebellion. White colonists caught up with the rebels and executed those whom they managed to capture. The severed heads of the rebels were left on mile posts on the side of the road as a warning to others.

White fear of blacks was also rampant in New York City, which had a density of slaves nearing that of Charleston. In 1741, fires were ignited all over New York, including one at the governor's mansion. In witch-hunt fashion, 160 blacks and at least a dozen working class whites were accused of conspiring against the City of New York. Thirty-one Africans were killed; 13 were burned at the stake. Four whites were hanged.

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