I was watching the new HBO special last night, Exterminate All the Brutes. It’s ok. I don’t like the director/narrators raspy voice. But it inspired me to see if I could find out if my family ever owned slaves. I always assumed they never did. My immediate family is poor and working class going back to my great grandparents. My great grand parents and their parents were civil servants and before that farmers. But I found the 1850 slave schedule was available online and I searched it. https://www.familysearch.org/search/collection/1420440 And I found my greatx5 grandfather registered 10 slaves on that survey. They lived in Virginia at that time and I am sure it’s him because I found my great grandmothers very detailed family tree going back to the late 1790s. His children moved and stayed in free state until after slavery was abolished but the legacy is still there. I feel bad because I wish I hadn’t learned that. But the legacy is real.
It's over. Our ancestors are products of their times. They didn't have our perspective. As a black person who is familiar with some of my slave ancestors, I'm sorry they were slaves but it's over.
One of the most interesting things a found was an ancestor who was born to a white man and his slave mistress, eventually freed along with his siblings and mother, but still himself owned several slaves in the 1850's. I'll tell ya watching that Clayton Bigsby skit was never the same...
There are two whose race is listed as M under 10 years old so I assume that’s mixed and his children.
If you have to go back to the 1700s and earlier then yes your ancestors owned slaves and they were also slaves themselves. Whether you are black, white , native american , escimo or oriental. Whether it happened in the 1700s, 1600s or 1000s what's the difference? They have nothing much to do with you. Everyone is the same unless it is some subsaharan completely isolated jungle tribe.
I traced my surname all the way back to the 1400s in Wales. To some dude who was a lord and called "the wolf". The story is, a pair of brothers came over in the early 1600s on their own ship, bought thousands of acres of tobacco farms in Virginia. (I don't think they had slaves at this point, too early). One of them was my grandpappy, he had kids, after many generations they traveled south, 150 years later the family line ends up on a plantation in SC that still stands today on a street with my surname on it. They lived there for about 100+ years, and held around 20-40 slaves at a time. My 4x great grandfather said duces to the plantation in SC, moved to Arkansas to start a homestead, and that's where my grandfather was born. The family seemed to have real money for many generations, but it sure did run out by the time my grandfather was born. My father's mother's side was much poorer, harder to find documentation of them, many fought in the civil war for the south. And then my mom's side are relatively recent descendants of Spain, can't find anything on them.
Damn, I’d be pissed your ancestors squandered your inheritance. AFAIK my people were always poors. Pretty confident they came here mid 19th century as poor irish/german immigrants and never owned slaves. But who knows, maybe my ancestor were slaves or owned slaves at some point in dark ages Europe.
I'm sure some still have it, you got to understand each generation had about 5+ kids, that turned into 5+ kids, into 5+ kids, and a generation in those days started around 15-20 years old. There are thousands of people who broke off from that lineage starting 250 years ago at the SC plantation, (If you count the girls who lose the surname).
Largest single owner in my family tree is a comic-book Colonel Sanders knock-off looking plantation owner (who, it turns out, was actually a colonel in the Confederate army) from Georgia with 54 in 1860. And that accounts for less than 50% of total slaves when I stretch it across all branches. Also a "old money" branch related to a famous Texas politician who had 40+ in Alabama in 1860, and another family with several dozen in Arkansas at the same time. Also possibly related to notorious slave impregnator Thomas Jefferson, though I'm not 100% on that. So, yeah, I got a few.
Slavery started as an economic system. We found a new world we have to clear land and take advantage of farming opportunity. We don't have John Deere let's get those Africans Then someone questions the humanity or lack of and then someone says ohh they're subhuman. Learned this in college, not my opinion
Not to discount our terrible legacy of slavery, but history is all about oppressing and being oppressed. Women are still oppressed around the world and marrying for love as a mainstream idea is still fairly recent development. A more deeply ancient trope is judging other people based on their lineage. People can feel proud that they have the blood of royalty or derive some form of purity they themselves didn't have a choice over. I find it fascinating that we now try to point out the lows along with magnifying the highs. I guess it's a matter of questioning the narratives or truths we, our parents, and grandparents tell ourselves over time. Having Jefferson as your possible ancestor is still a cool story even if it's one that's been distorted orally through time. I guess technology turns those stories into myths. But are we letting go of something that fits a cultural or personal purpose? What happens when a story that helped defined your family turns out to be a lie? The truth sets us free...from what?
Good for you The Rest of are not so . . . .. .. forgiving So we will be pissed until reparations are made.. I cannot help but wonder if he too got reparations when the war was over for his "lost property" See The Slave Owners for Reparations . .. Slaves did not . . . .. . Rocket River
