Part 137 (1/2)

Rev. John Rankin, of Ripley, Ohio, a native of Tennessee, and for same years a preacher in slave states.

”Thousands of the slaves are pressed with the gnawings of cruel hunger during their whole lives.”

Report of the Gradual Emanc.i.p.ation Society, of North Carolina, 1826.

Signed Moses Swain, President, and William Swain, Secretary.

Speaking of the condition of slaves, in the eastern part of that state, the report says,--”The master puts the unfortunate wretches upon short allowances, scarcely sufficient for their sustenance, so that a _great part_ of them go _half starved_ much of the time.”

Mr. Asa A. Stone, a Theological Student, who resided near Natchez, Miss., in 1834-5.

”On almost every plantation, the hands suffer more or less from hunger at some seasons of almost every year. There is always a _good deal of suffering_ from hunger. On many plantations, and particularly in Louisiana, the slaves are in a condition of _almost utter famishment,_ during a great portion of the year.”

Thomas Clay, Esq., of Georgia, a Slaveholder.

”From various causes this [the slave's allowance of food] is _often_ not adequate to the support of a laboring man.”

Mr. Tobias Boudinot, St Albans, Ohio, a member of the Methodist Church. Mr. B. for some years navigated the Mississippi.

”The slaves down the Mississippi, are _half-starved,_ the boats, when they stop at night, are constantly boarded by slaves, begging for something to eat.”

President Edwards, the younger, in a sermon before the Conn. Abolition Society, 1791.

”The slaves are supplied with barely enough to keep them from _starving._”

Rev. Horace Moulton, a Methodist Clergyman of Marlboro' Ma.s.s., who lived five years in Georgia.

”As a general thing on the plantations, the slaves suffer extremely for the want of food.”

Rev. George Bourne, late editor of the Protestant Vindicator, N.Y., who was seven years pastor of a church in Virginia.

”The slaves are deprived of _needful_ sustenance.”

2. KINDS OF FOOD.

Hon. Robert Turnbull, a slaveholder of Charleston, South Carolina.

”The subsistence of the slaves consists, from March until August, of corn ground into grits, or meal, made into what is called _hominy_, or baked into corn bread. The other six months, they are fed upon the sweet potatoe. Meat, when given, is only by way of _indulgence or favor._”

Mr. Eleazar Powell, Chippewa, Beaver Co., Penn., who resided in Mississippi, in 1836-7.

”The food of the slaves was generally corn bread, and _sometimes_ meat or mola.s.ses.”