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Hi, I’m Clint Smith, this is Crash Course
Black American History, and today we’re

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talking about Black Women’s experiences
under the early days of American slavery.

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Enslavement, as has been made obvious by now,
was inherently cruel to anyone subjected to

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it. But it is important for us to note, the
unique ways that men and women experienced

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the institution differently because of their
sex.

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Women’s experiences under slavery gave them
specific vantage points from which to observe

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what was happening around them and also left
them particularly vulnerable to some of the

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most horrific parts of the intitution. So
we want to spend a little bit of time talking

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about experiences unique to enslaved women
directly.

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INTRO
I want to note that there will be mentions

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of sexual violence in this episode.
Upon arrival at American ports, African captives

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were taken to various trading hubs to be auctioned
off to the highest bidder for plantation labor.

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Historian Daina Ramey Berry writes in her
book, The Price for Their Pound of Flesh,

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that an enslaved person could be worth anywhere
from $4 - $94,000 (when adjusted to 2014 numbers).

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Plantation owners searched for enslaved laborers
to cultivate cash crops, the most lucrative

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of them being cotton, sugar, indigo, tobacco,
and rice.

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So, when these enslavers came to markets searching
for new laborers, they considered several

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factors before making a bid.
Enslavers considered the health and strength

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of potential laborers. They considered age,
height, skin color, and the specific skills

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an enslaved worker might have had.
But there was another element that shaped

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the hierarchy of value to prospective enslavers:
And that’s gender. Gender placed a figurative

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price-ceiling on enslaved women’s value,
even though as we’ll see, they were often

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expected to do the exact same labor as enslaved
men. The deeply entrenched patriarchy in European

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cultures extended across racial lines, and
played a significant role in shaping African

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captives' monetary worth.
Even though enslaved women were not sold at

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the same high price range as enslaved men,
their value to those who purchased them, was

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absolutely clear.
In many regions of the colonies, enslaved

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women’s ability to reproduce was hugely
important. Buying a laborer who could bear

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children meant that once those children got
older, the enslavers could either exploit

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that child’s labor or sell them at a profit.
And as we’ve discussed one of the most consequential

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laws that developed around slavery in the
colonial era was Virginia's use of partus

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sequitur ventrem, codified by the Virginia
Assembly in 1662, which established the legal

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precedent that defined slavery by the mother's
status.

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Therefore, regardless of the father's race,
an enslaved black woman's child would automatically

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be classified as the property of her enslaver.
Meaning the children had from an enslaved

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woman and the white man who may have enslaved
her, would be born into slavery, and owned

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by their father.
In their jobs on plantations, enslaved women

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sometimes did domestic labor, which consisted
primarily of cooking, cleaning, waiting on

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the lady of the house, and caring for the
children of the estate.

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New and nursing black mothers would often
be forced to prioritize the care of the white

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children of the estate, even at the expense
of their own children. It was not uncommon

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for enslaved women to breastfeed white infants
as it was a task white women on the plantations

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sometimes preferred not to do.
But while there were many Black women who

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engaged in domestic labor, in most cases,
enslavers directed women to work outside the

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home, working the land alongside the men and
even their children.

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While women’s field labor was comparable
to men’s, they weren’t allowed to take

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on some artisanal positions, like carpentry.
Chattel slavery fundamentally disrupted traditional

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gender norms within the colonies and in the
emerging United States. Black women were seen

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in fundamentally different ways than white
women, and many of the typical notions around

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gender roles simply did not apply to them.
Sojourner Truth became one of the earliest

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and foremost speakers to address black women's
unique experiences in a racist and sexist

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society. Spending a bit of time with her can
be illuminating because she directly experienced,

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and spoke about, life as a Black woman in
bondage.

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Let’s go to the thought bubble.
Truth was born Isabella Baumfree aka “Bell”

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in 1797 in upstate New York.

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She was purchased and sold four times and
was made to do brutal physical labor.

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Truth, as we’ve mentioned of other enslaved
women before, also attested to having to nurse

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white babies in place of her own, as a part
of her expected chores.

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She also had to tend to poultry, prepare the
ground for the cultivation of corn, pumpkins,

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or buckwheat, and even cut the grass

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-- which, at that time, was not as simple
as just sitting on a tractor or pushing a

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lawnmower. It involved a scythe and a lot
of upper body strength.

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In fact, when enslaver John Dumont offered
to free her, she attempted to increase her

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work product as a show of good will.

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In the process, she lost her index finger
during a work accident. Which, in a situation

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filled with cruel irony, led Dumont not to
keep his promise, claiming that she had become

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less productive because of the accident.
After realizing that Dumont would not free

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her, Truth decided she was going to free herself.
So, she was just going to walk away. Literally.

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She gathered her still nursing child, said
her goodbyes to the rest of her family and

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left before dawn eventually fleeing to a local
abolitionist family,

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the Van Wagenens, who paid Dumont twenty dollars
to buy Truth’s labor for the remainder of

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the year.
She remained with the family until she was

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freed when the New York State Emancipation
act went into effect.

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She’d later successfully sue for the return
of her six-year-old-son Peter, who was illegally

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sold into slavery in Alabama.

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Thanks thought bubble.

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You may have heard of Sojourner Truth because
of her famous “Ain’t I A Woman” speech.

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...the one where she said “I have borne
thirteen children, and seen most all sold

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off to slavery, and when I cried out with
my mother's grief, none but Jesus heard me!

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And ain't I a woman?”
Well, it turns out, she might not have ever

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said exactly that! She gave a speech in 1851.
That’s definite. But as historian Nell Painter

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explains in her book, Sojourner: A Life, A
Symbol, while this is the version that is

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most widely circulated, it is not one grounded
in…well, Truth.

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The famous--but inaccurate--version was written
and published 12 years later in 1863, by a

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white abolitionist named Frances Dana Barker
Gage. Not only did Gage change or simply make

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up some of Sojourner’s words, but she also
put it in a stereotypical 'southern black

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slave accent', rather than in Truth’s actual
upper New York State, low-Dutch accent which

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sounded very different.
And what’s more, the line Gage originally

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published was “ar’n’t I a woman” but
became widely recast as the “ain’t I a

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woman” speech in the early 20th century.
It’s a reminder of how, throughout slavery,

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the testimonies of Black people were often
filtered through others, who may or may not

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have made their own changes along the way.
One of the most horrifying parts of Black

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women’s experience in slavery, was the pervasive
sexual violence and harassment they were subjected

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to.
Harriet Jacobs provided a detailed account

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of the sexual violence that shaped the everyday
lives of black women in her 1861 autobiography

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Incidents of the Life of a Slave Girl, which
she published under the pseudonym Linda Brent

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in order to protect herself.
She writes, “My master met me at every turn,

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reminding me that I belonged to him, and swearing
by heaven and earth that he would compel me

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to submit to him. If I went out for a breath
of fresh air, after a day of unwearied toil,

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his footsteps dogged me. If I knelt by my
mother’s grave, his dark shadow fell on

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me even there. The light heart which nature
had given me became heavy with sad forebodings.”

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The sexual violence that Black women experienced
took on many different forms. There was even

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a practice called the Fancy Trade designed
specifically for the sale of mixed race women

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for sexual concubinage and prostitution.[1]
In 1937, a formerly enslaved man W. L. Bost

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explained some of these dynamics to an interviewer
for the Federal Writers’ Project, a New

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Deal era initiative which recorded the oral
testimonies of over 2300 formerly enslaved

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people in the late 1930s.
When published, these conversations were often

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written with a heavy dialect attributed to
the Black interviewees. Bost said: “Plenty

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of the colored women have children by the
white men. She know better than to not do

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what he say...they take them very same children
what have they own blood and make slaves out

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of them.”
While the use of sexual agency is discussed

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by many historians and writers as a viable
form of resistance, it is important that we

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not misconstrue it for consent. Writer and
scholar Saidiya Hartman urges us to redefine

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rape and sexual assault within the context
of slavery. Women who were legally defined

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as property were never in a position to provide
consent when, in so many ways, their bodies

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and their choices did not belong to them in
the first place.

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Relationships with an enslaver--to the extent
that any such association can be called a

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relationship given the power dynamics in place--
could provide some women certain types of

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protection and some small privileges that
other enslaved people did not receive.

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That could take many forms. It could mean
not having to work in the field. It could

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mean having slightly better food for one’s
family. It could also mean keeping one's children

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safe from harm or from being sold away. Black
women were presented with a series of impossible

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choices, and each decided for themselves how
to navigate it.

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Slavery was an oppressive institution and
enslaved life and labor were difficult regardless

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of someone’s sex. But it did not affect
black men and women in the same ways, and

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it’s important that we be precise about
that.

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Their experiences reveal that as critical
as Black women’s labor, and their reproduction,

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were to the early American economies, they
were not valued as such--not on the auction

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block and certainly not in respect to their
womanhood.

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Black women’s particular experiences during
the era of slavery give us insight into the

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early iterations of racialized and gendered
oppression that would continue and evolve

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in new and insidious ways for centuries to
come. Thanks for watching, I’ll see you

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next time.
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________________
[1] Findley, Morgan, An Intimate Economy Enslaved

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Women, Work, and America's Domestic Slave
Trade. (North Carolina: University of North

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Carolina Press, 2020)