Product Description

From John Hope Franklin, America's foremost African American historian, comes this groundbreaking analysis of slave resistance and escape. A sweeping panorama of plantation life before the Civil War, this book reveals that slaves frequently rebelled against their masters and ran away from their plantations whenever they could. For generations, important aspects about slave life on the plantations of the American South have remained shrouded. Historians thought, for instance, that slaveswere generally pliant and resigned to their roles as human chattel, and that racial violence on the plantation was an aberration. In this precedent setting book, John Hope Franklin and Loren Schweninger demonstrate that, contrary to popular belief, significant numbers of slaves did in fact frequently rebel against their masters and struggled to attain their freedom. By surveying a wealth of documents, such as planters' records, petitions to county courts and state legislatures, and local newspapers, this book shows how slaves resisted, when, where, and how they escaped, where they fled to, how long they remained in hiding, and how they survived away from the plantation. Of equal importance, it examines the reactions of the white slaveholding class, revealing how they marshaled considerable effort to prevent runaways, meted out severe punishments, and established patrols to hunt down escaped slaves. Reflecting a lifetime of thought by our leading authority in African American history, this book provides the key to truly understanding the relationship between slaveholders and the runaways who challenged the system--illuminating as never before the true nature of the South's "most peculiar institution."

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1127373 in Books
• Published on: 2000-05-15
• Original language: English
• Dimensions: .1 pounds
• Binding: Paperback
• 480 pages

From Amazon.com
Runaway Slaves is yet another masterpiece from the esteemed African American historian John Hope Franklin, author of the influential From Slavery to Freedom. Along with history professor Loren Schweninger, Franklin examines the often unexplored phenomenon of slave resistance--specifically, that of runaway slaves. For too long, there has been a myth that slaves were happy with their condition. Armed with the data from numerous Wanted posters, letters, county-court petitions, and newspapers, Franklin and Schweninger prove that slaves were in a constant state of rebellion with their masters. The intense circle of violence between blacks and whites was marked by property sabotage, work stoppage, assault, murder, and escape into the North. "Perhaps the greatest impact runaways had on the peculiar institution," the authors suggest, "was in their defiance of the system. Masters and slaves knew that there were blacks who were willing to do almost anything to extricate themselves from bondage." Comprehensive in scholarship and compelling in prose, this book sheds light on an underappreciated aspect of the American quest for freedom. --Eugene Holley Jr.

From Library Journal
Franklin (history, emeritus, Duke Univ.) and Schweninger (history, Univ. of North Carolina, Greensboro) have written an exhaustive account of slaves who escaped during the antebellum period. Organized topically, this scrupulously detailed work is based primarily on advertisements for runaways and records of court cases involving escaped slaves. While the book is longer on description than analysis, the authors do agree on one theme: that the substantial number of runaways makes it clear that slaves were hardly content with their condition. Because of its careful, sometimes overwhelming detail, this work can serve as both a reference book and a monograph.AA.O. Edmonds, Ball State Univ., Muncie, IN
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Kirkus Reviews
In a searing indictment of plantation life in the antebellum South, noted historian Franklin (professor emeritus at Duke Univ.) and Schweninger (History/Univ. of North Carolina, Greensboro) use primary documents such as court records, newspapers, and letters of contemporaries, including slaves themselves, to show that slaves often resisted their condition by means direct and indirect, and frequently to the point of running away. Historians traditionally have depicted antebellum plantation slaves as docile and resigned to their fate. Indeed, early studies of American slavery, such as Ulrich Phillips's Life and Labor in the Old South (1929), romanticized plantation slavery and even portrayed slaves as generally contented with their lot. While modern scholarship has exposed the harsh aspects of plantation life, the image of the slave as passive victim has survived. The reality was vastly different, say the authors; quiet resistance and open rebellion were common occurrences on the typical Southern plantation, and the average plantation owner had several runaways every year. In a meticulous survey of primary sources, the authors examine multiple aspects of slave resistance, including passive resistance and outright racial violence on the plantation; the motives of runaways, which included, commonly, the desire to be reunited with family members; and typical opportunities for running away, such as the death of the master. Runaways faced tremendous obstacles, the authors point out: they had to travel hundreds of miles to freedom amid a well-organized system of slave catching and retrieval that was so efficient and vicious that it even enslaved free blacks, and runaways faced drastic penalties, including physical punishment and even death, if caught. Most were caught, but thousands continued to seek their freedom, and many made it, whether alone, through the solicitude of free blacks or by the Underground Railroad of clandestine assistance, to the promised land of the free states or Canada. A well-crafted and carefully researched account that opens a new window onto a dark and painful chapter in American history. -- Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.