70
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(SLAVERY AND ABOLITION.) PORCHER AND BAYA, Slave Dealers.
ESTATE SALE 229 RICE FIELD NEGROES. An uncommonly Prime and
Orderly Gang of Two Hundred and Twenty-Nine Negroes. Being two gangs in
one, commonly known as the forces of “Tranquility” and “Henrietta” planta-
tions on Santee Rivers.
Bi-folium sheet, folded to form four pages, later folded again
horizontally; printed on all four sides; some contemporary ink notes; some stains; parted
halfway at the folds. (WGC)
Charleston, 1859
[10,000/15,000]
AN EXCEPTIONALLY DETAILED SLAVE SALE
BROADSIDE
/
BROCHURE
from one of the deep
South’s major slave dealers. Of the two hundred
and twenty-nine slaves, one hundred and forty-
seven are identified by first name only. Any
special capabilities or faults are cited: “Sandy
45, cook and watchman,” or “Simon 30, rup-
tured.” In the main, the citations are for slaves
with problems rather than advantages. This sale
is significant in that an attempt was made to
keep family groups together, their number indi-
cated to the left of their names. It’s important to
note that these 229 slaves are identified in bold
at the top of the broadside as “Rice Field
Negroes.” The thinking was that these slaves
were habituated and thus virtually immune to
the fevers and disease common to the planting
and cultivation of rice-much the same thinking
that went into the use of the so-called
“immune” Negro troops in the Spanish
American War.
