Other editions of book American Slavery As It Is: Testimony of a Thousand Witnesses

The stories of hundreds of African-Americans who lived in bondage are preserved in this powerful 1839 chronicle. Compiled by a prominent abolitionist, the accounts include personal narratives from freed slaves as well as testimonials from active and former slave owners, presenting a condemnation of slavery from both those who experienced it and those who perpetuated it. Detailing the overall conditions of slaves across multiple states and several years, the book includes information on their diet, clothing, housing, and working hours as well as their punishments and suffering.Connecticut farmer-turned-abolitionist Theodore Dwight Weld (1803–1895) was a central leader of the American Anti-Slavery Society and traveled the country lecturing against slavery. Weld took great pains to document the trustworthiness of contributors to American Slavery so that there could be no doubt as to its authenticity. A major influence on Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin, the book sold 100,000 copies in its first year of publication and remains a valuable historical testament. This edited selection presents these powerful first-person accounts to a new generation.

Compiled by a prominent abolitionist Theodore Dwight Weld, American Slavery As It Is combines information taken from witnesses, and from active and former slave owners, to generate a condemnation of slavery from both those who observed it and those who perpetuated it. The narrative describes the appalling day-to-day conditions of the over 2,700,000 men, women and children in slavery in the United States. Weld demonstrates how even prisoners--in the United States and in other countries--were significantly better fed than American slaves. Readers will find one of the most meticulous records of slave life available in this text. Unlike personal slave narratives, which focus on a single man or woman's experience, American Slavery details the overall conditions of slaves across multiple states and several years. A DOCSOUTH BOOK. This collaboration between UNC Press and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Library brings classic works from the digital library of Documenting the American South back into print. DocSouth Books uses the latest digital technologies to make these works available in paperback and e-book formats. Each book contains a short summary and is otherwise unaltered from the original publication. DocSouth Books provide affordable and easily accessible editions to a new generation of scholars, students, and general readers.

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

This volume was published in 1839 and was written by the Anti-Slavery Activist Theodore Dwight Weld.The witnesses tell horrific stories of what they saw on their many visits to different plantations in Southern states. These gruesome reports on how slaves were treated helped build the case for the Abolitionist Movement.Other volumes on this subject are: - "Henry Box Brown"- "Letters to Catherine E. Beecher"

The stories of hundreds of African-Americans who lived in bondage are preserved in this powerful 1839 chronicle. Compiled by a prominent abolitionist, the accounts include personal narratives from freed slaves as well as testimonials from active and former slave owners, presenting a condemnation of slavery from both those who experienced it and those who perpetuated it. Detailing the overall conditions of slaves across multiple states and several years, the book includes information on their diet, clothing, housing, and working hours as well as their punishments and suffering.Connecticut farmer-turned-abolitionist Theodore Dwight Weld (1803–1895) was a central leader of the American Anti-Slavery Society and traveled the country lecturing against slavery. Weld took great pains to document the trustworthiness of contributors to American Slavery so that there could be no doubt as to its authenticity. A major influence on Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin, the book sold 100,000 copies in its first year of publication and remains a valuable historical testament. This edited selection presents these powerful first-person accounts to a new generation.

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it.This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. To ensure a quality reading experience, this work has been proofread and republished using a format that seamlessly blends the original graphical elements with text in an easy-to-read typeface.We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book.

Excerpt from American Slavery as It Is: Testimony of a Thousand WitnessesReader, you are empannelled as a juror to try a plain case and bring in an honest verdict. The question at issue is not one of law, but of fact - "What is the actual condition of the slaves in the United States?" A plainer case never went to a jury. Look at it. Twenty-seven hundred thousand persons in this country, men, women, and children, are in slavery. Is slavery, as a condition for human beings, good, bad, or indifferent? We submit the question without argument. You have common sense, and conscience, and a human heart; - pronounce upon it. You have a wife, or a husband, a child, a father, a mother, a brother or a sister - make the case your own, make it theirs, and bring in your verdict. The case of Human Rights against Slavery has been adjudicated in the court of conscience times innumerable. The same verdict has always been rendered - "Guilty;" the same sentence has always been pronounced, "Let it be accursed;" and human nature, with her million echoes, has rung it round the world in every language under heaven, "Let it be accursed. Let it be accursed." His heart is false to human nature, who will not say "Amen." There is not a man on earth who does not believe that slavery is a curse. Human beings may be inconsistent, but human nature is true to herself. She has uttered her testimony against slavery with a shriek ever since the monster was begotten; and till it perishes amidst the execrations of the universe, she will traverse the world on its track, dealing her bolts upon its head, and dashing against it her condemning brand. We repeat it, every man knows that slavery is a curse. Whoever denies this, his lips libel his heart. Try him; clank the chains in his ears, and tell him they are for him. Give him an hour to prepare his wife and children for a life of slavery. Bid him make haste and get ready their necks for the yoke, and their wrists for the coffle chains, then look a…

The Best Book on Slavery in American ever Written American Slavery As It Is: Testimony of a Thousand Witnesses. Theodore Dwight Weld 1803-1895. Human nature works out in slaveholders just as it does in other men, and in American slaveholders just as in English, French, Turkish, Algerine, Roman and Grecian. The Spartans boasted of their kindness to their slaves, while they whipped them to death by thousands at the altars of their gods. The Romans lauded their own mild treatment of their bondmen, while they branded their names on their flesh with hot irons, and when old, threw them into their fish ponds, or like Cato "the Just," starved them to death. It is the boast of the Turks that they treat their slaves as though they were their children, yet their common name for them is "dogs," and for the merest trifles, their feet are bastinadoed to a jelly, or their heads clipped off with the scimetar. The Portuguese pride themselves on their gentle bearing toward their slaves, yet the streets of Rio Janeiro are filled with naked men and women yoked in pairs to carts and wagons, and whipped by drivers like beasts of burden.

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1839 edition. Excerpt: ...of facts, illustrating the position that slaveholders treat their slaves worse than they do their cattle, will occur to all who are familiar with slavery. When cattle break through their owners' inclosures and escape, if found, they are driven back and fastened in again; and even slaveholders would execrate as a wretch, the man who should tie them up, and bruise and lacerate them for straying away; but when slaves that have escaped are caught, they are flogged with the most terrible severity. When herds of cattle are driven to market, they are suffered to go in the easiest way, each by himself; but when slaves are driven to market, they are fastened together with handcuffs, galled by iron collars and chains, and thus forced to travel on foot hundreds of miles, sleeping at night in their chains. Sheep, and sometimes horned cattle are marked with their owners' initials--but this is generally done with paint, and of course produces no pain. Slaves, too, are often marked with their owners' initials, but the letters are stamped into their flesh with a hot iron. Cattle are suffered to graze their pastures without stint; but the slaves are restrained in their food to a fixed allowance. The slaveholders' horses are notoriously far better fed, more moderately worked, have fewer hours of labor, and longer intervals of rest than their slaves; and their valuable horses are far more comfortably housed and lodged, and their stables more effectually defended from the weather, than the slaves' huts. We have here merely began a comparison, which the reader can easily carry out at length, from the materials furnished in this work. We will, however, subjoin a few testimonies of slaveholders, and others who have resided in slave states, expressly asserting that...

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.