Runaway Slaves: Rebels on the Plantation - Softcover

Franklin, John Hope

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0195084519 ISBN 13: 9780195084511

Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA, 2000

Synopsis

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 slaves were 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 marshalled 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".

About this title

Review:

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., Amazon.com

Review:

"[The authors] address the meaning of slave flight by inspecting hundreds, perhaps thousands, of cases gleaned from a careful reading of runaway advertisements and judicial and legislative records. Their close analysis reveals that flight was not a single phenomenon but many, because runaway slaves had different motives, strategies, tactics, and goals....[This book] not only tells the story of the minority who secured freedom and attacked slavery from the outside, but how even those who failed to gain their liberty subverted slavery from the inside. In unfolding the fugitives' tale, Franklin and Schweninger contribute mightily to our understanding of how the system of slavery stood for nearly three centuries and why it eventually fell."―Ira Berlin, Los AngelesTimes Book Review (Chosen as a Best Book of 1999)

"Assiduous researchers, [the authors] have catalogued and categorized in a 'Runaway Slave Database' a wealth of information, which they impart extensively in their book."―Benjamin Schwarz, The New York Times Book Review

"Thoreau said that historians show us the present more than the past, and nothing illustrates his statement better than [this book]....Runaway Slaves is a formidable corrective [that] tells us more than we want to know about ourselves."―Kent Gramm, Civil War Book Review

"[This] should be on the shelf of any person who has an interest in Southern history or black history, and it certainly will be useful in the classroom."―The Times (Roanoke, Virginia)

"An excellent book, the best available on the struggle between slaves and their masters."―John David Smith, The News & Observer (Raleigh, North Carolina)

"By repetitive and relentless example, Runaway Slaves gathers force: the book is monumental in impact....What emerges is a picture of powerful human resistance―and of a political and economic system rotten to the core."―Phyllis Eckhaus, n These Times

"In this rich, descriptive volume, based on considerable archival research...one of this country's most distinguished historians...collaborates with one of his former students...to get at the true nature of salvery in the Old South by examining the significant number of slaves who by running away challenged the system."―Robert L. Paquatte, The Washington Times

"Runaway Slaves provides an arsenal of ammunition to prove that the Old South was indeed a war zone....[It] amply documents the prevalence and variety of slave rebelliousness."―Arkansas Democrat-Gazette

"An amazing wealth of detail on the backgrounds and experiences of bondsmen and bondswomen who were so discontented with slavery, or at least with their particular experience of it, that they simply ran away....Franklin and Schweninger argue convincingly that more than 50,000 (a conservative estimate) took flight each year....Numbers aside, what is impressive about these runaways is their sheer variety. Again and again, the authors offer a generalization―for instance, that young men were over-represented―and then swamp us with counter-examples....Many different kinds of men and women appear, but none who is docile, or cowed, or content."―John Shelton Reed, Times Literary Supplement

"What a treat to read the engrossing, indeed astonishing, new book by John Hope Franklin and Loren Schweninger! Runaway Slaves: Rebels on the Plantation, 1790-1860 is destined to be a classic and will undoubtedly be well-received by the academic community and general readers alike. The scholarship is truly impressive and it is written in such accessible prose. This book should be on assigned reading lists for as long as we teach American History."―Darlene Clark Hine, co-author A Shining Thread of Hope: The History of Black Women in America

About this edition

• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
• Publication date: 2000
• ISBN 10: 0195084519
• ISBN 13: 9780195084511
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 476