The Forced Migration - Forks of the Road
The Forks of the Road market served as a nexus of the largest forced migration of labor in American history.
Between 1800 and 1860 more than 750,000 enslaved African-Americans were moved from the upper to the lower South, reflecting a shift in the agricultural economy of each region and the legal closing of the international slave trade after The Forks of the Road market served as a nexus of the largest forced migration of labor in American history.
Between 1800 and 1860 more than 750,000 enslaved African-Americans were moved from the upper to the lower South, reflecting a shift in the agricultural economy of each region and the legal closing of the international slave trade after1808. While migrating planters brought their own laborers to the new cotton and sugar plantations, slave dealers brought many more through their interstate trading network. Purchasing surplus workers from plantations and at auctions in Maryland, Virginia, and Kentucky, these traders sent them in groups to the lower South for sale.
Many enslaved resisted being ‘sold south,’ fearing break-up of families and harsher working and living conditions. Some escaped north, some implored neighbors to purchase them, and some even resorted to self-mutilation to make themselves unsaleable. [Upper middle and right: “The Coffle Gang” (Black Americans with shackled wrists being marched overland by mounted White men with whips - fiddle players and a large American flag in column.]
“I was at length knocked down, to a man whose name was Denton, a slave trader, then purchasing slaves for the Southern market...and we were called to form a line. Horses and wagons were in readiness to carry our provisions and tents... Mr. Denton taking the lead in his sulky; and the driver, Mr. Thornton, brought the rear. While stopping [in Tennessee], the men were hired to pick cotton. While in Tennessee, we lost four of our number, who died from exposure on the road. After the lapse of three weeks, we started again our journey, and in about four weeks arrived in Natchez, Miss., and went to our pen which Mr. Denton had previously hired for us; and had our irons taken off. ...” –Former slave Henry Watson on the start of his march from Richmond to Natchez, 1827.
[Center middle:] The slave pen and yard at Alexandria, Virginia, was a gathering point for coffles and shipments of slaves to the lower South, many destined for Natchez. Slave-trading businesses such as Franklin and Armsfield involved one partner gathering slaves in Alexandria and another selling them in Natchez. Insert photo courtesy of New York Historical Society.
[Lower middle and right:]
“Before we proceeded very far, Mr. Denton gave orders for us to stop, for the purpose of handcuffing some of the men, which, he said in a loud voice, 'had the devil in them.' The men belonging to this drove were all married men, and all leaving their wives and children behind: he judging from their tears that they were unwilling to go, had them made secure."
–Former slave Henry Watson on the start of his march from Richmond to Natchez, 1827.
“Armfield was a regular slave trader, run slaves from Alexandria to New Orleans, had two vessels in that employment, when one would leave Alexandria with a load of slaves the other would leave New Orleans to get a load of slaves. This I know, I have passed them more times than I have fingers and toes.” – Former enslaved seaman, George Henry, ca. 1834.
[Captions overlaying a map of the southeastern U.S. with internal slave trade routes indicated; lower right:]
Closing off imports from Africa after 1808 increased the price of enslaved people already living in the upper South.
New crops in Kentucky, Virginia and Maryland such as wheat and hemp required far less labor than tobacco. At the same time, the acreage of labor intensive crops of cotton and sugar expanded with the opening of Native American homelands in the lower South.
Floating or steaming down river of flatboats and steamboats from Kentucky and Missouri was relatively inexpensive and speedy.
Sailing down the Atlantic coast, across the Gulf to New Orleans and upriver to Natchez was very fast and cost about $20 per enslaved person.
The overland route from Virginia to Natchez was the least expensive but arduous on all who walked.