Disowning Slavery: Gradual Emancipation and "Race" in New England, 1780-1860

by Joanne Pope Melish

Overview

Following the abolition of slavery in New England, white citizens seemed to forget that it had ever existed there. Drawing on a wide array of primary sources—from slaveowners' diaries to children's daybooks to racist broadsides—Joanne Pope Melish reveals not only how northern society changed but how its perceptions changed as well.

Melish explores the origins of racial thinking and practices to show how ill-prepared the region was to accept a population of free people of color in its midst. Because emancipation was gradual, whites transferred prejudices shaped by slavery to their relations with free people of color, and their attitudes were buttressed by abolitionist rhetoric which seemed to promise riddance of slaves as much as slavery. She tells how whites came to blame the impoverished condition of people of color on their innate inferiority, how racialization became an important component of New England ante-bellum nationalism, and how former slaves actively participated in this discourse by emphasizing their African identity.

Placing race at the center of New England history, Melish contends that slavery was important not only as a labor system but also as an institutionalized set of relations. The collective amnesia about local slavery's existence became a significant component of New England regional identity.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780801434136
Publisher:	Cornell University Press
Publication date:	05/14/1998
Pages:	320
Product dimensions:	6.12(w) x 9.25(h) x 1.00(d)
Age Range:	18 - 17 Years

About the Author

Joanne Pope Melish is Associate Professor of History at the University of Kentucky.

Table of Contents

Introduction

1. New England Slavery
"Short of the Truth": Slavery in the Lives of Whites
Another Truth: Enslavement in the Lives of People of Color

2. The Antislavery Impulse
To "Clear Our Spirits": Whites' Expectations of Freedom from Slavery
The "Privilage of Freemen": Blacks' Expectations of Freedom from Slavery

3. "Slaves of the Community": Gradual Emancipation in Practice

4. A "Negro Spirit": Em-bodying Difference

5. "To Abolish the Black Man": Enacting the Antislavery Promise

6 "A Thing Unknown": The Free White Republic as New England Writ Large

7. "We Are the Alphabet": Free People of Color and the Discourse of "Race"

Index

What People are Saying About This

David Brion Davis

A brilliant book. -- Author of The Problem of Slavery in the Age of Revolution

Editorial Reviews

Joanne Pope Melish argues that the need to portray a virtuous North battling the slave-holding South during the Civil War resulted in the creation of a 'mythology of a free New England' in the antebellum period and that the notion persists to this day.... She makes the case that slavery was far more important to New England's economy than is commonly recognized by historians.

New York Times

Painstakingly researched, filled with new information and astute analysis, this book is a major contribution to our knowledge of New England slavery and a valuable addition to the understanding of race relations in the United States.

American Historical Review

Melish's work is original, important... a fascinating work that opens new interpretations of emancipation and race in New England.

William and Mary Quarterly

Melish's searching analysis compels a reconsideration of many aspects of the conventional narrative of antislavery within both white and African-American communities.... This is an important book, one that commands a reconsideration of many of our assumptions about the meaning of emancipation, the development of racial ideologies, and also about antislavery itself.

Reviews in American History

The work is an invaluable contribution to the emerging picture of slavery and emancipation in the American North. Pope Melish has made it difficult for New Englanders ever to see their history quite the same way again.

Law and History Review

Disowning Slavery brims with ideas: it is an exciting and argumentative book.

Journal of American History

Melish's book makes an important contribution to the literature on slavery and abolition and fills a significant gap in our understanding of how slavery in New England affected both that region and the nation.... This is a terrific book, one that all scholars of slavery, abolition, and the early republic absolutely must read.

H-Net Reviews

"In this wonderfully observed history, Melish's keen truth-giving shows a new picture of the past, in turn giving us a different perspective on the turbulent race relations of our country today."

Providence Sunday Journal

"Joanne Melish sheds more fresh light on the significance of slavery in the North than any other historian I can think of. Disowning Slavery is a brilliant book."

David Brion Davis

"Melish's determination to put the history of local slavery at the core of New England racial attitudes has produced a highly nuanced picture of the gradual emancipation process that goes well beyond anything of its kind.... A tremendous achievement that will have an impact across a wide historiographical spectrum."

Connecticut History

"In this ambitious and often compelling study, Joanne Pope Melish seeks to explore in detail, and then to reconfigure, our sense of the meaning of 'gradual' emancipation in New England.... Her relentless vision of New England Americans 'disowning' the enslaved history, and displacing it on the South, illuminates in a new and important way the history of race and regionalism that we must rethink again."

Journal of Southern History

"Fifteen years in the making, this is an unusually mature and finished first book. It is also a major contribution to the study of the construction of American national identity."

Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science

"Joanne Pope Melish argues that the need to portray a virtuous North battling the slave-holding South during the Civil War resulted in the creation of a 'mythology of a free New England' in the antebellum period and that the notion persists to this day. . . . She makes the case that slavery was far more important to New England's economy than is commonly recognized by historians."—New York Times

"Melish's work is original, important . . . a fascinating work that opens new interpretations of emancipation and race in New England."—William and Mary Quarterly

"Disowning Slavery brims with ideas: it is an exciting and argumentative book."—Journal of American History

"Melish's book makes an important contribution to the literature on slavery and abolition and fills a significant gap in our understanding of how slavery in New England affected both that region and the nation. . . . This is a terrific book, one that all scholars of slavery, abolition, and the early republic absolutely must read."—H-Net Reviews

"Painstakingly researched, filled with new information and astute analysis, this book is a major contribution to our knowledge of New England slavery and a valuable addition to the understanding of race relations in the United States."—American Historical Review

"Melish's searching analysis compels a reconsideration of many aspects of the conventional narrative of antislavery within both white and African-American communities. . . . This is an important book, one that commands a reconsideration of many of our assumptions about the meaning of emancipation, the development of racial ideologies, and also about antislavery itself."—Reviews in American History

"The work is an invaluable contribution to the emerging picture of slavery and emancipation in the American North. Pope Melish has made it difficult for New Englanders ever to see their history quite the same way again."—Law and History Review

"Fifteen years in the making, this is an unusually mature and finished first book. It is also a major contribution to the study of the construction of American national identity."—Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science

"In this ambitious and often compelling study, Joanne Pope Melish seeks to explore in detail, and then to reconfigure, our sense of the meaning of 'gradual' emancipation in New England. . . . Her relentless vision of New England Americans 'disowning' the enslaved history, and displacing it on the South, illuminates in a new and important way the history of race and regionalism that we must rethink again."—Journal of Southern History

"Melish's determination to put the history of local slavery at the core of New England racial attitudes has produced a highly nuanced picture of the gradual emancipation process that goes well beyond anything of its kind. . . . A tremendous achievement that will have an impact across a wide historiographical spectrum."—Connecticut History

"In this wonderfully observed history, Melish's keen truth-giving shows a new picture of the past, in turn giving us a different perspective on the turbulent race relations of our country today."—Providence Sunday Journal

"Joanne Melish sheds more fresh light on the significance of slavery in the North than any other historian I can think of. Disowning Slavery is a brilliant book."—David Brion Davis, author of The Problem of Slavery in the Age of Revolution

"Disowning Slavery impressively roots the development of white racial ideology in the antebellum North both in an expansive New England nationalism and in the day-to-day experience of gradual emancipation. An important addition to the literature on race relations and on sectionalism in the U.S."—David Roediger, University of Minnesota

From the Publisher