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Soul by Soul: Life Inside the Antebellum Slave Market

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In a book that argues that the slave trade itself fundamentally defines American slavery as a whole, a focus on the brutality and inhumanity of slavery would be expected. The tragedy of individuals torn from their families, kept in inhumane conditions in the slave markets, and sold to strangers who likely would physically abuse them is certainly one focus of Soul By Soul. However, Walter Johnson has gone much further than that in defining the slave markets as central to our understanding of slavery. Through creative interpretation of numerous personal and business documents drawn from slave dealers and owners, the court transcripts produced when their bargains went awry, and the haunting memoirs of slaves who either came through the markets themselves or had relatives who did, Johnson shows that the act of buying a human being was profoundly important to the Southern mind in ways that transcend economics or dynamics of power. It is thus not possible to dismiss Johnsons interpretation with the argument that the majority of slaves never passed through the traders hands, so their experience with the market was negligible and therefore of less importance than Johnson would suggest. This is a book less about the experience of black slaves in the market than about the effect those markets had on the white psyche.

Johnson sees southern whites as consumers, ready to be marketed to in the modern sense. Traders knew this and were prepared to advertise their wares in ways that would allow those consumerist impulses to be satisfied. The purchase of a first slave for a man just starting to build his fortune was an act of hope; the buyers dreams of prosperity rested upon the slave whom he had chosen, in a sense transferring dependence from the slave to the paternalist himself. Wealthier buyers could impose their own fantasies upon their purchases; domestic slaves could bring respectability to a household by relieving the masters wife from physical labor. Slaves could also establish a masters reputation among his peers by being stubborn or unruly slaves whom the master could break, establishing his power. They could also embody sexual fantasies, allow a white man to create a role for himself as a paternalist, or simply reflect well on their owner by being good purchases. Much as a man may express his desired appearance to others by purchasing a certain model of car, and judges others buy what they drive, so did slaveholders define and judge themselves according to the quality of slaves they owned.

Similarly, just as slaveowners defined themselves according to their actions in the market, they also defined slaves humanity according to their market value, using racial and physical markers to determine the abilities of their purchases. However, the human nature of their property inevitably led to slave owners being dissatisfied with their purchases; slaves seldom fulfilled the materialist fantasies of their buyers. Violence was the surest response, as slave owners expressed their disappointment with faulty products. Slaves could be returned for failing to perform as the traders had promised, but more often they were simply whipped. Presumably, slaves common experiences drew them closer to one another, as Johnson argues. However, his sources show that slaves frequently judged each other in ways reminiscent of the slaveholders own criteria, that is upon skin color, intelligence, attitude, etc. Arguing that they automatically united against whites is perhaps sensible, but not supported by Johnsons sources. This however, is one of the few flaws in Johnsons otherwise insightful analysis.

In his review of Soul By Soul, tabsaw compares Johnson's book about the slave market unfavorably with the WPA interviews taken with former slaves themselves, and claims that Johnson, a skilled and careful historian, presents no documentation for his claims. In fact, a quick examination of a few of the many hundreds of footnotes in Soul By Soul illustrates that Johnson's work is well-grounded in the documentary evidence--much of it from court records and newspapers in which the slaveholders themselves described their world. For example, advertisements for runaway slaves routinely describe the markings on their bodies--ears cut off, whip scars, and the like.
The WPA slave narratives are good, but they need to be read (like all historical sources) carefully. For example, the interviewers are all middle class and white, the interviewees are all black and aged, and the interviews take place in the 1930s Jim Crow South, where several African Americans were burned alive, lynched, or tortured to death in public every single week, year in and year out. The interviews take place in a situation where whites own almost all the property and make all the laws and where any white man can kill any black person without fear of prosecution. Does this sound like an environment likely to produce candid information about race relations? I don't mean to say we disregard the slave narratives, but obviously they cannot simply be taken at face value. Walter Johnson is a real historian, while tabsaw is just a neo-Confederate propagandist, searching for something to defend his fantasy of the Old South. As a Southerner myself, I don't find that either shocking or admirable, but Soul by Soul is a great book, and cannot fairly be faulted for such a misuse of evidence.

"Soul by Soul" is required reading for anyone interested in the history of the American South.

Anyone familiar with the historiography of the antebellum South is familiar with discussions of slaves and owners and "the worlds they made." Genovese, Fox-Genovese, and Sobel, among others, make various arguments about how slaves and owners worked together or in opposition to create the world of the Antebellum South.

Johnson convincingly molds this trope into a new paradigm for discussing the relationships of slaves and owners. He argues that the buying and selling of slaves was central to antebullum white culture -- it was through the buying and selling of slaves that white people sought upward mobility and gentility and it was in discussions of these sales (successful and unsuccessful) that whites judged one another.

In the end, Johnson reformulates the long-standing trope of "worlds made," arguing that slave owners were "made of slaves": their self-image (and, as important in a pre-modern society, their pubic image) was made of their ability to make shrewd decisions both about the purchase and management of slaves.

He also presents convincing evidence that far from being passive victims in the domestic slave trade, African-Americans did, sometimes at great personal risk, influence the terms of their own sale.

Johnson's arguments will shape discussions of slaves and slave owners for many years to come. "Soul by Soul" is required reading for anyone who studies the American South.

Kent Brook's review, as it attempts to describe Walter Johnson's Soul By Soul, comes closer to describing itself. It is Johnson's masterpiece, in fact, that hews to the facts and bristles with documentation, and Brook's tendentious review that comes off as a politically-driven tirade. What Brooks derides as "gossip" are the court records, themselves assembled by slaveowners, not abolitionists. Johnson presents a very well-grounded look at the slave market, rooting his assertions in the documentary record. It is true that he does not write a local history of slave life in New Orleans, but that is because Soul By Soul is a far larger, more ambitious and profound than any such local history could be; this is appropriate, since New Orleans was not a local but a regional slave market, and its tenacles reached far into the Southern upcountry. Soul By Soul won the Frederick Jackson Turner Award from the Organization of American Historians--an organization that knows something about documentation--which is one of the most prestigious awards a work of history can attain. The reason: it's a terrific work of scholarship, and, beyond that, Soul By Soul is an extraordinary piece of literary craft, a gripping read. Maybe that is why it is being picked up by history book clubs across the country. Read it and judge for yourself.

this book was assigned to me as a summer reading book for my advanced placement american history course... after reading the first chapter, i was automatically interested. i wouldn't exactly say i couldn't put the book down, but having to read it was more like an interesting leisure activity instead of a boring read. johnson's use of citing people who reappear throughout the book was very useful because it was more obvious that the horrors of the slave market were true statements from real slaves instead of a general statement without a citation. i strongly recommend this book to people of all ages!!!

In response to Tabsaw's "brilliant" book review, I would offer a more balanced perspective. Yes, the slave narratives provide interesting reading, but what evidence is there that these are historically accurrate? In fact, a quick review of how the WPA collected these narratives should give an clue as to their reliability. Most were done by whites looking to support their perception of slavery in the 1930's. The people interviewed were elderly and their stories written down by their white interviewers. Gee...no chance for embellishment or mistakes in that process!! And Tabsaw just assumes that the white recorders were able to keep their bias out of the narratives as they transcribed them!! Hey..show me a single interviewer who is able to do that!!

Johnson's book, on the other hand, is an excellent work of scholarship. He does cite his sources (that is what those numbers mean at the end of sentenses or paragraphs, genius!!), and had Tabsaw taken the time to look in the section called "Notes", he would have discovered that Johnson is relying upon a wide range of primary and secondary sources to tell his tale. The picture he paints is one of horror and dehumanization. Slaves were treated like animals with little regard given to their well-being. Johnson takes the reader inside the slave market where the smells, sounds and conditions of slavery cannot be ignored. It is a compelling and disturbing read.

In a larger sense, Johnson's work is also a commentary on Southern life as a whole during the 1800's. The enslavement of fellow humans required a new and different social structure. The patriarchial society that ensued brought with it profound implications for relations with women, property rights and behavior. Johnson makes it plain that the slave culture came to dominate Southern life.

I recommend this work highly!! For anyone interested in what the process of slavery was like, this is the place to start. Once finished with the book (which I doubt Tabsaw actually read cover to cover because of the simple-mindness of his review), one will have a clear picture indeed of what life was like for slaves awaiting their purchase and the interactions that occurred with the white owners. The slave narratives are interesting reading, but background knowledge is necessary for an informed arguement. Johnson's book provides the needed background and helps put those narratives in context. READ THIS BOOK and see what life was like in an antibellum slave market.

Soul By Soul is an extraordinary journey into the heart of slavery. Johnson's examination of "the chattel principle"--the idea and reality of persons as property--cuts to the core of slavery's central truths and brutal contradictions. And the really impressive thing is that he conjures the past with such vision, clarity, and vigor that this is a truly rare and stunning book--both an engrossing read and a serious work of scholarship. One of the best books I have read in years.

Johnson has done a splendid job of collating primary resources focused specifically on aspects surrounding the degrading slave auctions. He adds to his woven-together quotes a theme that focuses upon how Whites viewed themselves and each other in light of how well they managed their slaves. Much like a modern banker today might think or say, "I'm a success because I made a great commodity trade," so went the thinking of the slave owner.

The strength of Johnson's research reaches its apex in his focused, first-hand narratives exposes the despicable and hypocritical ways Whites treated blacks.

Johnson details how enslaved African Americans survived in these deplorable conditions. Highlighting how their faith in God, in particular how their identification with Christ's suffering, buoyed them up and gave them hope, not only to survive, but to thrive, would have strengthened an already strong work.

"Soul by Soul" is a very important read about a profound topic. It is not easy reading, if by "easy reading" one means a "happy story." It is hard reading--reading about the hard realities of life, but nonetheless, vital reading.

Reviewer: Bob Kellemen, Ph.D., is the author of Beyond the Suffering: Embracing the Legacy of African American Soul Care and Spiritual Direction , Soul Physicians, and Spiritual Friends.

The book has a peculiar structure. The introduction and epilogue are the best parts. Expectation of political and economic analysis in the introduction is not fulfilled. The middle chapters feature individual slave stories and overlong lists fingering the slave traders. Each chapter consists of a load of seemingly unedited data listings followed by a not bad summary. The book parlays extensive research into somewhat tedious listings of slave traders. It's full of individual stories of slaves and slavers without a great deal of cohesion. There is little Integration to form any general social or economic conclusions promised in the introduction. Johnson is at his best summarizing prior works relating to his topic. The best feature of the book is the references to other works along with the bibliography.

In the introduction, the only examination of economics, cotton price is mentioned but nothing about the price of sugar or competition between free and slave labor. There is a curious technique of describing impressions of charts and demographic maps in the text without presenting any illustration. Is the author simply avoiding royalties? It looks like something was left out of the book.

Migration from the northern tier of states, especially Ky and Md. to the deep south is the main social and economic theme. The book doesn't draw the analogy but it seems that the upper tier of states provided a breeding ground for a supply of slaves to the cotton and sugar plantations, much like Ky. thoroughbred horses today. Birth rates of slaves in the upper tier was the main reason that slavery was self sustaining in the USA in contrast to other areas after banning of the external slave trade. The book cites migration of slaves southward and westward, but only the southward movement is covered. The politically important issue of slavery in the territories is ignored.

Reasons for sale of slaves are too many and varied to draw any conclusions; as many reasons as for other forms of property. A conspicuous absence as a cause of sale is taxation.
The estate tax, so devastating to modern small business continuation, was never used as a tool to interfere with slavery. The federal government did not have the power in antebellum days that it has now.

I couldn't develop an interest in the characteristics of a good slave or in the subterfuges that slaves used to find the best place to land. Thanks to Johnson for the education on the 1829 law pertaining to redhibition, or reasons for returning a slave to rescind a sale. Two potentially interesting cases before the La. SC are dropped without particulars. Escapes are covered as is the spread of gonorrhea and some incidence of pregnancy in spite of close watching.

The book mentions a temporary halt in the trade due to the Matt Turner rebellion in 1831. There is no mention of the effects of the Nullification crisis, the Mexican war or changes due to abolition of the Atlantic trade in 1808. Would the USA market have been different if there had been a market in Brazil or the Caribbean? I suppose the "antebellum" term in the subtitle justifies ignoring changes brought about by the advent of war.

With depictions of the coffles, jails and holding pens of the internal slave trade and many individual stories the book forms one more view into the evils of slavery, without providing much insight into social or economic effects.

Heavy as in full of meat and flavor. This is a book that will make you change the way you think about slavery. It was worse than imagined.