Mar 30, 2023 - Sale 2631

Sale 2631 - Lot 9

Unsold
Estimate: $ 12,000 - $ 18,000
(SLAVERY & ABOLITION.) Under Decree . . . that Plantation or Tract of Land Called "Richfield". . . also, a Gang of About 111 Negroes. Letterpress broadside, 19 1/2 x 11 1/4 inches, signed in type by James Tupper, Master in Equity; folds, minor foxing, contemporary pencil notations on both front and verso. Charleston, SC, 1 March 1854
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Additional Details

A remarkably detailed broadside advertising the sale of an entire plantation and its 111 enslaved people, all promised to be "accustomed to the culture of Rice and Provisions." The names and ages of each are given, and a few have additional descriptors: 45-year-old Rose was blind, 10-year-old Fortune was "ruptured," and others had special skills such as blacksmith, cooper, driver, engineer, or carpenter.

Most of the enslaved people were sold in 11 family groups. This seems to have been the norm for this rice-field region. A 2010 book by Damian Alan Pargas, "The Quarters and the Fields: Regional Agriculture and Slave Families in the Non-Cotton South," discusses this same auction from a newspaper advertisement. He explores the differences between Southern economies based on rice instead of cotton, and details the various reasons why rice-crop slave families were kept intact.

Someone, perhaps the auctioneer, has recorded the results of the sale in the left margin: "This property was sold this day. The Negroes brought 560.00 each, making 62,160. Plantation brought 60,000. Sundry articles on the place, 1000. Total $123,160."

Richfield Plantation was situated along the Pee Dee River near Georgetown, SC (between Charleston and Myrtle Beach), and was owned by Benjamin Faneuil Hunt until his failure to pay the mortgage triggered this auction in 1854. The plantation land was sold to the Heriot family, and then in 1859 to the Sparkman family. They changed the name to Dirleton Plantation, built a new manor house which still stands, and remained in possession well into the 20th century. The land described here is now the Samworth Wildlife Management Area.

We trace no other examples of this important rice country auction broadside.