Feb 26, 2009 - Sale 2171

Sale 2171 - Lot 18

Price Realized: $ 1,320
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 800 - $ 1,200
(SLAVERY AND ABOLITION.) SLAVE-DEALERS. Autograph Letter Signed from Thomas Glenn to Tyre Glenn regarding the business of dealing in slaves. Folio sheet, folded to form four pages, written on three; worn with a few cracks and a faded portion in the center where the folds meet, still legible. Alabama, 1843

Additional Details

Thomas Glenn writes enthusiastically to his brother Tyre about the prospects of opening a slave dealership in Mobile, Alabama. "The prospect of Negro trading business is now better than it has been in years past . . . 4 year old Negro boys likely are worth from five to seven hundred dollars, your likely field hands are worth from seven fifty to nine hundred dollars. Women in proportion are a shade lower than boys & fellows . . . I believe any amount can be sold. There is none in the county for sale and only one or two dealers here: one company has sold 65 this season in this place. Sales all cash." He goes on about the relative prices in Virginia and Carolina where they could obtain slaves cheaply for re-sale in Alabama.