Summary Of Many Thousand Gone By Ira Berlin

One of the themes discussed in Ira Berlin’s book, “Many Thousands Gone” is the demolition of African culture and traditions in the colonies of the Lowcountry. This usually meant stripping African slaves of their identity in order to prevent any revolts and to basically domesticate them, so they can accustom to the plantation life. Berlin for the most part agrees that this system worked, as there were generally no successful insurrections in the Lowcountry during this time. However, many slaves in this region became masters of the system, as they were able to find ways play the system and in a way hire themselves out by making use of their skills during whatever time they had free to make money. This gave slaves in the Lowcountry a tool of resistance

Their annoyance against slaves had grown to a point where the Intendant of the Charleston City Council took his concerns to the House of Representatives. In his petition he demonstrates his concern for Slaves who have the capacity to write and read. He argues that slaves don’t need to know how to read and write to execute their tasks, therefore there is no need for institutions that teach people of color these skills; as a result, he asks for “absolute prohibition of all schools for the instruction of coloured persons.” This shows how strong white people felt against allowing slaves to have any tools to defend themselves. Moreover, slaves at this time were still able to purchase their own time, that meant that if they have saved enough, they could have a lot more time to dedicate to their families and could also have their own place, rather than living in the quarters with the rest of the

So when the time came for a slave (when allowed) to buy himself or his family out, they were faced with the hard truth, as the prices to their freedom were nearly impossible to obtain. So by this period, slaves were experiencing even further constrains, and their freedom was still very limited; these conditions resembled much of the life that slaves experienced decades ago, and that Berlin had described. In which slaves who had the skills could find ways to make use of, and profit from their talents, and also have the chance to improve even if a little their quality of