By the descendents of the original founders all that congregation. Y bought the land in 1870 two parcels of land with the express purpose of building a house of worship. They named their structure they named their congregation the antiyokut baptist congregation and that message of being against the yoke or against slavery is important for our story here. This is important for slaves on the east bank, so its really. Mportant we like to start our tour at the lady plantation, where we can kind of the what happens to people, some of the things they care about after freedom came. The whitney plantation is the only plan to show in that is devoted to taking andour owner started we had to kind of build it, build some things here. All of these things help us tell the story of slavery. The John Cummings built property, there were no original slave cabins. We had to move those in from elsewhere. This helped us round out our story and then we had other buildings. Collection. And at the end of slavery, they give the progress to the administration in the 1930s. We love the narrative of slaves in the 1930s throughout our interpretation on this site. In the 1930s, when they were taking the narratives of enslaved people, they were in their 80s and 90s and when they were enslaved, they were just children. These are the experiences of happen and things that to their parents and grandparents. And john law with his family, they sailed from france and came here. In indigo until the late 18th century, early 19th century. First planters and we are in the climate zone. We could not really, no one has really been able to take it the full way before that. Over was someone who came after the revolution and all of the planters followed after that. Right around the time the first sugar crop was being granulated, indigo was not really a viable crop anymore. Planted today. Industry. A gigantic they are now sent off to the dominoes refinery. Successive generations around the plantation, all of africanr of african and descended people. Many successive generations were enslaved here. So the population would have changed over time. The highest number we have 101, butat any time is we believe its a little low. We believe theres perhaps as many as 200 people. We had a record of 300 people. But there will be a lot of people miss saying. We will not really start introducing that population. Towill begin with a memorial people enslaved on this land. This is the wall of honor. On this memorial we have recorded the names and basic information of 354 individuals we have been able to find enslaved on this land. This memorial is it moves through time. , there is the 18th century and we are the first generation of enslaved people. We do not know anyone who is enslaved here. So these are people who were already missing. This is information that comes from sale documents. Peoples names are not always recorded when they are enslaved. If you look at things like census records it just includes the tally of how many people. Involved. A notary they had to go through the archives to find the sales and purchases. Where someone came from, how old they were, whether they came children, this is something that would affect their price at sale. These are different territories. So, in louisiana, for a very long time it was illegal to parentsildren away from. Later on it was codified. So, you see things like this. These are all people who have a lot, a lot being sold together. So, we have basic information and theres really not a lot the information can tell us, but we are able to tease out a little bit. One thing we notice, all of notice them we on this board, and their names, like michelle, are european names. There are a few spanish names as well. People were not born in africa with these names. That tells you something about the cultural annihilation, the way cultures are taken from them. Slave traders often renight renamed people. When people are sold from one theyation to another, change things. We often use the example of solomon northrup. Was 12 years slave in louisiana and lost for that time was he was never sold and he was living for 12 years , whichhe name of platt was not his given name. That was an experience a lot of people had in you can see that in various narratives. Even though there is this problem of names being taken away from people, there are people who have african names. Here is a person named mingo, which is an african name. We have someone names samba. A male born on a wednesday. These are cultural names that circumstances of someones birth. A muslim. N was people traded into slavery became from north africa were likely to have been exposed to islam through trading through arab world. This is something that tells us a little bit about the religion and culture of people who came to the new world as slaves. People came from wildly disparate groups. People came to the americas enslaved. In some cases they were catholic. The congo is officially catholic. Some people would be bringing indigenous. S they are going to the mainland of the United States. Theres another chance for that and westlending african and caribbean religions coming into louisiana. It is also important to note selected by were slave traders for specific skills they had. Most of the people who are slaves in louisiana, about 60 were gambian. People came to different parts for different reasons. Slave very first two of thosee captain ships were under orders to find skilled indigo growers. They were trying to establish in indigo economy in louisiana and the european traders did not. Ave the skills implanting had needed someone who skill processing. The same thing with rice. They bring those into louisiana and also South Carolina. There is trading going on to the pacific market in the United States to fill the market there and fill that crop. So, most of the people here in , there are aears few people born in the caribbean. Are coming internationally. Something that is important to note during the time of the atlantic slave trade is the vast majority of settlement was african, compulsory. Of all the people who crossed from the old world to the new world, four of five came from africa. The vast majority of movement was enslaved africans. There are not really good estimates of the number. The best historian was done that work came to an estimate of 12. 5 Million People. These are people who did not get to the coast. They got on the boat and came across. This is an and norman us and ormous the en aspera. The vastrity majority was into the caribbean. Internationalthe slave trade in 1807, which did not cut it off, but significantly lowered the movement. People were still being pirated. Still being smuggled. The last arrived in the united or 1860. 1859 right up until the end of the civil war, people were being snuck in. Thehe exact same time, lines here were just beginning to be developed. So, at the same time people are buying up large tracts of land and increasing their need and. Eliance on compulsory labor the culture here. Theres a very robust slave trade in the wake of that. We can see this happening here. There are a few people born on what is called the east coast, instead of, in the old world or , and on then reverse side of the wall you will see a large number. Here, all of a sudden, all of these people are listed. East coast. East coast is probably virginia. And you can see they probably come from an english plantation from their names. They no longer have french or spanish names. Not so many african names. You see a lot of people coming plantations. Owned an enormousade was in movement of people. After the conclusion of the International Slave trade, one Million People were moved from the upper south virginia, maryland, tennessee, North Carolina, South Carolina little bit, but most of it was tennessee, virginia, North Carolina, and they were moved downriver to mississippi, alabama. Large scale plantations. To give you a sense of the difference in the plantations i come from North Carolina a lot of the tobacco plantations in North Carolina, tobacco is very harmful for the soil and the soil has to lie fallow. Scalehey needed smaller labor. Slaves. 25, 50 we had a hundred and one on this plantation. Was a labor force. You can see that there is a greater need for largescale ,abor and in the upper south they have a Larger Population of women. They were encouraging family units. Part of the value of an enslaved woman was her reproductive potential and slavers talked by talking about her increase. They wouldwas given, talk about sally and her increase all of that reproductive potential belonged to the person who owned that woman. Because a great value they could make exponentially more money selling off those children. The majority of people he came from the upper south where their teens and 20s. Overland. Em marched over land. Some of it was on a riverboat in mississippi. Some of it was down the atlantic seaboard. But nor lians was the hardest at trade. And there was this constant flow of people coming down to new orleans. This is where you can see all that happening. History given to us by the descendents of one of the people in slave here. They describe this process of people being taken from the south. Anna is a girl born on the east coast. She was purchased to be a gift. As the family has related to us, anna lived inside the big house and had an interesting relationship with the family. People who lived in the big often hadwere slaves a strange relationship we cant really understand today. She was a slave and would have been treated as such, but also would have been very close to the family. And the reason why that is significant is because of her son. Was born in 1835. Brothermistress had a who impregnated anna. We dont know this was so long ago, we dont know if anna was raped where they had some kind of relationship. Although for enslaved women, there is no such thing as consent. So, victor would have been considered in louisiana one african ascended, three quarters european, and enslaved by his own family. This is one instance we know about, for certain. Of ownership. Many, many, many more people born of enslaved mothers and White Fathers and this was common throughout the south and those children born of those enslaved women would not necessarily be treated any weter and in many cases, read these narratives a little bit worse because usually there was a white wife in there somewhere who understood where these children were coming from. Relationship between the enslaved people and the enslaved andst enslaved people the slavers was not really bear. There were a lot of people of color existed here because of consensual relationships, where enslaved women would be free and given their own property. Theres a very different class. People of color. People enslaved by their own families as well. This is the gwendolyn hollow and transcribed the names of people enslaved tear through 1820. This is a day of a database the historian put together and there is talk now of extending it through 1865. But 107,000 people are inscribed inscribed here. We just have the names. These are coming from sale documents. We also have recorded very little snippets. Aroundw people to walk and reflect and read those names and the testimonials. This is the last memorial. Of angels. Field we put this memorial here for children who died in saint bob st. John the baptist parish. Home. S called coming along the wall. Dates, the ages, those who died, recorded in the church records. Our historian did the research. Collection. Rge these are people who are listed as little slaves, knee grow slave boys and girls. Some of these people were to be named. Oung that they had names even at three, but at dad, when they were born, they were born into a lowerclass and did not to lookortant enough into the origins of their name in life. Ae whitney plantation was sugar plantation. Land had ay, the sugar mill on its site as well. The people who were enslaved working the fields and probably the majority would have been occupied in sugar. They worked as domestics. This is kind of a little village. They made all the food here. They grew all the food here. Textiles, things like that. Sugar processing was at the end. F the year currently its early october. Sugar is growing and it will continue to grow until late october or early november. The goal is to have everything processed and done by christmas time. Christmas day, they want the field granulated. We brought these in from other places, but historically there would have been eight kettles like this and they would go from large to small. You can see this has a lip on it would be open on the bottom where there would be a fire underneath. Sugaral is to take the stock. Juice and take the. Oil it these would have to be this process and a day the people making the church would be using long handled scoopingd physically the juice and putting it in. Ooling pens this, as you can imagine would be a very hot and dangerous process. Sugar sap. Oiling not only would it get crusty and burn, which makes inferior product, but it could burn the people making the sugar, so it was dangerous in that way. The thing that makes sugar difficult and unique is it had to be processed as soon as it was cut. And sit onnot cut it it. Harvesting why the was extremely grueling and all of this done outside was also done at a very cold time of year. Enslaved workers would be working constantly on that. The whitney plantation does not have original slave cabins, as i mentioned. All of them were torn down by the 1970s. By the end of the civil war, there were 22 slave cabins on this site, and they looked about like this. Pretty typical. Its essentially a duplex. There would be a family on each side, if not a real family, a fictive family. Which was common in slavery, for people to form fictive kinship bonds. The slave cabins on this site were arranged the way we have brought these in. There would be two rows facing each other with a central courtyard. You can imagine that would have created a kind of community. These were set back from the plantation big house by about a half a mile. There was some physical distance between where the hydel family lived and slave enslaved workers lived. That distance is important in creating a sense of autonomy, although their movements were still controlled. People could not leave the plantation without a pass. An overseer would be monitoring them at all times of the day to make sure they got up at the right time, were at work at the right time, and got back to the cabins at the right time. That said, especially because of the distance and how there is so much space here, there are a lot of plantations on the river road, something that was very common in this region was something called running away a little bit. Maybe for a night. Especially since families tended to be separated, and it wasnt even necessarily a Long Distance. If a husband and wife were on neighboring plantations, they might be about two miles apart. Running away for a night to see a loved one and then coming back before dawn was extremely common. But that was all done with a certain degree of risk. If they got caught before they came back, even if they intended to come back, they could because be considered a runaway slave and be punished for that. Enslaved people would be in the cabins mostly at night. Cant see to cant see. From dawn until dusk they would be at their jobs and then come back to the cabinet nighttime. Cabins at nighttime. Nighttime at the cabin would be a time for communion with people who were there, the families, the fictive families, and food preparation. Enslaved people were given rations by the plantation owner. Typically, the most common thing you can read about in slave narratives are cornmeal and bacon. Bacon, fat back, pork belly, lots of fat, not a nutritious cut, and not considered really the high, good cut that the family would be eating. They would receive things like intestines, pig feet. These are things that have been sustained for a long time in southern cooking, but had their roots in the lower cuts given to enslaved people during slavery. Also very common in terms of the people aref enslaved things that originated in africa, blackeyed peas, watermelon, okra which is important here in louisiana for making gumbo. People brought with them their african foodways and supplemented the best they could with the ingredients they had here. People cooked in their cabins. There was usually a fireplace in the cabin where they could prepare meals. In a place like south louisiana where it is very, very hot, we imagine them preparing a campfire. So that they didnt have the smoke and heat inside their cabins. The furnishings in cabins were varied across time and space. All of these things would be different on different plantations. The way people were treated was different from plantation to plantation and regionally as well. We have a few things you can read about in slave narratives, where people talk about the types of furnishings they had. A rope bed like this is common. This is basically planks with ropes attached. What we have here is this rough kind of fabric with hay in the middle. You can see how that is constructed. In louisiana, it was also common to use spanish moss for stuffing for a bed. Another thing people did if they didnt have a bed, people talked about making a pallet on the floor. Thats something a lot of people experienced at different plantations. Again, solomon northrup never described sleeping on a bed for 12 years. He described sleeping on the pallet on the floor. People would be treated differently in different places. Beds like this, about the size of a full bed today, would be a bed for an entire family, so children, mom, dad, all sharing the space. You can see that there is not a lot of space in these cabins. There would not be much of a sense of privacy, what we would think of as being appropriate in a family and being private. All of that living was done in just a couple of rooms with everybody together. This is an 1868 jail. That we brought in. This is not a slave jail. Built in 1868, it is from a few years after the conclusion of slavery, but we brought it in as a learning tool so that we can see the types of typical spaces where enslaved people were confined, especially leading up to sales. This is a very typical design of that era. You can see, there are a few extant photographs of pens at auction houses that were similar to this. At an auction house, typically, like in new orleans, there would be a front room where the auction would take place, and in the back, a small courtyard with a row of cells. People could come out during the day and sleep in the cells at night. In addition to pens used in the marketing of enslaved people, there were also slave jails. In the new orleans Central Business district, there were two dozen slave jails at one time. People were locked up in the state pen