AN OLD SLAVE-SELLER. Strange Story by the Last of tho Negro Auctioneers – Slaves Lost and Won Gambling.

Te Aroha News, Volume II, Issue 63, 16 August 1884, Page 5

AN OLD SLAVE- SELLER. Strange Story by the Last of tho Negro Auctioneers - Slaves Lost and Won Gambling.

ins, sir, so tar as l know, ana l cmnic x now all about it, I'm the last living repro sntativo of tho profession — the last man live in the United States who made a busiess of selling niggers from tho auction lock. I'm 72 years old now, and I guess ly time has nearly come." Thus spoke old ack Campbell as he filled his glass for the mrth time at a Broad-street bar, and sanecl back against tho counter to open up is budget of reminiscences. " I went into 10 slave auction business in 1535, and never [uit it \intil the war broke out. I have old niggers in Baltimore, Richmond, Jharloston, Savannah, Louisville, Mobile, few Orleans, Memphis, and all along in the thor towns of tho South. I don't blow my wn trumpet— you know that on their own icrits modest men aro dumb— but I can ay that Jack Campbell had the reputation 3V showing up the good points of a ' buck ' r a ' wench ' and drawing out bids that lado him in demand wherever there was a ig sale. "Tho nigger traders have made me travel 00 miles to run oft" a lot for them, and they aid mo my own price for my work. " How many have I sold '! I was in the msinchs some twenty-five years, and I guess always handled 500 or GOO a year. " I've had plenty of queer experiences as_ ou call them," ho continued, after ho had iviped his lips with a nobby white silk handkerchief. " Long as you ask about it, I rcnombei tho biggest money I over got for a rigger was 9,000 dollars for a pretty quadroon wench that I sold in Louisville about 52 or '53. She was only I S, and was about is white as you or mo, and her two children lad light curly hair. Her master lived lown near Bowling (Jrcen, and though he lid'fc want to part, with her, he was so down n his luck that he had to sell her. I heard, ,00, that his wife swore that nigger must cave the plantation or .she would go home ;o her family. My instructions wero not to ,ake less than 6,000 dollars for the girl, and . was to get a big percentage on all over ;hat ; so when they put her on the block 1 alked her up for all sho was worth. "There were more than twenty men bidding for her, and the fellow that got her for 9,000 dollais Mas a rich and gay young bachelor Iroin Tcncsscc, who happened to be in tho city on a spree and was attracted by curiosity to the .sale He was a littlo drinky, and wasn't caring anything for his ducats. He was so set on having the girl, I believe he would have given 20,000 dollars for her, if anybody had bid her up that high. I 1 c carried her home that day, and I ain't s^oing to tell you anything more about him bhan that he made a big name in the Southam army, and was killed at the head of his soldicis. " One of this women's children by her first master lives in a Massachusetts town tiou , and is a rich man. There isn't a sign ol black blood in him." " Have you told many of such people?" " Plenty of likely girls, horn, chocolato colour up to nearly white, and got from 0,000 dollars to 0,000 dollars apiece for 'cm. There always was a good market for that kind of stock. No, it didn't conic from any particular place in the South. You could nnel it everywhere from Maryland to Louisiana. Southern gentlemen took an intercut in it, sir, and no decent master would let one of those girls marry a black man. They wero .superior people, supciior people." " Which were tho bebt markets ?" "New Orleans, Louisville, Charleston and Baltimore used to be about the same till the cussed black Abolitionists got to running the niggers* north by the underground railroad. After that it was always a little dangerous to do business in Baltimore or Louisville for fear the Yankees would steal them across tho Pennsylvania line or the Ohio River. " I brought six blacks to Baltimore once on my own account, and put 'em in the pen at the corner ot Eutaw and Camdcn-strcets, to wait lor a sale. Two got loose that very night, and that was the last I ever saw ol them. Of course they got over into Pennsylvania, but they never could have done it without somebody helped them, for they had come clear from North Carolina. They were worth 1,500 dollars apiece, and I was clear 3,000 dollars out of pocket. There was a nest of infernal Quakers up at a place called Cluistiana in this State, and they were always lookin' out to rob a man of hig honest property. " Another timo a nigger ran away fron me at Newport, Ky., and got to Cincinnati I went across the river and saw a friend o mine who kept a place where I had playec in a gooel many thousands of my hare earned dollars. I told him 1 wanted his help to get the man back, and, says he 'Jack, it you ain't a fool, you'll let thai moke go. It mightn't be healthy for yoi to raise a row here over one nigger, 'caus< the nigger lovers aro bosses here' Ho was a sensible man, and I took his advice. " This was in 'SS, and after that I didn' do any more business on my own risk si clobc to the North. The last sales wer made in Baltimore and Louisville in IS6I but for nYe or six years previous Ne\ Orleans was our best market. "Maybe it ain't any use tolling peopl 30, but the hardest masters on the slave were the Yankees who had settled in th South or had come there as overseers, never saw one of them that wouldn't breal up a family when he wanted to sell. 1 ha< to deliver two field hands once at a planta tion three miles out from Millcdgevillc. was marching them along tho road, and on turned as quick as a flash and knocked m down before I knew Avhat ho was doing They started to run, but I drew on then: ancl brought ono of them down with bullet in his back. He wasn't badly hurl but after I got them up to tho plantatio tho one I shot was laid up for three weeks and cuss me if tho man who had bought hii didn't offer to suo me tor tho loss of hi sorvices, after I had saved his nigger fc him. That man was a Yankee squattei and there was plenty more just as mean a him." "I supposo there are not many signs le: of tho slave trading days ?" " More than you'd think unless you kno where to look for them. Go into an Southern hotel that was built before tl war, and ask them to let you go down in! tho cellars. See if you don't find there tl old cells where servants of travellers wei shut up for the night. The Baltimore Cv torn House was once a hotel, and there ai more than two dozen colls under it nov Bon O'Hara's slave gaol in that city is sti standing on Pratt-street, although it hi been turned into a beer garden. An through all the larger cities in the Soul the old residenters could show you tl private pens." ; " When did you last sell a negro ?" "Going down the Mississippi from S Louis to New Orleans on the steamer St; of the South in May, 1861. I was getth out of the South, for things were becomir ! too hot for me there. A fellow who w; i taking some niggers to a plantation ) , owned in Arkansas got cleaned out in

little game of draw, and put two oi em up i m a small straight. They were Bcooped in j: oy a man who had three deuces and a pair t )f jacks, and, as he didn't want them, he \ >ffered them for sale. t " Pretty much everybody on board knew i' no, and I was called to aak for bids. They vere two as good young backs as ever you u law, and I only got 1,600 dollars for both, c When the war had brought business down t ;hat low, I thought it was time for me to t Irop out of it, and I did." * " I have heard it said that these stories y ibout betting slaves over a gambling table t k ro all lies." n "You just take old Jack Campbells word a or it that it is true. I've travelled the y Mississippi a hundred times before the war, « md held a hand in many a game where d u'ggers right on board were the stakes, h lea, I've won some of 'em, too, and lost a 3m again."— From Lhe "Boston Herald." n . 8i