Descendants of Former Slaves

Descendants of Former Slaves 2.jpg

Dublin Core

Title

Descendants of Former Slaves

Description

These are the descendants of former slaves of the Pettway Plantation. The plantation’s location was in Gees Bend, Alabama, but now the house is abandoned. The plantation was initially named after the first recorded white resident of the area, Joseph Gee. After his death in 1824, he left 47 slaves to his nephew Charles Gee. In 1845, Charles and his brother owed $29,000 to their relative, Mark H. Pettway, so they gave the plantation to him as a settlement. A year later, Pettway and his family moved there with a caravan of over one hundred slaves. The plantation retained the name “Gee,” but the names of those enslaved were “Pettway,” which has been that way until the present day. Today, those with the Pettway last name are descendants or married to a descendant of the slaves who traveled with Mark Pettway and his family.
After emancipation, these descendants stayed on the plantation and worked as either tenant farmers or sharecroppers. Shortly after emancipation, they did not have the money or resources to pursue their own lives. They also had to face the harsh realities of living as African Americans during the Jim Crow era. As a result, the descendants of the Pettway Plantation slaves were essentially born into sharecropping or tenant farming. The setting of the descendants' lives was very similar to their slave ancestors. They lived in the same shacks as their ancestors, and they had to provide for themselves. They often faced high-interest rates, and their debt would usually carry over into the future years. This typically put stress on families, so as a result, women and children were expected to work in the fields to help their families. Despite living in the post-emancipation era, the descendants' lives were strikingly similar to the lives of their ancestors.

Creator

Arthur Rothstein

Source

Rothstein, Arthur, photographer. Untitled photo, possibly related to: Negroes, descendants of former slaves of the Pettway Plantation. They are living under primitive conditions on the plantation. Gees Bend, Alabama. Feb. Photograph. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, <www.loc.gov/item/2017775718/>.

Publisher

Library of Congress

Date

February 1937

Contributor

Blake Bouldin