Connecting to the Future
Sickness and Health as Resistance to the Plantation System
In any relationship of power, there is resistance. One of the major trends in history in the later half of the 20th century was locating and valuing resistance to power. Guilds, factories, armies, colonies, and every other organized structure for exerting power faced resistance to power. The most successful organizations designed outlets for this resistance that did not challenge the status quo, but provided the oppressed an opportunity for relief. Whether through legal rights, customs, or tacit understanding, the oppressed have clung to certain privileges and protections to resist those with power. The work of historians has shown that resistance can take on many forms ranging form physical to psychological. After reading the Cameron Plantation Papers, I believe that such an outlet may have existed in the Slave/Owner power relationship in the form of absenting from work for reasons of health.
There is no doubt that a great deal of disease circulated in antebellum plantations. That these diseases hit the overworked and ill-nourished slaves harder than their white owners is no surprise. As a result of this deadly climate, the overseers of the Cameron plantations were obsessed with health, their own, and that of their slaves. Their letters are filled with updates on new sickness, old injuries, and news of the dreaded fever and chills. My inference that slaves and overseers acknowledged health as a mechanism of resistance relies on the assumption that reports of “sick” contain multiple meanings. One reading of sick implies that there is a debilitating illness that requires attention, rest, and maybe a doctor. Another meaning, my inferred meaning, uses “sick” to communicate a period of rest for slave who may not be in any danger yet who is kept away from work.
Owners and overseers communicated with each other on the status of their slaves and more importantly how the slaves’ work was coming. When ever a serious illness struck a slave, the reference of “sick” is generally followed up with by a mention of fever and chills. Fever and chills was the language used if a slave’s work was compromised or if the slave in question was in danger of dying. Paul Cameron’s overseer Charles Llewellyn writes, “I have now in the house 17 sick hands. None very sick, but Daniel. He had today a congestive chill…” In a letter from Paul to his father Duncan Cameron, he writes, “it happened that we have a great deal of chill and fever at the mill quarter in [unintelligible] I have made the best arrangement that I could for the administration of medicine by cutting it up into portions 1g. for the elder ones and 5 grains for the younger [unintelligible] with a letter [unintelligible] with instructions for the use of our usual teas.” Fever and Chill was serious illness that had lasting consequence on the work force. In a letter from Paul Cameron, to his father, Paul laments that Duncan was suffering “from such an [unintelligible] negro disease as chill and fever.” Paul considered himself knowledgeable of medicine and was carefully involved in the treatment of his sick slaves, yet he interestingly classified fever and chills as a slave’s illness. “Fever and chills” was not a list of symptoms but rather the phrase communicating the condition of slaves who were not able to be put to work for reasons of health.
If such explicit measures were taking to indicate serious incapacitation, then why are the letters filled with references of sick slaves whose incapacity seems minor? One explanation might be that being “sick” was the only way out of a day in the fields or at hard work. A few references indicate that maladies of short duration were used as excuses to remain “in the house”. Paul again writes to his father, “three hands in the house not very sick. Joe and Henderson the same. Both together won’t haul water for the hands.” Another letter writer, William Hams, states, “All [slaves] were out there except Tower and Patience. Tower said he had hurt his back lifting but I except he went out the next day. Not much the matter with Patience.” These observers indicate that despite only minor illness or incapacity, the referenced slaves were away from work. Indeed “Tower” was expected back to work the next day, and Hams could find no reason why Patience was kept in.
It is likely that slaves understood their owners/overseers concern with health and were thus able to use that concern against them as a way to evade work for a day or two. Overseers were likely unwilling to let a slave who exhibited slight symptoms develop full blown fever and chill. The question remains, did owners and overseers recognize this use of resistance and tacitly accept it? The slippages in the meaning of “sick” seem to indicate that they did. Paul wrote to Duncan, “We have several sick, no one ill.” This distinction between sick and ill demonstrates how the classification of “sick” might mean something unrelated to physical health. Lewellyn wrote an interesting letter to Paul, “Mr. Cameron I have tried to write you once in 15 days, but sometimes business and sickness prevents me from doing so. As I like to say as little about sickness as possible, sick at this time Orrinn, Peggy, Eaton, Becky Caroline, Martin, Molly, Aggy and [children] Monroe, John low, Frank, and six women not able to do anything in the crop.” This letter raises many questions. Why is Lewellyn reluctant to talk about sickness when disease is a feature of almost every letter? Why are so many sick yet there is no mention of doctors, or of any efforts to heal them? Lewellyn must be using “sick” to refer to some other condition that leads to such a large number of Cameron slaves staying in from work.
After reading just a few examples from the Cameron plantation letters, we can begin to see that “sick” is a term that carries multiple meanings. What I have presented here is by no means a smoking gun that proves that slaves had the means to dodge work with their owner’s tacit approval or understanding. What I have tried to present is just the possibility that slaves understood their health as a way to resist the terrible burden of field labor and that owners acknowledged, and to a certain extent, tolerated this informal system through linguistic slippages located in the discourse of health and disease.
Letters Used:
Letter from Charles Lewellyn to Paul Cameron. October 20 1847. P1.
Letter from Paul Cameron to Duncan Cameron. September 29 1846. P1.
Letter from Paul Cameron to Duncan Cameron. November 8 1847. P1.
Letter from Charles Lewellyn to Paul Cameron. September 17 1845. P1.
Letter from William Hams to W. Bennehan. January 7, 1847. P1.
Letter from Charles Lewellyn to Duncan Cameron. June 1 1845. P1.
Letter from Charles Lewellyn to Paul Cameron. July 7 1846. P1.
There is no doubt that a great deal of disease circulated in antebellum plantations. That these diseases hit the overworked and ill-nourished slaves harder than their white owners is no surprise. As a result of this deadly climate, the overseers of the Cameron plantations were obsessed with health, their own, and that of their slaves. Their letters are filled with updates on new sickness, old injuries, and news of the dreaded fever and chills. My inference that slaves and overseers acknowledged health as a mechanism of resistance relies on the assumption that reports of “sick” contain multiple meanings. One reading of sick implies that there is a debilitating illness that requires attention, rest, and maybe a doctor. Another meaning, my inferred meaning, uses “sick” to communicate a period of rest for slave who may not be in any danger yet who is kept away from work.
Owners and overseers communicated with each other on the status of their slaves and more importantly how the slaves’ work was coming. When ever a serious illness struck a slave, the reference of “sick” is generally followed up with by a mention of fever and chills. Fever and chills was the language used if a slave’s work was compromised or if the slave in question was in danger of dying. Paul Cameron’s overseer Charles Llewellyn writes, “I have now in the house 17 sick hands. None very sick, but Daniel. He had today a congestive chill…” In a letter from Paul to his father Duncan Cameron, he writes, “it happened that we have a great deal of chill and fever at the mill quarter in [unintelligible] I have made the best arrangement that I could for the administration of medicine by cutting it up into portions 1g. for the elder ones and 5 grains for the younger [unintelligible] with a letter [unintelligible] with instructions for the use of our usual teas.” Fever and Chill was serious illness that had lasting consequence on the work force. In a letter from Paul Cameron, to his father, Paul laments that Duncan was suffering “from such an [unintelligible] negro disease as chill and fever.” Paul considered himself knowledgeable of medicine and was carefully involved in the treatment of his sick slaves, yet he interestingly classified fever and chills as a slave’s illness. “Fever and chills” was not a list of symptoms but rather the phrase communicating the condition of slaves who were not able to be put to work for reasons of health.
If such explicit measures were taking to indicate serious incapacitation, then why are the letters filled with references of sick slaves whose incapacity seems minor? One explanation might be that being “sick” was the only way out of a day in the fields or at hard work. A few references indicate that maladies of short duration were used as excuses to remain “in the house”. Paul again writes to his father, “three hands in the house not very sick. Joe and Henderson the same. Both together won’t haul water for the hands.” Another letter writer, William Hams, states, “All [slaves] were out there except Tower and Patience. Tower said he had hurt his back lifting but I except he went out the next day. Not much the matter with Patience.” These observers indicate that despite only minor illness or incapacity, the referenced slaves were away from work. Indeed “Tower” was expected back to work the next day, and Hams could find no reason why Patience was kept in.
It is likely that slaves understood their owners/overseers concern with health and were thus able to use that concern against them as a way to evade work for a day or two. Overseers were likely unwilling to let a slave who exhibited slight symptoms develop full blown fever and chill. The question remains, did owners and overseers recognize this use of resistance and tacitly accept it? The slippages in the meaning of “sick” seem to indicate that they did. Paul wrote to Duncan, “We have several sick, no one ill.” This distinction between sick and ill demonstrates how the classification of “sick” might mean something unrelated to physical health. Lewellyn wrote an interesting letter to Paul, “Mr. Cameron I have tried to write you once in 15 days, but sometimes business and sickness prevents me from doing so. As I like to say as little about sickness as possible, sick at this time Orrinn, Peggy, Eaton, Becky Caroline, Martin, Molly, Aggy and [children] Monroe, John low, Frank, and six women not able to do anything in the crop.” This letter raises many questions. Why is Lewellyn reluctant to talk about sickness when disease is a feature of almost every letter? Why are so many sick yet there is no mention of doctors, or of any efforts to heal them? Lewellyn must be using “sick” to refer to some other condition that leads to such a large number of Cameron slaves staying in from work.
After reading just a few examples from the Cameron plantation letters, we can begin to see that “sick” is a term that carries multiple meanings. What I have presented here is by no means a smoking gun that proves that slaves had the means to dodge work with their owner’s tacit approval or understanding. What I have tried to present is just the possibility that slaves understood their health as a way to resist the terrible burden of field labor and that owners acknowledged, and to a certain extent, tolerated this informal system through linguistic slippages located in the discourse of health and disease.
Letters Used:
Letter from Charles Lewellyn to Paul Cameron. October 20 1847. P1.
Letter from Paul Cameron to Duncan Cameron. September 29 1846. P1.
Letter from Paul Cameron to Duncan Cameron. November 8 1847. P1.
Letter from Charles Lewellyn to Paul Cameron. September 17 1845. P1.
Letter from William Hams to W. Bennehan. January 7, 1847. P1.
Letter from Charles Lewellyn to Duncan Cameron. June 1 1845. P1.
Letter from Charles Lewellyn to Paul Cameron. July 7 1846. P1.
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