A Sequel to Mrs.
Kemble's Journal_ [1863]. This appears to have been a reprint of an
article in the New York _Tribune_. The slaves were sold in family parcels
comprising from two to seven persons each.]
[Footnote 27: MS. record in the Ordinary's office at Macon, Ga. Probate
Returns, vol. 9, pp. 2-7.]
[Footnote 28: Edward Ingle, _Southern Sidelights_ (New York [1896]), p.
294. note.]
Editorial warnings were now more vociferous than before. The _Federal
Union_ of Milledgeville said for example: "There is a perfect fever raging
in Georgia now on the subject of buying negroes.... Men are borrowing money
at exorbitant rates of interest to buy negroes at exorbitant prices. The
speculation will not sustain the speculators, and in a short time we shall
see many negroes and much land offered under the sheriff's hammer, with few
buyers for cash; and then this kind of property will descend to its real
value. The old rule of pricing a negro by the price of cotton by the
pound--that is to say, if cotton is worth twelve cents a negro man is
worth $1,200.00, if at fifteen cents then $1,500.00--does not seem to be
regarded. Negroes are 25 per cent. higher now with cotton at ten and one
half cents than they were two or three years ago when it was worth fifteen
and sixteen cents.
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