Aspects of Slavery and Freedom Seeking in North Carolina Main Menu Creative Commons License Preface and Acknowledgements ArcOnline Maps and ArcStory Maps Additional Project Components Introduction Earth Wood Fire Water Wind Escaping Network to Freedom Underground Railroad Locations Maps and Additional Resources Resources Brian Robinson 351175f8b63e375b96b75c26edde5534c94e8162 Torren Gatson 9cd3f098d43ed240801c35d1d0fd0737b5602944 Rhonda Jones 4c7a2610c10c17f5b487bcebc8abbbf64c221aa6 Arwin Smallwood 329b2d587e93ceaac77a3b3e316b5ce377128ac0 Self-Publish
Eccles Mill and Pond
1 media/Eccle Mill and pond_thumb.jpeg 2021-11-28T18:21:21+00:00 Brian Robinson 351175f8b63e375b96b75c26edde5534c94e8162 3 2 plain 2021-12-15T15:23:16+00:00 The Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs: Print Collection, The New York Public Library. "Eccles' Mill and Pond, Fayettevile, North Carolina" New York Public Library Digital Collections. Accessed December 15, 2021. https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/1b4dca20-bd0f-0131-d0ea-58d385a7bbd0 20140515 101835-0400 Brian Robinson 351175f8b63e375b96b75c26edde5534c94e8162This page is referenced by:
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Earth-Labor-Textile Mills
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It is always important to emphasize that enslaved people not only worked in agriculture but also in other industries, such as textile mills that used cotton to produce fabric and finished goods. As textile workers, the enslaved worked as skilled and unskilled workers, spinners, reelers, weavers, and machinists (hired out skilled slaves comprised many of these slaves.)
Labor in the mills was tiring and repetitive. Moreover, mills had a number of hazards, but cuts and “broken fingers were common injuries.”
Textile mills welcomed slave labor, for instance, “managers of textile mills agreed that slaves worked well. Henry A. Donaldson, who left Rhode Island to join Joel Battle in building a cotton plant on the Tar River in North Carolina, employed bondsmen there and later at another mill near Fayetteville.” Black labor was often preferred over white labor but in cases like textile mills, white labor, following the Civil War, eventually replaced black labor.
Enslaved people working in textile mills typically worked six days a week with time off on Saturday afternoon and all of Sunday. Work started a little before sunrise and continued a little after sunset, just as on plantations.
However, at times, enslaved people were forced to work at night or on Sundays “to meet a rush or orders.” Moreover, some periods were busier than others and some mills were busier than others, for instance, “at the Battle Mill in North Carolina slaves were ‘constantly going’ because of the briskness of business.” Enslaved people helping to make wool yarn and clothing, when viewed from a group perspective, extended their work. They not only helped to cultivate raw materials but were also critical to creating finished goods for consumption.
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