By the middle of the nineteenth century, slavery was a foundation of North Carolina’s economy and society. One-third of North Carolinians were enslaved — yet only a quarter of free families owned slaves. In this chapter, we’ll explore those inequalities and what slaveholders had to do to maintain them.

Section Contents

• Distribution of Land and Slaves
• Social Divisions in Antebellum North Carolina
• North Carolina v. Mann
• The Quakers and Anti-Slavery
• Levi Coffin and the Underground Railroad
• Negotiated Segregation in Salem
• Manumission
• A Petition to Free a White Slave
• Black Codes
• Advertising for Slaves
• Runaways and Slave Hunters in the Dismal Swamp
• Antislavery Feeling in the Mountains