The Silent Fields
Radioontheshelf
The American Congress banned the importation of slaves in 1808, but the initial population of close to 400,000 enslaved Africans grew to nearly four million by 1860.
South Carolina’s total population in 1860 was just over 700,000 - and of that, 57% were slaves owned by some 26,000 white Americans.
It was their labour that supplied Britain with cotton during the industrial revolution. Though the slave trade had been banned in Britain and most of Europe by 1807, investors there were “bankrolling slavery” by slave mortgages repackaged as merchant bonds.
600 years earlier the practise of serfdom or slavery was existing throughout the world. From Britain to Persia and Mesopotania, Egypt and India throughout China and Japan various forms of mans inhumanity to man provided the labour to build the world we now know.
The United Nations still has a department overseeing the abolition of slavery as in many places today it still exists. It is estimated that in 2020 the worldwide business of modern slavery is worth
0 BillionSouth Carolina’s total population in 1860 was just over 700,000 - and of that, 57% were slaves owned by some 26,000 white Americans.
It was their labour that supplied Britain with cotton during the industrial revolution. Though the slave trade had been banned in Britain and most of Europe by 1807, investors there were “bankrolling slavery” by slave mortgages repackaged as merchant bonds.
600 years earlier the practise of serfdom or slavery was existing throughout the world. From Britain to Persia and Mesopotania, Egypt and India throughout China and Japan various forms of mans inhumanity to man provided the labour to build the world we now know.
The United Nations still has a department overseeing the abolition of slavery as in many places today it still exists. It is estimated that in 2020 the worldwide business of modern slavery is worth
Many thanks to Emily for the fragile but devinely edgy vocals
I’m going to Jerusalem by way of River Road looking for a Jesus to help me regain hope
Searching for a holy ghost a preacher in good form someone who can sanctify my road trip through the storm.
I have little I can give him I have nothing I can trade my heart is full of broken shells of men who were enslaved
But throughout all our history it seemed the thing to do was to wrap up fellow humans in the chains of the abused.
When I cross the fields with Moses with a tablet in both arms I will gesture to the masses that good men can do no harm
I will hold the threadbare ideals as he dares to part the waves to lead us to salvation and one more sunny day
In the robes of simple people they will dance and justify the hardship and the cruelty they brought into our lives
And even though the history has given us the facts its hard to think that once we dined off scarred and broken backs
When the dust has taken liberties and freedom had its day the naked raw ambition will remain to lead the way
The books will speak of sacrifice and gross illgotten gains and memories will never fade for those who still remain
I’m going to Jerusalem by way of River Road passed the old Whitney plantation where the sugar cane was grown
And the pictures on the buildings show the people who were chained not only by the metal but by voices never raised