Beyond Cotton: The Extent of Slavery's Reach in the North

In addition to harvesting cotton, rice, sugar, and other cash crops, white enslavers forced enslaved Africans into other types of labor, including harvesting lumber and working in iron foundries. Ledgers, like those shown below, recorded the cost, quantity, and type of materials used in the construction of Lowell’s Boott Mills.

Primary Document

This excerpt from an account book references the purchase of “Hard Pine Floor Boards,” made from trees harvested in the Carolinas by enslaved laborers.

Primary Document

This excerpt references the purchase of pig iron, which is iron that has been extracted from ore through a smelting process (heating to a very high temperature) but has yet to be molded into its final shape. This pig iron was likely used both in the construction of the Boott Mills and the manufacture of power looms. It came from a foundry in Patuxent, Maryland, that relied on enslaved labor. Curtis Leavens was a 19th-century Boston shipping firm.