Underground Railroad

The Library of Congress contains graphic pictures and photographs of the buying and selling of African-American slaves:

• Arriving in South Carolina in the 1780s, a group of slaves are slated to be sold at Ashley Ferry (outside Charleston).
  
  
• Others - including men, women and children - are auctioned off as though they were farm implements.
  
  
• Advertisements highlight virtues of a particular slave.
  
  
• The chains America threw away when the colonies declared their independence from Great Britain did not apply to blacks. Some even attempted to argue that American slavery was justified.
  
  
• White buyers inspect a kidnapped African and negotiate a purchase price with African slave traders. 
  
  
• Families were often split up. Here a mother pleads: "Buy us too."
  
  
• In Alexandria, Virginia captured Africans were held in "slave pens" as they waited to be sold while in Easton, Maryland many whites gathered for a slave sale.

Once slaves were purchased, how did they live? What kind of clothing did they wear? How much food were they allowed?