River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1884-10-02
AN OLD SLAVE SELLER.
Strange Story by the Last OF the Negro
Auctioneers Slaves Lost and Won Gam

From the Boston Herald
Yes, sir, so far as know, and think
know all about it, I'm the last living
representative of the professionally
last man alive in the United States who
made a business of selling niggers from
the auction block. I'm u years old
now, and / guess my time has nearly
come. +" Thus spoke old Jack Campbell
as he filed his glass for the fourth time
at Broad street bar, and leaned back
against the counter to open up his bud
get of "reminiscences. II went into the
slave auction business in 1885 and never
quit it until the war broke out. / have
sold niggers in Baltimore, Richmond,
Charleston, Savannah, Louisville, Mo-
bile, New Orleans, Memphis and all
along in the other towns of the south.
/ don't blow my own trumpet-you
men are dnmb-but lean say that Jack
Campbell had the reputation for show
ing up the good points of buck or a
'wench' and drawing out the bids that
made him in demand wherever there
was big sale"
1.-THE niger traders have made me
Gravel 500 miles, to run off a lot of them,
and they paid me my own price for tho
work.
"How many have / sold? was in
the business some % years, and / guess
| always handled 500 or GOO year.
"I'ye had plenty of queer experiences,
as you call them" he continued, after
he had wiped his lips with a nobby
white silk handkerchief. ''Long as
you ask about it, remember the big
gest money ever got for niger was
50, 900 for a pretty quadroon wench that
/ sold in louisville about 80 or '53.
She was only IS, and was about as white
as you orme, and her two children had
light curly hair. Her master lived down
near Bowling Green, and though he
didn't want To part with her, he was so
down in his luck that he had to sell her
] heard, too, that his wife swore that
niger must lave the plantation or she
would go hone to her family. Ny in
structions we1s not to take less than $6,-
900 for the gii, and was to get big
percentage on all over that; so when
they put her on the block / talked her
up for all she was worth.
"There were more than 20 men bid
ding for her, and the fellow that got
her for 50, 900 was rich and gay young
bachelor from Tennessee, who hap
pened to be in the city on spree and
was attracted by curiosity to the sale.
He was a little drinky and wasn't caring
anything fol his ducats. He was so set
ON having the girl, / believe he would
have given $40, 600 for her, if anybody
had bid her up that high. He carried
her home flat day, and | amt going to
tell You anything more about him than
that he made big name in the south
ern army and was killed at the head OF
his soldiers,
Zone of this woman's children by her
first masterlives in Massachusetts, town
now, and is rich man. There isn't
sign of black blood in him."
"Have you sold many of such peo
ple?"
Plenty Of likely girls, from chocolate
color up tonearly white, and got from
So, 900 to $1,000 apiece for 'em. There
always was good market for that kind
of stock. No, it didn't come from any
particular place in the south. You
could find it everywhere from Maryland
to Louisiana. Southern gentlemen took
an interest IN it, sir, and no decent mas
ter would let one of those girls marry
black man. They were superior peo-
pie, superior people.
(Which were the best markets."
"New Orleans, Louisville, Charleston,
and Baltimore used to be about the
same till the cussed black abolitionists
got to running the niggers north by the
underground railroad. After that i
was always little dangerous to do
business in Baltimore or Louisville for
fear the Yankees would steal them across
the Pennsylvania line or the Ohio river.
eI brought six blacks to Baltimore
once on my own account and put them
in the pen at the corner of Eutaw and.
Camden streets to wait for sale. Two
got loose that very night, and that was
the last L ever saw of them. Of course
they got over into Pennsylvania, but
they never could have done it without
somebody helped them, for they had
come clear from North Carolina. They
were worth 81 800 apiece, and was
clear SO, 600 ont of pocket. There was
a nest of internal Quakers up at place
called Christina in this state, and they
were always ldokin' out to rob man of
his honest property.
Another time niger ran away from
me at Newport, KY, and got to Gin
cinnati. | weat across the river and
saw friend ofmine who kept place
where | had played in good many
thousand of mt hard earned dollars. l
told him | wanted his help to get the
man back, and says he, Jack, if you
amt a fool, you'll let that moke go. 1t
mightn't be healthy for you to raise a
row here over one niger, cause the
nigger lovers are bosses here He was
a sensible man, and took his advice.
"This was in 50, and after that l
didn't do any more business on my own
risk so close to the north. The last
sales were made in Baltimore and Louis
vile in 1861, but for five or six years
previous New Orleans was our best mar
ket.
Maybe it amt any use telling peo-
pie so, but the hardest masters on the
slaves were the Yankees who settled
in the south or had come
there as overseers. / never
saw one of them that wouldn't break up
a family when he wanted to sell. / had
to deliver two field hands once at q
plantation three miles out from Mil
,edgeville. Twas marching them along
the road and one turned as quick as
flash and knocked me down before /
knew what lie was doing. They start
ed to run bit I drew on them and
brought one Of them down with a bullet
in his back. He wasn't badly hurt but
after got him up to the plantation the
one / shot WAS laid up for three weeks,
and cuss me the man who had bought
him didn't offer to sue me for the loss
of his services after [ had saved his
nigger for hin. That man was a YAM
kee squatter and there was plenty more
just as mean as him"
81 suppose there are not many signs
left of the slave trading days?"
s'More than you'd think unless you
knew where to look for them. Go into
any southern hotel that was built be-
fore the war and ask them to let you go
down into the cellars. See If you don't
find there the OLD cells where the SER
wants of travellers were shut up at night.
The Baltimore custom house was once
a hotel, and theie are more than two
dozen cells underit now. Ben O'Hare's
slave jail in that dty is still standing on
Pratt street, although it has been
f111-n oil into a haar ryaTdan And thPnuDh