Slavery in the Clover Bottoms
Subtitle: John McCline's narrative of his life during slavery and the Civil War
By: edited by Jan Furman.
Contributors: Furman, Jan.
Edition: 1st ed.
Series: Voices of the Civil War; Voices of the Civil War series
Publisher: University of Tennessee Press
Published: 1998
Place of publication: Knoxville
Language: eng
Number of pages: 155
Subjects: McCline, John, 1852-1948 -- Childhood and youth.; United States. Army. Michigan Infantry Regiment, 13th (1861-1865); African American soldiers -- Biography.; Soldiers -- United States -- Biography.; Slaves -- Tennessee -- Nashville Region -- Biography.; Plantation life -- Tennessee -- Nashville Region -- History -- 19th century.; Nashville Region (Tenn.) -- Biography.
Genres: Biography.
Description: Born into slavery on a Tennessee plantation, John McCline escaped from bondage, worked for the Union Army in the Civil War, and eventually found a new life in the American West. Slavery in the Clover Bottoms is his own story, recollected in later years, of his life as a slave and as a free man.

McCline's memoirs, completed in the 1920s and now published for the first time, vividly describe the James Hoggatt plantation in Davidson County: the work and routine of slaves; their religious, family, and social life; the behavior of the overseers; and the atmosphere of violence under Mrs. Hoggatt's omnipresent whip. McCline tells of how he worked with livestock, a boy doing a man's job, until he ran away with the Thirteenth Infantry of Michigan late in 1862, when he was little more than ten years old.

For the next two-and-a-half years, young John worked as a teamster and officers' servant, and during that time he witnessed some of the Civil War's most famous battles - such as Murfreesboro, Chickamauga Creek, and Lookout Mountain - as well as Sherman's march through Georgia. Slavery in the Clover Bottoms joins an important body of newly published slave narratives. Its compelling story spans a continent and tells us much about relationships between the races in the middle and late nineteenth century.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. [149]-151) and index.
Table of contents: title: Foreword; title: Acknowledgments; title: Editor's introduction; title: Slavery in the Clover Bottoms; title: Introduction / by Herbert J. Hagerman; title: Before the War; title: During the War; title: After the War; title: Appendix: Thirteenth Michigan Volunteers; title: Appendix: Slaves referred to by McCline; title: Appendix: McCline's will, remembrances, and obituary notices; title: Notes; title: Selected bibliography; title: Index.