Enslaved people were hired out to non-slaveholding farmers, railroad companies, and other businesses.

The practice of enslaved hiring was widespread in Augusta County. In 1860 370 entries in the slaveowners census schedule recorded employers, listing 570 enslaved people hired out in the year (out of 5,616 total slaves or 10 percent). The average number hired out to a given employer was one enslaved person. A railroad corporation or a business sometimes hired out more--the highest number employed in Augusta in 1860 was 22. Employers who hired enslaved people were diverse--small planters, women heads of households, heirs of estates, trustees, businesses, and corporations. The Virginia Central Railroad hired laborers from twelve different slaveholders. The Deaf, Dumb, and Blind Institute and the Western Lunatic Asylum in Staunton also hired dozens of enslaved people from various owners. A wide range of individuals took part in this market too, including both other slaveholders and nonslaveholders.

The Staunton Vindicator, in fact, considered "the policy of permitting slaves to hire their own time, or get persons to stand as their masters" a "source of great annoyance to our town. The habit induces idleness among slaves, and is the cause of all kinds of trafficking among them, which is more or less connected with petty thefts. These evils should be radically corrected without delay. The quicker the better."

Slaveholders viewed their enslaved as part of a larger portfolio of property. John Imboden, an attorney and clerk of Augusta's county court, wrote a friend of his financial thinking. "I have brought 4 young and handsome negroes over from Charlotte, and have the offer of any others we may wish. Mary & I dont think we will take but one more, possibly two at Christmas. This will save me a good deal in negro hire." The same kind of calculation that could lead some white people to hire slaves, in other words, could lead others with more money to purchase instead.

The enslaved people hired out to whites worked in several kinds of arrangements. Some received wages and then handed them over to their owner. Some arranged for their clothes, food, and shelter, deducting the cost from the money they earned. While such relatively loose supervision was not uncommon in Richmond, a hundred miles away, hiring out may have been more controlled in Augusta. A contract between John McCue and Mrs. Mary Carrington of neighboring Nelson County specified the details of an arrangement involving Sally: "Twelve months after date I promise to pay Mrs Mary Carrington the just and full sum of Forty three Dollars & fifty cents it being for the hire of Sally, a negro girl belonging to the sd Mary Carrington, the said hiring to date and take effect from the 2nd of Jany 1854 and to determine the 25th of Decr. of the same year, at which time the sd servant is to be returned to the sd Mrs Mary Carrington at Fleetwood in the Co. of Nelson. The taxes of sd girl are to be pd by me and the usual clothing furnished during the term, and when returned." In this bargain, Sally handled no money and enjoyed no greater latitude than if she had stayed with Mrs. Carrington.

Those who hired slaves devoted considerable energy to acquiring them. W. W. Gibbs looked for a female slave for John McCue: "I went to every place I thought I could procure you a cook or nurse but could find none all having been disposed of. I hear Tho Bowan near Greenwood Tunnel has a good cook for hire if you are not supplied you had best write to him or come over and see him such as you want is hard to find." Networks of hiring stretched from city to city, city to town, and farm to farm.

C. Alexander, C. Alexander to John H. McCue, December 18, 1858

W. J. D. Bell, J. D. Bell to John H. McCue, April 21, 1860

F. Davis, F. Davis to John H. McCue, September 5, 1859

G. W. Imboden, G. W. Imboden to John H. McCue, April 12, 1860

Hiring of Enslaved Persons, Augusta County, 1860 (table)

Slaveowners and Employers, Augusta County, 1860 (table)

Related Historiography

Kenneth E. Koons and Warren R. Hofstra, ed., After the Backcountry: Rural Life in the Great Valley of Virginia, 1800-1900 (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 2000).

Edward Pessen, "How Different from Each Other Were the Antebellum North and South," American Historical Review 85 (1980): 1119-1149.