They may not have meant that the slave housing was small enough to fit onto a 
cart in one piece. Log houses (as described at Mason Neck) are easily 
disassembled and moved log by log- either by carrying on multiple shoulders or with 
the aid of a cart.

Roy Underhill


In a message dated 9/21/07 5:11:43 PM, [log in to unmask] writes:


> Mr. South is wrong on the facts. The slave housing at Mount Vernon was far
> worse than that of free white laborers, by Washington's own estimation. And
> I suspect that the newly reconstructed cabin might not be representative of
> the typical MV housing--it's much too large and substantial to pass the
> "will it fit on a cart?" test.  A letter from GW to his manager tell us that
> Mount Vernon had some cabins so small and insubstantial that the slaves
> could carry them from one place to another on carts, and they might not even
> need the carts -- the letter refers to "Removing the largest kind of the
> Negro quarters (the smaller ones or cabbins I presume the people with a
> little assistance of Carts can do themselves) to the ground marked out for
> them opposite to [the overseer's] new house." (GW To William Pearce,
> December 22, 1793.)
> 
> In a 1793 letter to the Englishman Arthur Young, Washington described the
> spacious houses available to his overseers while referring to the
> habitations of his slaves as mere "coverings"--and he admitted that white
> people would probably refuse to live in them. Here is the text:
> 
> [At his Union Farm] "A new house is now building in a central position, not
> far from the Barn, for the Overlooker; which will have two Rooms 16 by 18
> feet below and one or two above nearly of the same size. Convenient thereto
> is sufficient accommodation for fifty odd Negroes (old and young) but  these
> buildings might not be thought good enough for the workmen or day labourers
> of your Country. . . .
> 
> "Dogue run farm has a small but new building for the Overlooker; one room
> only below, and the same above, 16 by 20 each; decent and comfortable for
> its size. It has also covering for forty odd negroes, similar to what is
> mentioned on Union farm." (GW to Arthur Young, December 12, 1793).
> 
> A Polish visitor to Mount Vernon, Count Julien Niemcewicz, left this
> account, which makes clear that the poorest white people of impoverished
> Poland would not live in an American slave's shack:
> 
> "We entered one of the huts of the Blacks, for one can not call them by the
> name of houses. They are more miserable than the most miserable of the
> cottages of our peasants. The husband and wife sleep on a mean pallet, the
> children on the ground; a very bad fireplace, some utensils for cooking, but
> in the middle of this poverty some cups and a teapot."
> 
> All of this is documented in my book, "An Imperfect God." If you search the
> book on Amazon (better yet, buy it and read it), for "miserable" you will
> find the descriptions of the slave housing at Mount Vernon; if you search
> for "socks" you will find information about clothing. It's all from GW's own
> documents and eyewitness descriptions.
> 
> As for slaves "living better" than free people, the latter were not whipped
> or sold, as were the slaves at Mount Vernon.
> 
> When I was writing the book it deeply puzzled me that a man who freed his
> slaves would treat them so harshly. After more research and discussions with
> historians, I realized that this apparent paradox grew out of Washington's
> hierarchical view of society. He knew that there would always be people at
> the bottom, white and black, whose lives would be very hard, and he didn't
> think they deserved much; but he was convinced that no one should be a
> slave--that slavery was an abomination. That was his great insight. As for
> African-Americans going "back to the jungle," Washington's will makes it
> clear that HE believed African-Americans had a right to live here and a
> right to education and decent work. Unlike many people then and now, George
> Washington believed in a multi-racial society. 
> 
> In earlier posts I discussed the peculiar quasi-slavery of indentured
> servitude that was fastened upon mixed-race children for thirty years. It
> was vastly different from the indentured servitude of immigrant white men,
> and Jefferson himself denounced the system as "wicked."
> 
> Henry Wiencek
> 
> It appears to me that President Washington's slaves were well  cared for
> >and lived better than most of the free population in that area at the  
> time,
> >plantation owners excepted.
> >
> >J South
> >
> >
> 




**************************************
 See what's new at http://www.aol.com