Everyone imagines antebellum (before the Civil War) Louisiana with beautiful plantations, magnolia trees in bloom and well-dressed men and women enjoying mint juleps. And of course, everyone knows that reality was often different. Here are some antebellum facts from Louisiana: A History*:
- In the 1830s Norbert Rillieux, a free man of color, made great improvments in the method of making granulated sugar from sugar cane juice. Unfortunately, his improvment made the demand for slave labor increase. (133-4)
- The Fourth of July was the traditional day for laying by, the date after which corn and sugar cane would not need to be weeded because the plants were tall enough to make too much shade for weeds to grow. (135)
- October, the harvest time for sugar cane, was called the grinding season. (135)
- Hogsheads were barrels that held about 1,000 pounds of still wet granulated sugar. (136)
- The work of slaves on sugar plantations was often divided into three eight-hour shifts and slaves had to work two shifts per day. (136)
- To chop cotton meant to thin the sprouts. (138)
- A skilled cotton picker could pick up to 400 pounds a day. (138)
- Louisianians planted more acres in corn than in all other crops combined. Besides using it for animal feed, they ate it roasted and boiled or ground for grits, meal or corn bread. (139)
- Some farmers still planted tobacco, especially perique tobacco. (140) Tobacco had been major cash crop during the colonial days.
- New Orleans was a center for slave trade. Slaves were even sold in the lobbies of famous hotels, the St. Charles and the St. Louis. (142)
- Episcopal Bishop Leonidas Polk used his slaves as collateral for a loan. When many of his slaves died of cholera and a hurricane destroyed his sugar cane crop, he lost his plantation. (142)
- Irish immmigrants were used to do labor considered too dangerous for valuable slaves. (128-9) Irish immigrants were used to dig through the cyrpress swamp to construct the New Basin Canal in New Orleans. (128)
- Three Irish immigrants changed the face of New Orleans. James Dakin desiged St. Patrick's Church and the Medical College of Louisiana. Henry Howard designed Nottoway Plantation and James Gallier designed the St. Charles Hotel and a city hall which served the city until the 1950s and is now known as Gallier Hall. (151)
- German immmigrants shocked Americans in New Orleans by going to saloons after Sunday church services. (128)
- Antebellum Louisiana had more free people of color than other southern states because under Spanish rule during much of the 1700s, Spanish law provided that slaves could purchase their freedom. Slaves could have themselves literally appraised by a Spanish official. Many did and saved to buy their freedom. (155)
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