Nashville, Tennessee slave market explained

While the biggest slave market in the state was along the Mississippi River in Memphis, land routes connecting Nashville to the ports at New Orleans, Louisiana, and Natchez, Mississippi, sufficed to deliver human cargo to and from Nashville.^{[1] [2]} By 1850, slaves were a major export of the U.S. state of Tennessee, and Nashville served that market with no fewer than eight slave-trade brokers.^[3] These brokers sold slaves at multiple locations in the city, albeit generally in proximity to Cedar Street.

Nashville Market-House

An 1842 gazetteer mentioned the Market-House first in its list of the city's attractions: "The town is adorned with one of the largest and handsomest market-houses in the western country."^[4]

The construction of the Nashville Market-House building, which had a copper roof and a landmark dome, was described in an 1890 history of the city:^{[5] [6]}

While the building was still in use in 1870, a guidebook writer had complaints:^[7]

Newspaper clippings of the building

Cherry & Cedar

The Memphis Avalanche reported in 1888 that Nashville's old slave mart was to be demolished soon:^[8]

Accounts in slave narratives

The subject of one slave narrative interview conducted by Fisk University staff in the 1920s stated, "There was a sale block where they carried the Negroes there and auctioned them off. Right where that old building is now, those Irishmen got rich selling Negroes to white folks."^[9] Another man told the interviewer that he had been sold four times in his life and recalled of the slave markets, "You could see the women crying about their babies and children they had left." A third recalled that her mother was sold in Nashville, to buyers who lived in another state.^[10] A centenarian named Millie Simpkins interviewed by the WPA Slave Narratives project told her experience:

See also

• Slave markets and slave jails in the United States
• Slave trade in the United States
• History of Nashville

External links

• nashvillehistoricalnewsletter.com: The Old Nashville Market House, 1828–1937

Notes and References

1. Book: Lovett, Bobby L. . The African-american History of Nashville, Tn: 1780-1930 (p) . 1999 . University of Arkansas Press . 978-1-61075-412-5 . en.
2. Book: Goetsch, Elizabeth K. . Lost Nashville . 2018-10-15 . Arcadia Publishing . 978-1-4396-6556-5 . en.
3. Book: Lovett, Bobby L. . The African-american History of Nashville, Tn: 1780-1930 (p) . 1999 . University of Arkansas Press . 978-1-61075-412-5 . 18 . en.
4. Book: Davenport, Bishop . A history and new gazetteer, or geographical dictionary, of North America and the West Indies. . 1842 . S.W. Benedict . 434–435 . en-us.
5. Book: Goetsch, Elizabeth K. . Lost Nashville . 2018-10-15 . Arcadia Publishing . 978-1-4396-6556-5 . en.
6. Book: Wooldridge . John . History of Nashville, Tennessee . Reese . W. B. . Hoss . Elijah Embree . 1970 . Published for H. W. Crew by the Pub. House of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South . Nashville, Tenn. . 116 . en-us . 1890.
7. Book: Robert, Charles Edwin . Nashville and her trade for 1870: a work containing information valuable alike to merchants, manufacturers, mechanics, emigrants and capitalists ... . 1870 . Printed by Roberts & Purvis . Nashville . 371–372 . en-us . HathiTrust.
8. News: 1888-03-06 . A Landmark Going: The Old Slave Mart of Nashville to Be Demolished . 1 . Memphis Avalanche . 2023-08-14.
9. Web site: Carey . Bill . 2018-02-02 . Life in Slavery . 2023-05-04 . The Tennessee Magazine . en-US.
10. Harrison . Lowell H. . 1974 . Recollections of Some Tennessee Slaves . Tennessee Historical Quarterly . 33 . 2 . 175–190 . 42623449 . 0040-3261.