An extremely rare and interesting letter written by a young man to his mother who is also held in slavery Walker was sold south some seven years earlier from North Carolina.*

The letter is highly evocative and expressive of the time, place and the daily lives of slaves. The letter touches upon virtually every aspect of slave life, literacy, relations between master and slave, discipline, economics, sex, family: especially enforced separation and the desire to keep the extended family together.    Walker’s letter is a candid and frank relation of the world of a slave in his own words and as such constitutes especially valuable slave testimony.    John W. Blassingame, in his ground breaking book Slave Testimony Two Centuries of Letters, Speeches, Interviews and Autobiographies, provides the following assessment of both the scholarly value and extreme rarity of slave letters, especially those written to family members:     “Historians have long given top priority to personal letters in their efforts to ascertain the effect of events and institutions on people. When considering slaves, however, the scholar is immediately struck by the paucity of such material. Commenting on this phenomenon, one exasperated historian observed: “Direct evidence from the slaves themselves is hopelessly inadequate. Well over 90 per cent of them were illiterate, and even the small literate minority seldom found an opportunity to write or speak with candor… I know of not a single slave diary; and letters written by slaves are rare.” Another scholar flatly asserted: “Slaves wrote no letters and kept no records.”1    In spite of their high rate of illiteracy, many slaves wrote letters which have been preserved in several repositories… The letters vary considerably in credibility. Only those written by blacks to their relatives can be accepted as literally true. These familial letters generally have a high degree of credibility because of the element of unconciousness in them. Written with no expectations of publication, they contain a faithful and simple reporting of facts and conditions. On the other hand, slaves were highly conscious of what they said in letters to their masters. Convention in these letters was as strong as it was in personal relations between masters and slaves: a black man who had to take his hat off when talking to his master had to tip it symbolically in his letters by expressing his love, humility, and obedience.” 2      “Dear Mother,     I now seat my self to write to you once more to let you know that we are all well at this time. Jack and myself is doing well we are both well we are clearing in the new ground we have been clearing for the last three weeks I keep up with any of the men and one thing I cant be beaten cutting small grain We have had a bad crop year. My master allows his servants to make crops for our selves I made two hundred and sixty pounds of cotton and the reason that I don’t sell it is that I am waiting to get 30 dollars for it I received your letter on the sixteenth day of January of which I was very glad to hear from you dated the 30th of December 1853. You say that Henry is to be sold and my Master says that if he is as healthy as he was when I came away from there he will give eight hundred dollars for him Delivered at Hootenville Upson County Georgia. Tell Master Green Saterfield3 if he is to be sold to receive him and return him to my Master for the amount of Eight Hundred Dollars you must write back to me as soon as you get this letter what is the lowest he will be sold for tell Henry he must leave his family and come I will give him thirty dollars to start on if he will come and a good wife a good home and a good master to live with I have been living with him nearly seven year and my self and Fanny never has had a lick since I have  we have been here Mammy you must have this letter read to all of my kinfolks you write whether all of you whether all of you is to be sold or not tell Henry that this is a great place for black People if you and all your family was here I would not care for North Carolina tell Master Green to send me word how all his family is. Tell Henry there is some of the pretyest yellow girls out here he ever saw they are a great deal prettier than Ann Diggins ever was. My Mistress says enquire if Sally Smalls was any Relation to Major Middleton and Wm Kendall send me word if she is kin. Jack sends howdy to all of you and to his Daddy tell him he is sorter lazy. Tell sharlott we have not heard from Anna since we parted she went on with the speculators tell uncle Manuel howdy for me tell him  I have got a likely yellow wife I have had one big Boy by her but he is dead I will close by sending my love to you all your son Moses Walker …” [sic]  An exceptionally rare primary source document and record of slave testimony. Such letters are rarely found and are all but unknown in the market.      * Moses Walker, ex-slave, is found in records from 1877 listed as 47 years of age and married, which would make him in 1854 about 24 years old.   Kenneth Stammp, “Rebels and Sambos: The Search for the Negro’s Personality in Slavery,” Journal of Southern History, XXXVII (August, 1971), pp., 367-392. Henry Irving Tragle, ed., The Southampton Slave Revolt of 1831 (New York, 1971) p. 5.Blassingame, John W., ed., Slave Testimony Two Centuries of Letters, Speeches, Interviews and Autobiographies (Baton Rouge: 1977) pp., 3-4The University of North Carolina Ms Collection contains some papers of Green Sattersfield, the former  owner of Moses Walker, and the owner of the bulk of his family. Sattersfield was born in 1807 and died in 1879.  For further information see: Woodson, Carter G., The Mind of the Negro as Reflected in Letters Written During the Crisis, 1800-1860 (1926)Starobin, Robert, Blacks in Bondage Letters of American Slaves (1974)