![]() ![]() ![]() Some were said to have permitted their slaves to sing, but only at a whisper-and never at night for fear it would encourage voodoos and foment rebellion. A few owners allowed their slaves to sing their own songs and dance their own dances See, for example, the reference to Thomas Jefferson‘s brother, Randolph, in “Jefferson the Violinist”. slave owners deliberately destroyed family ties, languages and religions, and only guardedly allowed some native dancing and singing. ![]() In a conspiracy that amounted to a spiritual and cultural holocaust, Jon Butler, Becoming America: The Revolution Before 1776 (Cambridge, Massachusetts, 2000), 44. From the time slavery was introduced into North America in the early seventeenth century, most slave owners took punitive steps to eradicate all traces of their workers’ original African identities, from their personal names to their tribal origins-Yoruba, Ibo, Ashanti, and others. Even if someone had invited him to sing them, it is probable that he as well as many of his listeners would have considered it ill-mannered if not illegal to do so, despite the sense of brotherhood that they came to share as they worked their way up the Missouri River. Did the men of the Corps of Discovery ever hear York, William Clark‘s black body servant, sing any of his own peoples’ songs? Not that we know of. ![]()
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