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The Deep South or the Lower South is a cultural and geographic subregion of the Southern United States. The term was first used to describe the states which were most economically dependent on plantations and slavery , specifically Louisiana , Mississippi , Alabama , Georgia , and South Carolina .
As slavery began to displace indentured servitude as the principal supply of labor in the plantation systems of the South, the economic nature of the institution of slavery aided in the increased inequality of wealth seen in the antebellum South. The demand for slave labor and the U.S. ban on importing more slaves from Africa drove up prices ...
Historian William Barney reports, "no major slave revolts erupted during the Civil War." Nevertheless, slaves took the opportunity to enlarge their sphere of independence, and when union forces were nearby, many ran off to join them. [218] [219] Slave labor was applied in industry in a limited way in the Upper South and in a few port cities.
Complete: The use of the word complete in a slave advertisement indicated a high level of competency, meaning the person had especial capability and/or the necessary training to "adeptly" perform certain work. [5] Dower slaves: Slaves brought into a family unit through the wife's previous ownership. [6]
Slave traders took advantage of this arbitrage opportunity by buying at lower prices in the Upper South and then selling slaves at a profit after taking or transporting them further south. [21] Some scholars believe there was an increasing prevalence in the Upper South of "breeding" slaves for export.
More than one million slaves were sold from the Upper South, which had a surplus of labour, and taken to the Deep South in a forced migration, splitting up many families. New communities of African American culture were developed in the Deep South, and the total slave population in the South eventually reached 4 million before liberation.
So far as I can learn, the term was first used to designate a part of the country which was distinguished by the colour of the soil. The part of the country possessing this thick, dark, and naturally rich soil was, of course, the part of the South where the slaves were most profitable, and consequently they were taken there in the largest numbers.
The social structure of the Old South was made an important research topic for scholars by Ulrich Bonnell Phillips in the early 20th century. [3] The romanticized image of the "Old South" tells of slavery's plantations, as famously typified in Gone with the Wind, a blockbuster 1936 novel and its adaptation in a 1939 Hollywood film, along with the animated Disney film, Song of the South (1946).