Look at this painting of Washington and his slaves. The man bending over with the sickle is not a black man. The white man he is talking to must be an overseer surely?
But why is he holding a saddle and a farming implement? Maybe he is a stout Rhinelander.
Ol' George has his baton in the ready...
correction, On a closer look the saddle is on the horse by the tree, not his shoulder. He is not even allowed to touch that!
-Mescaline Franklin
James Describes the Painting
From right to left:
1. A white servant, probably German, holding a rake. No overseer holds anything other than a weapon of discipline.
2. Big daddy George Washington, negro teeth lining his mouth, stands with the baton of keeping your ass at it, instructing the servant on ground work.
3. A white man bends his back to the grain with his sickle, wearing the standard white servant hat initially used in 1620s Virginia.
4. A negro, sickle in hand, resting while the white man works, drinks water.
5. A negress with a pitch fork, resting by the water bucket.
6. A comely quadroon wench, serving water in fine clothing. One might well assume that she serves her master at night in a like posture, though more lightly attired.
7. A cherubic pair of white baby-youths, the girl having her hair dressed with flowers by the boy of privilege.
8. A negro forks hay up to the hay wagon being loaded by the negress on its back. Even the horses toil in white and brown, the draft team pulling the wagon as salt and pepper as the crew.
9. In the background a negress or mulattress stands drawing cord as the white man—so indicated by his distinctive had as much as his lighter skin tone—on his Arуan knees, gathers the hay that will be bound in the cord.
Of 12 figures we have:
-Three elites
-Three white servants
-Six black slaves
The 2-1 black to white unfree labor ratio is in keeping with late 18th century demographics. Consider that of roughly 3 million slaves only one sixth of the colonial population was black, but between 3 and 6 sixths were unfree whites [mostly in the north], and the 2-1 Virginia ration seems realistic.
Big Daddy Washington, First Shitlord of these Slave States, does get points for doing his own discipline which is in keeping with his miserly, alpha male persona.
A Bright Shining Lie at Dusk
A Partial Exhumation of the American Dream
link › jameslafond.blogspot.com
Strange, draft horse were usually matched, in colour?
Where can one read accounts of George Washington's true persona?