The Books Oracle

They Were Her Property: White Women as Slave Owners in the American South

by Stephanie E. Jones-Rogers

Stephanie E. Jones-Rogers dismantles the myth that white women in the antebellum South were passive bystanders to slavery, revealing instead their active economic and social investment in the institution. Drawing on extensive archival research, she demonstrates how white women inherited, bought, sold, and brutally managed enslaved people. This groundbreaking work reframes our understanding of slavery, complicity, and gendered power in American history.

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