City History: New Orleans 1.2: Slavery and Smuggling in Early New Orleans
Apr 25, 2024
Rebuilding after a catastrophic storm and the failure of Enlightenment planning. The rise of urban slavery and the skilled labor enslaved people provided. Widespread smuggling, barter economies, and neglect from France. Markets where enslaved and free Black people operated with relative autonomy. Growth of a large free people of color population and shifting racial and social norms.
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Enlightenment Plan Collided With Frontier Reality
- New Orleans was planned as an Enlightenment grid city but rapidly devolved into informal, haphazard settlement after storms and neglect.
- A 1722 hurricane wiped out early huts, forcing rebuilding to the grid, yet by the 1740s the grid was chopped into cramped plots and alleys.
African Labor Built Early New Orleans
- Between 1719 and 1762 roughly 6,000 Africans were brought to New Orleans, mainly from Senegambia and Lower Guinea, shaping the city's demographic majority.
- Enslaved people built levees, streets, canals, houses and were trained in skilled trades like smithing and medicine.
City Proximity Created Cross-Racial Interaction
- Unlike plantation-dominated Anglo South, New Orleans had plantations surrounding a dense urban center, producing constant contact among enslaved, free black, and white people.
- This proximity enabled mingling in markets, carnivals, gambling houses and the sex trade.
