They Were Her Property

White Women as Slave Owners in the American South

By: Stephanie E. Jones-Rogers

Narrated by: Allyson Johnson

A bold and searing investigation into the role of white women in the American slave economy.

Bridging women's history, the history of the South, and African-American history, this audiobook makes a bold argument about the role of white women in American slavery. Historian Stephanie E. Jones-Rogers draws on a variety of sources to show that slave-owning women were sophisticated economic actors who directly engaged in and benefited from the South's slave market. Because women typically inherited more slaves than land, enslaved people were often their primary source of wealth.

Not only did white women often refuse to cede ownership of their slaves to their husbands, they employed management techniques that were as effective and brutal as those used by slave-owning men.

White women actively participated in the slave market, profited from it, and used it for economic and social empowerment. By examining the economically entangled lives of enslaved people and slave-owning women, Jones-Rogers presents a narrative that forces us to rethink the economics and social conventions of slaveholding America.

©2019 Stephanie E. Jones-Rogers (P)2019 Tantor

Read/listen to this book

If you are advising someone running for President or you are the candidate, read this book. If you are a person whom push’s identity politics, read this book. If you are a white American, read this book... if you are a person whom likes to think themselves informed you should read this book. This book is as enlightening a read as anyone could expect for said subject... Further it should be on everyone’s short list for summer/down time reads.

Powerful and Necessary

This is an amazing book to be read by all races to understand the role of white women in the slave industry in America. High suggest reading as part of a book group.

In Depth

Very in depth history. Things that we knew but not with the amount of details. Sad that some are trying to erase history from our books. These are needed for us to continue to grow.

Nothing Like It!!

The information was astounding and almost shocking! This book uncovers many documented
truths and testimonies regarding the involvement of white women in the slave trade around the globe, particularly in the U.S. Many were actually “co- conspirators” in the slave trade not just as the wives and family of slave holders , but as slaveholders themselves. And these historical facts, explain the basis for white women’s participation in lynchings and their allegiance to White supremacy groups like the KKK after slavery.

Sheds light on an often overlooked history

This is a well researched, well written and accessible history, which documents the overlooked way in which white, slave owning women engaged in Southern Slavery.