Honesty on a touchy subject

Darrel Salisbury
Published: April 13, 2008

Are we going to be honest about race this time?

To be honest, the answer is, for most, “no,” but I will try.

The first slaves in this country were white men, women and children — thieves, prostitutes, beggars and honest citizens — swept from the streets of England, held at Bridewell Prison and “transported” to the Virginia Colony, where most died within a year.

They arrived four months before an English captain, flying the Dutch flag, landed at Jamestown with a cargo that included “twenty and odd” Africans.

Two hundred years later, January 5, 1821, the records of Bath County, Virginia, Will Book 2, page 404, record the “emancipation” of 14 slaves, including white woman, Nancy, 18; white child, James, 2 months.; white slave Strother, 23; white woman, Sally, 30; white woman, Patsy, 21; white girl, Jane, 9; white man, Benjamin, 25; white boy, Washington, 3; white girl, Betsy, 4 and white child, Sarah Jane, 5 months. One person, in one county, in one state, with 10 white slaves. How many more whites were enslaved? How many black slave owners — and there were black slave owners — owned white slaves? Who will apologize and pay reparations to the descendants of those white slaves? I would but, how would I apologize and pay reparations to myself if I found I was a descendant?

The Constitution, in 1789, deemed a black slave to be counted as 3/5 of a free white person, but made no mention of white slaves like Strother. Did they count for nothing? No, census documents made no distinction — a slave was a slave.

An honest discussion of race can not start with the lies of white or black persons and can not continue without calling those lies, not just wrong, but lies.

DARREL SALISBURY

Lorton