As slavery collapsed, enslaved men and women around the US South envisioned a new start. They hoped freedom would bring democratic opportunities, protections from violence, and chances to practice religion beyond the watchful eye of their enslavers. They looked toward life at home as well. They were eager to build families after their enslavers denied them the chance. They also joined the ranks of American free laborers, many wishing to farm the same land for subsistence that they once tilled under the whip. Their dreams for freedom gave them enormous power during the US Civil War. Whether they forced Lincoln’s hand or merely encouraged him to sign the Emancipation Proclamation, historians now agree that the Black southerners surprised their enslavers, who imagined their captives contented underlings, and aided the Union war effort. Over 130,000 men marched in the army’s ranks, and enslaved women supplied care for wounded Yankees, baked food for empty northern bellies, and washed uniforms of Union blue. But, despite their contributions to the suppression of the enslavers’ rebellion and eradication of bondage, their emancipation was not a smooth transition. As historians including Jim Downs, Chandra Manning, Amy Murrell Taylor, Joseph Reidy, Thavolia Glymph, and Carole Emberton have shown, emancipation was a contested process. Enslaved men and women were often frustrated along the way by a host of factors. This panel explores the challenges the formerly enslaved faced on their journeys.

In particular, this panel details how emancipation unfolded as new racial ideas emerged and freedom seekers pursued novel expressions of gendered selves. Erin Mauldin’s paper details how an old debate over agricultural production garnered renewed interest during the 1860s thanks to the formation of a racial archetype. Advocates of fenced farming appealed to white southerners by pointing to “thieving freedmen” and subsequently gained traction after prewar activism failed to yield new barriers. Her paper reveals how such racism combined with the chaotic aftermath of emancipation contributed to efforts to prevent Black southerners from enjoying economic opportunities as freedpeople. Nkili Cooper turns to children’s struggles, showing how those youths once kept in chains carried on their fight for liberty at home and sometimes against their parents. Finally, looking at Black southerners who decamped the US Army during their Civil War service, Jonathan Lande shows that some formerly enslaved soldiers identified alternative means of demonstrating an emancipated manhood. Lande shows that the deserters’ flight reflected another facet of Black men’s pursuit of freedom. Together, these papers supply evidence of the complex journey from slavery to freedom.