When we arrived at Richmond, George Pullan, a “nigger-trader,” as he was called, came to the boat and began to question me, asking me first if I could remember having had the chickenpox, measles or whooping-cough.  I answered, yes.  Then he asked me if I did not want to take a little walk with him.  I said, no.  “Well,” said he, “you have got to go.  Your master sent you down here to be sold, and told me to come and get you and take you to the trader’s yard, ready to be sold.”  I saw that to hesitate was useless; so I at once obeyed him and went.

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A slave market.

The trader’s establishment consisted of an office, a large show-room and a yard in the rear enclosed with a wall of brick fifteen feet high.  The principal men of the establishment were the proprietor and the foreman.  When slaves were to be exhibited for sale, the foreman was called to the office by means of a bell, and an order given him to bring into the show-room all the slaves in the establishment.  This was the work of but a few minutes, and the women were placed in a row on one side of the room and the men on the other.  Persons desirous of purchasing them passed up and down between the lines looking the poor creatures over, and questioning them in about the following manner:  “What can you do?” “Are you a good cook? seamstress? dairymaid?”—­this to the women, while the men would be questioned as to their line of work:  “Can you plow?  Are you a blacksmith?  Have you ever cared for horses?  Can you pick cotton rapidly?” Sometimes the slave would be required to open his mouth that the purchaser might examine the teeth and form some opinion as to his age and physical soundness; and if it was suspected that a slave had been beaten a good deal he would be required to step into another room and undress.  If the person desiring to buy found the slave badly scarred by the common usage of whipping, he would say at once to the foreman; “Why! this slave is not worth much, he is all scarred up.  No, I don’t want him; bring me in another to look at.”  Slaves without scars from whipping and looking well physically always sold readily.  They were never left long in the yard.  It was expected that all the slaves in the yard for sale would be neatly dressed and clean before being brought into the show-room.  It was the foreman’s business to see that each one was presentable.

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Slave whipping as A business.

Whipping was done at these markets, or trader’s yards, all the time.  People who lived in the city of Richmond would send their slaves here for punishment.  When any one wanted a slave whipped he would send a note to that effect with the servant to the trader.  Any petty offense on the part of a slave was sufficient to subject the offender to this brutal treatment.  Owners who affected culture and refinement preferred to send a servant to the