{"product_id":"debt-investment-slaves-richard-holcombe-kilbourne-9780817357757","title":"Debt, Investment, Slaves: Credit Relations in East Feliciana Parish, Louisiana, 1825-1885","description":"\u003cb\u003e\" . . . the only book-length study documenting the use of human collateral in the nineteenth century.\" --\u003ci\u003eThe Journal of Southern History\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e For his landmark \u003ci\u003eDebt, Investment, Slaves\u003c\/i\u003e, Louisiana attorney Richard Holcombe Kilbourne Jr. performed a thorough survey of parish mortgage records and other manuscripts to create a rich map of antebellum credit relationships in the region. He demonstrates that most credit relationships, collateralized and uncollateralized, were grounded in slave property and not, as a contemporary reader would assume, land or other forms of wealth. Antebellum slavery was thus not only an arrangement of labor, but also an arrangement of finance and economics that shaped all of Southern life and politics. For this reason, defeat in the Civil War and emancipation not only freed enslaved people to work and earn wages, it occasioned a monumental credit implosion from which the Southern economy did not recover for the remainder of the nineteenth century. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e To understand the antebellum South, it is necessary to set aside assumptions shared by modern Americans about the nature of borrowing, lending, banking, and investing. Kilbourne's seminal work reminds readers of the absence of banks outside of major cities like Charleston, New Orleans, and Mobile. He explains the defined and ad hoc roles that regional banks, intermediary lenders, and flexible agents (\"factors\") played in the absence of a robust banking system. He persuasively shows that this network of borrowers and lenders was based to an extent not well understood today on bondage. He then demonstrates how this fragile and improvised financial system had no ability to respond to the shocks and disruptions of war. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e Setting out to write a book of local history, Kilbourne achieved an enduring work that illuminated aspects of Southern life that are indispensable to understanding American history.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e Richard Holcombe Kilbourne\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-10:\u003c\/b\u003e 0817357750\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-13:\u003c\/b\u003e 9780817357757\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e University Alabama Press\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLanguage:\u003c\/b\u003e English\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 04\/01\/2014\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 222\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFormat:\u003c\/b\u003e Paperback\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 0.75lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 9.20h x 6.00w x 0.70d","brand":"Richard Holcombe Kilbourne","offers":[{"title":"Paperback","offer_id":46880932004095,"sku":"9780817357757","price":24.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0662\/2982\/9887\/files\/img_543bf842-a4c2-4844-b1cb-4f6ef845fef9.jpg?v=1747970157","url":"https:\/\/www.whiterainbookhouse.com\/products\/debt-investment-slaves-richard-holcombe-kilbourne-9780817357757","provider":"WR Book House","version":"1.0","type":"link"}