Time for some live tweeting again, in an attempt to get a little ways back to normal. I'll be covering the @TJMonticello webinar "Enslaved on Grounds: Slavery @UVA"

Event description: "From Thomas Jefferson’s founding of the University of Virginia in 1819 through the American Civil War, over 4,000 enslaved people built, maintained, and served students and faculty at what is now one of the nation's most prestigious public universities...

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...Join us on Friday, September 4, at 1:00 p.m. EDT for a conversation with Justene Hill Edwards, Assistant Professor of History at the University of Virginia. Dr. Hill Edwards will discuss the enslaved people who built, maintained, and served students and faculty at UVA."

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Dr. Hill Edwards starts off by reading the names of a few people who were enslaved at UVA, including Isabella Gibbons

A quote from a letter she wrote are inscribed on the Memorial to the Enslaved Laborers @UVA

Dr. Hill Edwards says we're fortunate to know Gibbons' story, but there are so many more we don't know

Around 4000 people were enslaved at UVA in its first 44 years

"Slavery was, indirectly, an integral part of the liberal arts education that Thomas Jefferson designed" - Dr. Hill Edwards

The question Dr. Hill Edwards is considering is "how did enslaved people contribute to the University of Virginia and the Charlottesville community?"

The construction of UVA was started by 10 enslaved laborers in 1817. A few months later, more enslaved people were hired to work on the University, alongside free Black and white workers

A key component of Jefferson's design was to keep the enslaved workers hidden from view, except when they were needed to serve students and faculty

Slavery wasn't in tension with the goals of the University; rather, the University's curriculum encouraged slavery, and the functioning of the University wouldn't have been possible without slavery, Dr. Hill Edwards says

Most of the enslaved people on Grounds weren't owned by the University; they were mostly owned by faculty or nearby business owners and "hired" by UVA (i.e. rented out; their wages were paid to their owners)

Students were not allowed to bring enslaved people to the University. Dr. Hill Edwards points out that enslaved people are put in the same category as livestock and pets ("servant, horse or dog")

Jefferson said that owning slaves made the owner a worse person, despite owning slaves himself

His message to students: slaves for me, but not for thee

There was a substantial amount of violence against enslaved people from both students and faculty @UVA

Dr. Hill Edwards tells the story of an enslaved woman who was attacked by a student. The student later apologized to the professor who had enslaved the woman

The student wasn't punished, because it would've damaged his reputation

CW: sexual assault
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Three students were expelled after gang raping an enslaved woman, but no one knows what happened to the woman afterwards

Enslaved people made some money by smuggling alcohol and other banned items to students

Virginia introduced slave patrols in 1727. They are the precursor to the "violent ... relationship between police and Black people today" Dr. Hill Edwards says

Jefferson and UVA administrators encouraged the hiring, rather than purchasing, of enslaved people. Enslaved people who were hired sometimes had more autonomy in doing their jobs, but were also isolated from their families and communities for extended periods of time

Dr. Hill Edwards says we need to reflect on all the enslaved laborers whose names and stories we don't know. We need to honor their contributions to the University and the community, and remember the University's brutal history

On to Q&A

Someone asked about the slashes with no name on the Memorial. Dr. Hill Edwards says we only know ~600 of the almost 4000 enslaved laborers. The slashes represent the mark of a whip, and also give a space for names to be etched in as we learn them

Someone asks about the descendants of enslaved laborers, and whether they were consulted on the Memorial. Dr. Hill Edwards says yes, and that the whole initiative was student and community driven

"Even in their free time, there was an omnipresent violence going on [against enslaved people]," says the Q&A facilitator, whose name I missed

That was in response to what the day-to-day life of enslaved people looked like

Every student had something of an enslaver experience at UVA, because they were constantly served by enslaved people, despite not being allowed to bring enslaved people to the University

It was illegal to teach enslaved people to read or write in Virginia. Those laws weren't strictly enforced (Jefferson himself broke them) until slave rebellions started becoming more common

The Q&A facilitator emphasizes that the entire white community, not just slave owners, were terrified of enslaved people gaining any kind of power, including education. Jefferson said that the Haitian revolution was "terrifying"

Jefferson was afraid of the (in his opinion inevitable) end of slavery sparking a race war. He was afraid that Black people would seek revenge for what had been done to them

Dr. Hill Edwards, when asked about the cognitive dissonance of Jefferson speaking against slavery while also perpetuating it, says that it was probably more than a moral quandary; he also wasn't willing to give up the personal wealth-building potential of slavery

The Q&A facilitator says that, especially towards the end of his life, Jefferson took on an attitude of "slavery is wrong, but it's the next generation's job to end it"

She also pointed out that many of Jefferson's contemporaries *did* divest from the institution of slavery, undermining the argument that everyone at the time supported slavery https://twitter.com/AlexOxford3/status/1301939151810580480?s=20

Dr. Hill Edwards says that we are still grappling with the consequences of people speaking against racism while still willfully profiting from it, and then saying that ending it is a problem for future generations

And we're done!