Convict leasing once common practice
ASHS Column for 05 24 07
Jerry Simmons

    Recently I wrote about a challenge
put to me about the convict camp in
Century. For those who may not know
what I’m talking about, there is/was a
quarry of sorts just east of Jefferson
Avenue at the edge of the Escambia
River swamp that was known as the
"convict camp" when I was growing
up.

     Not until about five years ago did
I find someone who really had some
first-hand knowledge of it. The late
Sam Ptomey told me he recalled seeing
wagons loaded with men setting out to
work early many mornings. They rode
in wagons with small, solid, wide
wheels, probably to work on the various
clay and dirt roads of the area.
     I naturally assumed these were men who had committed crimes of some sort and that this place was an adjunct of the county’s penal system. Well, the challenge mentioned above was about why these men were really incarcerated – that they may have committed no crime other than being found in the area with no job and little money. They were summarily arrested for vagrancy. Upon research, I believe this is probably true.
     In the years after the War Between the States, Reconstruction almost killed the economy of most southern states. State governments had no funds to perform the necessary operations of government, even those ruled by puppet legislators and others who had no purpose in life but to exact punishment upon the white population of the South. There had to be some way to gain revenues, and in the latter part of the 19 ^th century, an idea began to form. Involuntary Servitude (slavery) was the answer!
     "Wait!" you say. "Wasn’t slavery abolished?" Well, yes, it was. The 13 ^th Amendment did just that: According to the 13th Amendment, "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, nor any place subject to their jurisdiction."
     Did you notice the exception? "…EXCEPT as punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted…" The states decided that someone convicted of a crime could be forced to serve as a laborer. The Southern states generally could not afford either the cost of building or maintaining prisons. As a result, leasing of convicts caught on and before long, almost every state in the union began hiring out its slaves (convicts).
     Slavery was indeed brutal and miserable. However, a slave was protected by his master, since there was a financial investment. The slaveholder had a vested interested in keeping slaves alive and seeing that they were cared for and maybe especially that they reproduced. On the other hand, one who leased a convict had no such interest. If a convict died of malnutrition or disease, they were simply replaced by a new convict. A convict was expendable.
     The work of convicts also changed as the South industrialized. It became the main producer of "many high demand raw goods, such as turpentine, at the beginning of the First World War. Chain gang labor replaced plantation labor for the majority of convicts; they were put to work mining coal, tapping turpentine and laying railroad. The free labor because of the convict lease program was the driving force behind the economic growth of the South after emancipation just as it had always been." (Wikipedia)
     Subleasing became very profitable. Some entrepreneurs leased men for around a dollar a month, then advertised to sublease them for up to nine dollars a month. As time went on, a form of slavery in agriculture began to grow from this concept, called share-cropping.
****
     My point of this column is to say that while some of the convicts in Century’s "convict camp" were bona-fide lawbreakers, my challenger a couple of weeks ago was very likely correct in saying that most were arrested because they’d simply fallen on hard times.
     A businessman could lease convicts only when they needed them. Therefore, the demand for convicts varied according to production seasons. And so too, did the crime rate. Thus planting season, or the start of a major public works project, would be accompanied by a so-called "crime wave," resulting in the mass arrest of as many men as were needed to fill the ranks. 
     In Tallahassee, for example, when Leon County officials made a deal to lease all of their convicts to the Putnam Lumber company the result was predictable, a minor "crime wave" hit Leon County. Vagrancy arrests shot up by almost 800 percent in the seven months following the Putnam Lumber deal (History Encyclopedia). Lumber companies were perhaps the major user of leased labor, with the demand for turpentine on the rise, for example, during World War I.
     My suspicion (note I said "suspicion") is that The Alger-Sullivan Lumber Company did the same thing. When it came time for a special project requiring more men temporarily, they may have leased convicts. If the number of convicts on hand was low, then a "crime wave" occurred and more men became readily available.
     In 1928, Alabama became the last state to outlaw this practice. Looking back, many historians believe the change was not so much the result of moral outrage, but of political expediency. Seems like some things never change!
****
     We had a great speaker at our last meeting. Della Scott-Ireton with the Pensacola Archaeology Society gave a presentation on the shipwreck at Emanuel Point in Pensacola Bay. The ship was discovered in the 1990s and is presumed to be one of de Luna’s 1559 expedition to settle Pensacola. Ms. Scott-Ireton is a good speaker and her topic fascinated just about everyone.
****
     You who are regular readers of the Ledger already know our beloved engine, "Old 100," is finally home. It took four years of persistence, but it is back in Century. It is a sad sight right now, but that’s what we knew all along. There’s a lot of work to do to get it back like we want it but we’ll be working to accomplish that as soon as we can.
     You’re welcome to drop by and see the engine, but don’t expect a sleek and shiny piece of metal. This is a work of mechanical archaeology and we’ll get the pieces together soon!
     If you’re interested in giving some help, be it welding, sheet metal work, painting, sanding, or whatever, please give us a call at the museum (850-256-2447) and we’ll add your name and be back in touch with you. Thanks, all of you who’ve been our cheerleaders and supporters for the last four years. We will continue to treat your trust in us with our utmost respect.
     Y’all come.

Pensacola Harbor, circa 1895
Loading sawn timbers into ships for export. Picture from "Bliss' Quarterly," 1896)

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This page last modified on Sunday, May 20, 2007