Slave children were usually forced into the field around the age of seven or eight. An older slave on a larger plantation would be in charge of the nursery of babies and toddlers, but a child as young as seven would also be seen in charge of the younger kin.
The child of a slave mother and free father was born a slave, while the child of a free mother and slave father was born free. This latter one was on the decline by the Revolution and was virtually nonexistent by the beginning of the Civil War. This peculiar standard allowed white owners to dally with their black slave women, and any child as a result would be a free slave, for pure profit when it was sold, or another field hand in eight years. But this was a quiet affair. No one ever wrote about this, and the only recorded times were when the man flaunted his affair in public or wished to marry her - which was outlawed in the South.
There were three basic attitudes a slave took towards their fate. The first, and most reasonable given their conditions, was to rail against everything. These slaves were the most often to run away, or be killed under the whip. The second were those who tried to associate themselves with their masters. The slaves who oversaw other slaves, carriage drivers, and house slaves most often fell into this category. Not all house slaves were this way however. They sometimes fell into the third role, that of an accepting slave who tries to influence the world around them. They are very mindful of their place and are quite tolerant of their often ignorant masters. They try to sway their master's favor so that they have a better life.
Slaves were often given as gifts or as collateral against debts, much the same way one would put down a horse as payment against debts. The bull whip was a part of their everyday life, and used vehemently against them for even the slightest offense. Some wives of slave owners were known to be quite harsh with the whip for little or no offense.
