New Masters
Northern Planters During the Civil War and Reconstruction.
Fordham University Press
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New Masters: Northern Planters during the Civil War and Reconstruction, analyzes the North’s efforts to transform the South, both during and after the war, into a free labor economy and society. In this ground-breaking work, Lawrence N. Powell addresses the role that the twenty to fifty thousand "new masters," or northern planters, had on the post-reconstruction system. Covering evidence of over five hundred northern planters, Powell asserts that northern emigrants provided much of the capital that hard-pressed southern planters used to stave off bankruptcy; showing that these planters became both the catalyst that perpetuated the plantation system of servitude and debt, as well as became the reason behind the revitalization of the South. New Masters deals with a variety of issues, including race relations, Northern planters’ motivations, work habits, capital investment patterns, and the planters’ gradual disillusionment as problems mounted and profits declined.
His sensitive narrative nicely balances general discussions with telling anecdotes, and his interpretations are uniformly intelligent and generally convincing.---—New York Times Book Review
“Not only an important addition to Reconstruction literature but also a demonstration as to how American history should ideally be written. . . . Anyone interested in Southern history, whether professional historian or casual reader, will find Powell’s book difficult to lay aside until it has been read from start to finish.”---—American Historical Review
Lawrence N. Powell is Professor of History at Tulane University in New Orleans. He is author of numerous books including Papers of Frederick Duglass and The Politics of Reconstruction.