Photo: Moment RF
For enslaved Americans, the holiday season offered a brief respite and joy for some, while deepening fear, separation, and control for others, per History.com.
Many white Southern accounts long portrayed the holidays as a time of generosity and harmony between enslavers and the people they enslaved. However, historical evidence shows a far more complex reality.
By the 1830s, several large slaveholding states, including Alabama, Louisiana, and Arkansas, declared Christmas a state holiday. During the antebellum period, many traditions now central to American Christmas celebrations, including gift-giving, feasting, music, and decoration, became common across the nation.
For enslaved people, this often meant the longest break of the year, typically a few days between Christmas and New Year’s. Some were allowed to travel to see family members, attend weddings, or enjoy foods and clothing unavailable the rest of the year.
However, other slaveholders feared rebellion during holiday gatherings and sometimes responded with heightened surveillance or harsh punishment. The buying, selling, and hiring out of enslaved workers continued uninterrupted. New Year’s Day, when many enslaved people were sent away from their families to work for new owners, became known as “heartbreak day.”
Christmas also reinforced power dynamics through gift-giving. Enslavers often distributed shoes, clothes, money, or food as “presents,” which were gestures that emphasized dependence and control rather than generosity.
Historian Stephen Nissenbaum noted that some slaveholders believed holiday gifts were a more effective tool of domination than physical punishment. Enslaved people were rarely expected or allowed to reciprocate, underscoring the imbalance of power.
Christmas, however, also created space for resistance. The temporary loosening of routine gave enslaved people opportunities to assert autonomy, nurture community, and, in some cases, escape.
Frederick Douglass said the days between Christmas and New Year’s felt like time that enslaved people regarded as their own. Ellen and William Craft used Christmas travel passes to flee Georgia for freedom in 1848. On Christmas Eve in 1854, Harriet Tubman led her brothers and their families to freedom after learning they were to be sold.
Cultural expression became another form of resistance. In places like Wilmington, North Carolina, enslaved people celebrated John Kunering (also known as Jonkonnu), dressing in elaborate costumes, dancing, singing, and demanding gifts as they moved from house to house. Rooted in West African traditions, the celebration allowed enslaved people to preserve cultural identity and express joy and humanity in a society that denied both.
Formerly enslaved people have remembered Christmas as a brief pause in lives shaped by forced labor and loss. While some recalled gifts and food with fondness, others remembered the season as a reminder of everything they lacked, including control over their labor, their families, and their futures.
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