Not every slave toiled in the fields. On the larger plantations, a certain group of slaves held other jobs. These were the so-called house slaves. Their number included maids, cooks, butlers, coachmen, and personal servants to the white plantation owners. In a related category were the artisans, slaves who had been taught crafts such as carpentry and brick making. There were not very many of these slaves on any given plantation, but across the South they made up a class of slaves distinct from the field hands; estimates of their number on Southern plantations range up to nearly a quarter of all adult slaves.

The world of the artisans and the house slaves was often very different from the world of the field hands. One difference lay in the company they kept while working. Field slaves labored in a nearly all-black environment...