A Family Venture Men and Women on the Southern Frontier [Hardcover]

This book is about the different ways that men and women experienced migration from the Southern seaboard to the antebellum Southern frontier. Based upon extensive research in planter family papers, Cashin studies how the sexes went to the frontier with diverging agendas: men tried to escape the family, while women tried to preserve it. On the frontier, men usually settled far from relatives, leaving women lonely and disoriented in a strange environment. As kinship networks broke down, sex roles changed, and relations between men and women became more inequitable. Migration also changed race relations, because many men abandoned paternalistic race relations and abused their slaves. However, many women continued to practice paternalism, and a few even sympathized with slaves as they never had before. Drawing on rich archival sources, Cashin examines the decision of families to migrate, the effects of migration on planter family life, and the way old ties were maintained and new ones formed.

Highly readable...This lively, human exploration of race, class, and gender...provides a new look at the impact of individualism in unsuspected places. --American Historical Review

Using diaries, family letters, travel accounts, and census samples, [Cashin] weaves historical analysis, effective illustration, and delightful anecdotes together and rewards readers with an impressive contribution to the literature of Southern history. --The Historian

Packs quite a wallop. In relatively few pages she comments intelligently, provocatively, and originally on many of the most disputed subjects in southern history...Writing with clarity and grace, Cashin brings fresh interpretations to complex problems. --William and Mary Quarterly

A beautifully written statistical study of planter families and slaves who migrated from the southern seaboard states to the new southwest between 1810 and 1860. --CHOICE