Born a Child of Freedom, Yet a Slave explores the diverse strategies employed by Southern slaveholders to keep their slaves under control-from threats of sale, shackles, screw box, or treadmill, to a peck of corn a week, a dram of whiskey, a pound of tobacco, the bribe of freedom, and the promise of heaven. It explores also the counterdefensive strategies employed by the slaves to resist control-among them, arson, theft, poison, subterfuge, murder, escape, and rebellion. Norrece Jones, himself a descendent of South Carolina slaves, has written a powerful book based on intensive research in...