User:CCampbell95/sandbox

Margaret Garner’s actions were driven by her master’s abuse and the well known abuse slaves faced nationwide. Women were known to practice infanticide to alleviate the burden of slavery from their children, however in Garner’s case her children faced even more opposition due to her children being born as mulattos. Mulatto children are born having one white parent and one colored parent. Mulattos were seen as a threat and also seen as a disgrace among the plantation and white families, through the birth of mulatto children it highlights infidelity within the slave owning families. Thus mulattos where seen as a disgrace and a highlight to sin, and often beaten or sold.

However, Margaret is not the only slave that faced this issue. Lou Smith, a slave in a similar situation killed her mulatto child, because she knew that her master and mistress would sell it. Leading up to this event, the child was often abused and beaten by their mistress more often than the other slave children, due to it mulatto status. These women underwent drastic measures to protect their children not only from the cruelty of the institution of slavery, but from the double threat their children faced, due to their mulatto status.