Excerpt from Ten Years on a Georgia Plantation Since the War Covering events from 1866 to 1868; published in 1883; reprinted on Documenting the American South (Web site)

A plantation owner writes about life after slavery

"Our properties will soon be utterly worthless, for no crop can be raised by such labour as this, and no negro will work if he can help it.…"

After the Civil War ended, the South had to start over in many ways. Homes, hospitals, and businesses needed to be rebuilt. Neglected fields needed to be sown (planted) with new seeds. Families that lost a husband or father in battle had to rebuild on their own. African Americans and whites alike had to learn how to make a living in a new economy—one in which African Americans were no longer slaves, but wage-earning employees.

Major stretches of the South were in ruins. In the opening account...