It is almost impossible to believe it, but not so long ago in America you could find several businessmen in town squares across the South engaged in purchasing humans.
These shocking pictures from the 19th century demonstrate the commonplace slave auctions that occurred before the Civil War purged slavery from the country.
In the 1800s, market days were held each week in the South and farmers brought livestock, and goods to sell.
Alongside these items, people were also sold - just as if they were livestock.
The collection of photographs below demonstrates the courthouse yard in Lexington in Kentucky where the slave auctions took place, which made the town one of the biggest slave markets in the South.
At the same time, an 1864 photograph demonstrates an 'Auction & Negro Sales' shop in Atlanta, Georgia.
Other photographs show Price, Birch & Co, a slave dealership in Virginia which was captured by Union forces during the Civil War.
Above is a photograph of American slaves who managed to escape their imprisonment after fleeing the Confederacy and reached Union lines in Cumberland Landing, Virginia in 1861 - the same year when the momentous Civil War started.
A picture of what is thought to be a crowd of people gathered for a slave auction in Easton, Maryland, circa the 1850s.
A building with a business advertising 'Auction and Negro sales' in Whitehall Street, Atlanta, 1864, just one year before the South was crushed by the Union and slavery terminated as an institution in the USA.
An image of what is thought to be a slave auction on Cheapside, Lexington, Kentucky.
The premises of a slave dealership. The pens were used to hold slaves before auctions in Alexandria, Virginia.
This picture shows Price, Birch & Co, a slave dealership in Virginia that was captured by Union forces during the Civil War. Inside are pens where slaves were held before being auctioned. The building was taken by the Union Army in 1861, who then used it as a military prison to hold confederate soldiers.
A group of slaves at the Cassina Point plantation on Edisto Island, South Carolina in 1862.
A group of slaves who made it to a Union-controlled part of the US during the American Civil War. They are pictured relaxing in Yorkstown, Virginia in 1861.
Advertisements for slave auctions.
This picture shows the premises of a slave dealership in Alexandria, Virginia.
The last slaves sold at public auction in the court house yard, unknown date.
Left: The former slave dealership, Price Birch & Co, Alexandria, Virginia, pictured in 1861 after its capture. Right: A building occupied by a business advertising 'Auction and Negro sales' in Whitehall street, Atlanta, 1864.
Three Abyssinian-modern-day Ethiopian slaves in chains in 1910. The country didn't abolish slavery until 1942, during the Second World War.
Reference: Daily Mail
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