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A Founding Father of the United States and the country's first president, George Washington kept over 300 enslaved people at his Mount Vernon plantation.
Thomas Jefferson, the third president of the United States, owned more than 600 slaves during his adult life.
Jefferson's slaves were held captive at his main residence, Monticello, near Charlottesville, Virginia. It was here that he fathered several children with an enslaved woman called Sally Hemmings. As president, however, Jefferson developed a contradictory attitude towards slavery. During his time in office, he consistently spoke out against the international slave trade and outlawed it while he was in the White House.
James Madison kept several enslaved people—he came from a large slaveholding family. By 1801, Madison's slave population at Montpelier, his plantation estate, was slightly over 100. That figure eventually numbered over 300.
During his presidency Madison occasionally condemned the institution of slavery and opposed the international slave trade. He even produced a pamphlet, 'A plan for the general abolition of slavery,' outlining his ideas, although notably these designs were to be implemented "without danger or loss to the citizens of the south."
Like Thomas Jefferson, James Monroe outwardly condemned the institution of slavery as evil, and advocated its gradual end. But he, too, still owned many slaves.
The ACS was formed to address the prevailing view that free people of color could not integrate into US society. Instead, it encouraged and supported the migration of freeborn people of color and emancipated slaves to the continent of Africa. Monroe enthusiastically embraced the notion of sending freed slaves to the new country of Liberia; its capital, Monrovia, is named after him.
Like most planters in the South, Andrew Jackson used forced labor. Over his lifetime, he owned a total of 300 slaves, most of whom were put to work in the cotton fields of his plantation, The Hermitage, near Nashville, Tennessee.
During his presidency, Jackson was a vocal critic of abolition and anti-slavery efforts. He even directed the US Postmaster to seize abolitionist literature in the mail. Pictured c. 1880 are Aaron and Hannah Jackson, two slaves owned by Jackson.
Martin Van Buren was ensconced in the White House during the Amistad Case, a freedom suit that resulted from the successful rebellion of African slaves on board the Spanish schooner La Amistad in 1839. Van Buren viewed abolitionism as the greatest threat to the nation's unity, and he resisted the slightest interference with slavery in the states where it existed. Later in life, Van Buren belonged to the Free Soil Party, which opposed the expansion of slavery into the Western territories, but not immediate abolition.
William Henry Harrison owned several inherited enslaved people before becoming president in 1841.
As the first governor of Indiana, Harrison had unsuccessfully lobbied Congress to legalize slavery there. But as his political career took off, Harrison carefully avoided condemning slavery and instead professed the belief that the states themselves should decide its fate.
John Tyler owned as many as 50 slaves throughout his lifetime, including during his tenure as White House incumbent. In 1845, Tyler oversaw the annexation of Texas as a slave state.
Part of a prominent slave-owning family in Virginia (the family home was Sherwood Forest Plantation), Tyler never freed any of his slaves and consistently supported slaveholders' rights and the expansion of slavery during his time in political office.
President James K. Polk was generally tolerant of slavery. He owned several plantations and even purchased enslaved people during his term in office. His will provided for the freeing of his slaves after the passing of his wife, Sarah Childress, though the Emancipation Proclamation and the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution ended up freeing them long before her death in 1891.
One slave who benefitted from the Emancipation Proclamation was Elias Polk. He'd been enslaved by President Polk and his family from the time of his birth until emancipation in 1865. After the American Civil War, he became a conservative Democratic political activist, when most freedmen joined the Republican Party.
Zachary Taylor owned slaves throughout his life. In fact, of the other presidents who owned slaves, Taylor benefited the most from slave labor.
Taylor had enslaved servants in the White House, and it was in Washington where he also supervised his Mississippi plantation's operations. As president, however, he generally resisted attempts to expand slavery in the territories, and he vowed to veto the Compromise of 1850, which granted enslavers greater authority to seize supposed fugitive slaves in Northern states, as well as other extremely controversial measures.
Assuming the presidency following the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, Andrew Johnson was one of the last US presidents to personally own slaves. Despite being an enslaver, Johnson had been chosen as vice president by Lincoln as a gesture of unification, with Johnson supporting many of Lincoln's policies, although he did lobby for Lincoln to exclude Tennessee from the Emancipation Proclamation. But as President Johnson, his Reconstruction goals were to reunify the Union by readmitting former Confederates as citizens of the United States and to limit emancipated people's civil rights.
Johnson served one term in office, during which he went on to free all his personal slaves in 1863, and in 1864 all slaves in Tennessee. Among Johnson's personal slaves liberated was Sam Johnson, said to be the president's favorite.
The last president to personally own enslaved people was Ulysses S. Grant. As the former commanding general of the Union Army, Grant had kept one enslaved black man named William Jones. He was freed in 1859.
However, Grant's wife Julia had control of four slaves during the American Civil War, given to her by her father. All would be freed by the Emancipation Proclamation of 1863. Pictured is the Ulysses S. Grant National Historic Site.
Sources: (History) (Miller Center) (The White House) (Encyclopedia Virginia) (American Battlefield Trust) (US History) (White House History)
See also: Defining moments in Black history
This figure included the 80 slaves Martha Custis brought with her to Mount Vernon after marrying Washington. Despite becoming increasingly uneasy with the idea of slavery, especially during the War of Independence when he requested the number of black slaves at Mount Vernon be reduced, Washington generally adhered to the practice of slaveholding. John Trumbull's 1780 portrait of George Washington (pictured) also depicts a man believed to be Washington's enslaved valet William Lee.
But Jefferson made no provision for Monticello's enslaved workforce. After his death, they were sold to pay off his estate's debts. Pictured in 1847 is Isaac Jefferson, a former personal slave of Jefferson's.
In July 1799, five months before his death, Washington wrote his will, in which he stipulated that one of his slaves should be freed, and the remainder forced to work for his widow, to be freed on her death.
In his will, Madison left his slaves to his wife Dolley, who later sold the Montpelier plantation and much of the forced labor workforce to pay off the Madisons' debts. One of the slaves sold was Paul Jennings (pictured). He'd been enslaved as a young man by Madison during and after his White House years. Jennings later became a noted abolitionist.
In the wake of Gabriel's Rebellion in 1800, an ultimately thwarted plan by enslaved African-American men to attack Richmond and destroy slavery in Virginia, Monroe joined the American Colonization Society (ACS).
Despite his anti-abolitionism stance, Van Buren only ever owned one slave, a man called Tom. In 1814, before Van Buren's ascent in politics, Tom escaped and ended up in Worcester, Massachusetts (pictured). In 1828, a slave catcher offered to bring Tom in, but Van Buren showed little interest in the return of his errant slave.
Many of Taylor's slaves survived him, the president having died 16 months into his term from a stomach disease. One of these was Henry Hawkins, who'd accompanied Taylor on his Mexican-American War campaigns. Hawkins died in 1917, aged 98, his passing announced in the Natchez Democrat.
As president of the United States, Washington oversaw the implementation of the 1787 Northwest Ordinance, which banned slavery north of the Ohio River. But in 1793 he signed the Fugitive Slave Law, which empowered a slaveowner or his agent to seize or arrest any enslaved person on the run. His views on slavery took another turn the following year, when he wrote into law the Slave Trade Act of 1794, which prohibited the export of slaves from the United States to any foreign place or country.
Slavery was legal in the United States from its beginning as a nation. During the late 18th and early 19th centuries, slaveholding was common among the statesmen who served as president. In all, 12 chief executives enslaved people during their lifetime; of these, eight owned slaves while in office. The Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution formally abolished slavery in 1865, but the history of the American presidency’s relationship to slavery remains an uncomfortable one. So, who are these White House incumbents that were also enslavers?
Click through for the unsavory story about US presidents and slavery.
A dark history of American presidents who owned slaves
The unsavory story about US presidents and slavery
LIFESTYLE History
Slavery was legal in the United States from its beginning as a nation. During the late 18th and early 19th centuries, slaveholding was common among the statesmen who served as president. In all, 12 chief executives enslaved people during their lifetime; of these, eight owned slaves while in office. The Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution formally abolished slavery in 1865, but the history of the American presidency’s relationship to slavery remains an uncomfortable one. So, who are these White House incumbents that were also enslavers?
Click through for the unsavory story about US presidents and slavery.