Slavery's Borderland: Freedom and Bondage Along the Ohio River

In Slavery’s Borderland , Matthew Salafia scrutinizes the history of the Ohio River Valley and its people and communities, mostly from the late eighteenth through the mid-nineteenth centuries. At the center of his story, however, is not a generalized account of a watery thoroughfare and the interconnections that it facilitated over  time.  Instead  the  author  grapples  with  a  more  focused  historical  problem,  one  that  is  rich  with  historiographical  potential.  In  eight  thematically  oriented  chapters, Salafia assays if, when, and how the northern side of the river, specifically the southern regions of Ohio and Indiana, functioned as a barrier against slavery and a bastion of freedom from the age of territorial organization to the onset of the American Civil War. Salafia seeks to determine whether or not the ultimate establishment and early development of the non-slaveholding states of Ohio  and  Indiana  effectively  transformed  the  nature  and  meaning  of  the  Ohio  River  from  a  simple  geographical  boundary  into  a  more  complex  geopolitical border. In order to arrive at firm conclusions, the author incorporates a comparative  analysis  throughout  the  monograph,  frequently  exploring  a  chapter  theme  within  the  context  of  slavery-related  events  in  Ohio,  Indiana,  and  Kentucky,  as  well as cross-river relations among Ohioans, Indianans, and Kentuckians.