Virginia also had some of the harshest slave codes of the Upper South states prior to 1865.
Source?
Charles Elliott's
Sinfulness of American Slavery (published 1850) is the source I've been working with recently; I expect it's long since out of print. Volume I includes a dissection of Southern slave codes intended to enforce slavery by prescribing the penalties for actions seen as potentially revolutionary on the part of slaves. Virginia strengthened her slave codes following Nat Turner's rebellion: for instance, a slave found in possession of anything that could be even vaguely construed as a weapon could be given 39 lashes (in essence, unto the point of death); in North Carolina, the same offense carried the penalty of 20 lashes. It was likewise illegal for a slaveholder to free their slaves in Virginia, except for a brief period following the Revolutionary War, without a special dispensation by the courts.
