shackles

Dfx

Private
Joined
May 28, 2017
one of the items i kept over the summers finds..was told it was a slave shackle. i have looked through pics and i agree there is some similiarities but not 100% sure any thoughts...sorry to bother everyone just bored and looking through the stuff i have kept.
 

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dont have on phone but bar is about 5/8 thick. there is defenitly somthing on other end. nothing like the round end as seen in pic. looked to have like a small washer or something
 
It certainly appears to be similar to the shackles you posted. If the other end of the bar has an opening that a lock or bolt can go through I would say that's what you have. I cannot think of anything else it could be based on the images.
 
Shackles are not in the category of things that have any first-hand period references ... that I have ever seen or heard of. So that said, everything I read over the years has been speculation that this pattern of ironware was generic for hand and leg shackles used by both military and civilian applications, and not just slaves.
 
I agree, such devices were not unique to slavery use. It's a bit entrepreneurial to advertise them as such. Saying that they are slave shackles, true or not, brings more percieved value. Just as likely, perhaps more likely, they were used on some other type of prisoner. It's such a basic design and could hail from anywhere middle ages to nineteenth century, local blacksmith-made. (Of course there were blacksmiths on plantations, many of them black slaves themselves, something escaping slaves might have to avail themselves of).

btw such a device as this one in the OP would limit a slave's ability to work, so such would only be used for transport or punishment. A more typical slave shackle would be a long one (3ft or so) for the ankles so the person wearing them could work in the field. That type most often had an additional ring in the center, through which a longer chain could be run through to connect several workers together for walking to another work site. We're talking chain gang, again not just a slavery setting.
 
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I don't think they're shackles since there doesn't seem to be any way of securing them.

Being blacksmith made, they were customized to the size of wrist or ankle of a particular wearer, the loops sliding onto the bar and kept from sliding off (secured) either with a locking device on one end (a locking clamp or just a hole for a padlock) or a retainer hammered on by a blacksmith that could only be removed by a blacksmith at the end of the journey or the day.
 
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thanks for the awesome info. i did find it close to other CW finds. did soldiers carry these for prisoners??
 
Strong resemblances to shackles found in the wreck of the Henrietta Marie -- a small merchant ship captured in the War of the League of Augsburg and converted to an English slaver/ guineaman.

Look a lot like shackles I've seen at cafetales in rural Cuba too.
 
didnt know what they were when i found them. Knew it was odd so i kept it and glad i did.
 

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