slave owner

noun

variants or less commonly slaveowner

ˈslāv-ˌō-nər 

plural slave owners also slaveowners

: someone who holds one or more people involuntarily and under threat of violence within a system of chattel slavery : slaveholder

As the fugitive slave and later abolitionist James W. C. Pennington noted, every change in the financial, social, and personal affairs of a slave owner and his or her children could have traumatic consequences for enslaved people.

—Stephanie E. Jones-Rogers

… as the debate about reparations for slavery intensifies, it is important to remember that slaveowners, far more than enslaved people, were always the primary beneficiaries of public largess.

—Tera W. Hunter

Examples of slave owner in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Civil Rights groups are calling on the Maryland state government to rename the Francis Scott Key Bridge because Key was reportedly a slave owner. —Melissa Noel, Essence, 12 Apr. 2024

While many of Finding Your Roots' guests have been grateful, a few have been less-than-enthused by the show's reveals, including Ben Affleck, who requested that one detail — the discovery he was descended from slave owners — be omitted from his episode in the third season. —Jp Mangalindan, Peoplemag, 3 Apr. 2024

Key, after whom the bridge was named, was also an advisor to Andrew Jackson, served as the District Attorney for the District of Columbia from 1833 to 1841, and was a slave owner, according to the National Park Service. —Abc News, ABC News, 26 Mar. 2024

In the past two decades, prominent universities including Harvard, Yale, Brown and the University of Virginia have issued extensive mea culpas describing their historical involvement with the slave trade and slave owners. —Brandi Kellam, ProPublica, 14 Mar. 2024

Key, after whom the bridge was named, was also an advisor to Andrew Jackson, served as the district attorney for the District of Columbia from 1833 to 1841, and was a slave owner, according to the NPS. —Kiara Alfonseca, ABC News, 26 Mar. 2024

Jones' research will focus on the sometimes violent response of slave owners and other whites when enslaved people in America resisted or escaped during the 1700s and 1800s. —arkansasonline.com, 24 Mar. 2024

She and Junius were particularly taken aback by a scene in which the enslaved character is taken offstage to be beaten by the slave owner. —Ashley Lee, Los Angeles Times, 3 Nov. 2023

Lincoln suggested the issue in Black communities may have deep and dark roots, a vestige of American slavery when slave owners discouraged sleep in favor of labor. —Marc Ramirez, USA TODAY, 30 Jan. 2024

Word History

First Known Use

1789, in the meaning defined above