I'm currently into an eye-opening book about southern US slavery. The biographic main character is a slave named Robert Smalls. The book title is "Yearning to breathe free" by Andrew Billingsley and ... it's a terrific read.
You might want to read “Weevils in the Wheat: Interviews with Virginia Ex-slaves”. It’s a collection of interviews done in the 1930s. First hand accounts of their memories of slavery.