How would a slave owner have been informed of this? Would they just have immediately walked out to the slave huts and told them to go away? What exactly would have happened between the moment of official abolition of slavery and the moment that the slaves on some random plantation would have walked free?
Piggybacking:
In the immediate aftermath of abolition, how were slave-dependent industries (like the stareotypical cotton industry) affected? How did they adjust? Surely crops still had to be planted, harvested, shipped, and so on, right? Where did the labor come from? Did business owners suddenly just start paying their slaves-turned-employees, and everything continued as before? Or....?
Also, what happened to the economies in the south? With free labor suddenly turning into labor costs, I'm guessing there were lots of bankruptcies and mergers and defaults...? How long did it take the economy/economies in the South to recover and normalize? How did the economic fallout in the South affect those individuals and businesses in the North?
Thanks!
TL;DR: What were the immediate/short-term economic/market effects that resulted from Abolition? Assuming turmoil was among these effects, how long did it take for the economy in the related geographic regions to stabilize and normalize?
This is a great question! Fortunately, I found this great answer from not too long ago, that I have added to the FAQ.
I think the thread referenced earlier answers the question on a macro level. If you are more interested in what was happening on the ground at that time, the Library of Congress has collected some first first hand anecdotal accounts as part of the Federal Writers Project.
An example:
"Some Union soldiers come and told us that we was free like dey was and told us not to be afraid, dey wouldn't hurt us. Dey told us de war was over. De master told mother not to go away, dat if she stayed a while he would give her a couple hundred dollars. We stayed a while but she never got no money."
It's been a while since I looked through this source, but I believe that you will find many similar stories where the former slave owner offered to pay wages, and either didn't, or paid some trifling amount.
Is there any record of plantation owners trying to keep slaves anyway? Were others forced to pay the slaves they had/offer to set them free? Plantations need workers and the ex-slaves need jobs. Seems reasonable enough to just stay. Any experts who can weigh in?