ABSTRACT
Charles Blanc spoke of a “pariah,” but a pariah redeemed. The tables, as he said, had been renverser, knocked down and turned upside down and what had long been hidden from sight was now in plain sight, exposed for all to see. No longer confined to the fetid holds of negriers, men of color were literally on deck, breathing fresh air and mingling with whites, glorying in their freedom. But Blanc was speaking in 1842, inspired by revolutionary zeal, one he shared with those who favored the end of slavery, those who would soon give rise to the Second Republic and its goal to abolish the slave trade. During those intervening decades however—between 1819 when the Raft was shown at the Salon and well into the mid-century—the Raft, and especially the three black personages on its boards, suffered rejections and emendations, whitewashing the canvas of its people of color.
