Blood on the Forge
First edition cover
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| Author | William Attaway |
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| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Novel, Proletarian literature |
| Publisher | Doubleday, Doran |
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Publication date
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1941 |
| Media type | Print (hardback) |
| Pages | 279 |
| OCLC | 5284808 |
| Preceded by | Let Me Breathe Thunder |
Blood on the Forge is a migration novel by the African-American writer William Attaway set in the steel valley of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania during the 1919, a time when vast numbers of Black Americans moved northward. Attaway's own family was part of this population shift from South to North when he was a child.
His novel follows the Moss brothers as they escape the inequality of sharecropping in the South only to encounter inequality in the mills of the North. Their story illustrates the tragedy and hardships many Black Americans faced during the Great Migration. Blood on the Forge touches on themes such as the destruction of nature, the emptiness and hunger that the working characters experience, the complications of the individual in a depersonalized world, and the myth of the American Dream.
During his childhood in the 1910s, author William Attaway traveled with his family from the segregated south of Mississippi to the northern city of Chicago, Illinois; in doing so his family became part of what would be known as the Great Migration. From 1910 to 1930, approximately six million African Americans moved from the rural southern United States to the industrialized north. The northern states of Illinois, Ohio, Indiana, New York and Michigan received the majority of the migrating African Americans. Factors motivating blacks to migrate north included the plentiful job opportunities in Northern industry, and the desire to escape the harsh racial climate of the south. As a result, neighborhoods in Northern cities saw drastic changes in population and an increase in issues concerning housing. Many cultural movements were spawned due to the large influx in black populations in the North, including the Harlem Renaissance and the spread of jazz music.
The novel opens in Kentucky, in the year 1919; sharecropping half-brothers Big Mat, Chinatown, and Melody Moss are in dire straits. After their mule dragged their mother to her death, Big Mat killed the animal in a fit of rage. Now without a mule, the brothers are unable to work their land, and are likely to starve. The landowner, Mr. Johnston, agrees to give the brothers another mule.
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