He occasionally visited[259]—for example, he spent much of April 1844 on his Mississippi plantation, right before the Democratic convention.[260]
Adding to the inherited enslaved people, in 1831, Polk purchased five more, mostly buying them in Kentucky, and expending $1,870; the youngest had a recorded age of 11. As older children sold for a higher price, slave sellers routinely lied about age. Between 1834 and 1835, he bought five more, aged from 2 to 37, the youngest a granddaughter of the oldest. The amount expended was $2,250. In 1839, he bought eight enslaved people from his brother William at a cost of $5,600. This represented three young adults and most of a family, though not including the father, whom James Polk had previously owned, and who had been sold to a slave trader as he had repeatedly tried to escape his enslavement.[261]
The expenses of four campaigns (three for governor, one for the presidency) in six years kept Polk from making more slave purchases until after he was living in the White House.