Chesapeake Bay Area In The 1600s

In Virginia, the Chesapeake Bay area during the 1600s the slave community evolved over a long period of time. Problems occurred regarding their labor that had an important influence on the switch to a society dominated by slave labor. During the 1600s labor in the Chesapeake shifted to slave society because of a shift in culture, economic issues, and frustrations of the tobacco market boom. Each of these reasons all relate back to the labor problem the colonists were facing in Virginia. As mentioned above, one of the reasons that shifted the Chesapeake Bay area into a slave society was a shift in culture. In the early decades, people’s economic status was an important identifier for what benefits they could receive, or what they could and

The tobacco industry in Virginia started to boom from the 1620’s through the 1660’s. Because of this boom in production, the colonists of Virginia faced a major problem. The problem that arose was that the colonist did not have enough workers to grow the tobacco anymore. As a result of this issue, the colony began to receive indentured servants in order to keep up with the high production of tobacco. Indentured servants were the lower sorts from England who were bought for about 15-10 pounds and then were also apart of what is called the headwright system. The people of Virginia preferred young single men when searching for indentured servants to come over and work. The headwright system included a contract that lasted somewhere between four and seven years of being a slave. These servants were treated like property, lived a poor lifestyle and were punished harshly. However, if you were a servant who survived your contract you were rewarded freedom dues. Freedom dues included new clothes, new tools, seeds, and 50 acres of your own land. In the beginning, they chose indentured servants over African slaves because they were less expensive. The population differences between whites and Africans differed greatly in colonial Virginia. For example, starting in 1616 there were about 350 whites and zero Africans. By 1640 there were around 10,000

As a consequence, this frustration was another reason why the Chesapeake shifted to a slave dominated society. The common planters took their frustration out on their governor, William Berkeley. William Berkeley did not want to give them what they want or help them because he did not want to start another war with the Indians. Since Berkeley would not fulfill their needs the colonist found someone else who would. The person they found was Nathaniel Bacon. In comparison to William Berkeley, Bacon agrees to lead the attacks against William Berkeley’s order in 1676. This is then known as Bacon’s rebellion. Bacon stops attacking the Native Americans and decides to turn his rebellion against the governor. During this rebellion, the Governor flees, and the rebellion burns down his mansion and all of Jamestown. Bacon dies in October and by 1677 the rebellion is finished. As a result of Bacon’s rebellions, servants stop coming over, and now more Africans make their way over to the Chesapeake. Once more Africans started making their way over, positive notions were started to be realized by the planners looking for help. For example, they realized that Africans had become the better investment than indentured servants. Although the price for an African slave was greater than the price for an indentured servant, planners could now have a slave work for them for the rest of their life in addition