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The development of slavery in Colonial America
Origins and development of slavery in Britain’s North American colonies in the period 1607 to 1776
The development of slavery in Colonial America
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- Slaves were brought to the colonies by boat , by the indentured servants whose job was to exchange passage to North America. 3. What types of jobs did slaves do in each colonial region: New England , Middle and the South? - The slaves mostly did manual labor ( mostly physical) like harvesting cash crops such as : rice, tobacco , and cotton.
The southern colonies believed in enslaving and punishing the slaves and worked them till they could not no more. People would build small cabins with no windows and had no furniture because they would be out in the fields most of the time so there was no
The Chesapeake colonies grew up on cash crops, whisking up indigo, rice, and tobacco to make ends meet. However, once they began having intentions to mass produce they had to look for a cheap method of labor. That’s when the south adopted the idea of indentured servants, which was soon to be questioned because of a rebellion. Nevertheless, it was a mistake for them that they would learn to “fix” by replacing those indentured servants with African slaves because it was more efficient and helpful. The placement of African slaves in this system led to the creation of the Barbados Slave Codes in 1661 that led to the formation of superiority between whites and blacks.
Indentured servants, were by all accounts, the main source of labor in the seventeenth century. The labor force was mainly needed for the newly discovery of the cash crop that was tobacco. It was a plant that need a lot of man power to be harvested and transported to port to be shipped back to England. “At first they turned to their overpopulated country for labor, but English indentured servants brought with them the same haphazard habits of work as their masters.” Indentured service being described as haphazard is an understatement; uprising.
The source for this was usually in the popular crops such as tobacco, rice, cotton and wheat. With this being intensive labor and highly productive, slavery became popular in the states where this took place. These states included South Carolina,
Plantation owners loved having indentured servants because it really helped them save every bit of money they could. Indentured servants did suffer a lot especially with their working schedules but, with the laws that were later passed in Virginia throughout the years and any few freedoms black had were taken away making them feel hopeless at times because of the racial diversity in the America’s at the time. Servants were being optimistic at the time, they were hoping the laws being passed would not affect their rewards for all the hard work they had endeavored throughout the four to seven year long contracts. There was many uncertainty especially with how society would treat them because of their skin color. With all these new laws being passed, most plantation owners feared for their land, indentured servants were not needed as much anymore, plantation owners turned to slavery were they had more power of the individuals and were guaranteed no profit
There is a justification to the use of slave labor, and it involves social and cultural views. To the whites, slaves were seen as inferior to them, which resulted in racism. This racism then led to the justification to use slave labor. It was this that allowed the south to obtain a large labor force without paying much. After the Civil War, a new form of labor called wage labor would appear, which would also be known as "sharecropping."
Beginning in the 17th century, European settlers began using African Americans laborers as a cheaper source of work. In southern American colonies, slavery spread like wildfire. African American slaves worked on tobacco, rice, cotton and indigo plantations. Most slave owners forbid their slaves from learning to read and write, and typically did not treat them humanly.
The colonies needed labor but did not depend on slaves, it was a society with slaves not a slave society. Since New England was behind on finding a stable crop slaves and
The process of black slavery taking route in colonial Virginia was slow. Black slavery mostly became dominant in the 1680s. Slaves became the main labor system on plantations. The amount of white indentured servants declined so the demand for black slaves became necessary in the mid-1660s. The number of white indentured servants that Virginia had up until the mid 1660s, was enough to meet white peoples labor needs.
The end of the fifteenth century is attributed as the time period in which Christopher Colombus “discovered” the Americas. Although he was allegedly the first European to have reached these unknown lands at the time, many sought to reach the new world, for a variety of reasons. Most of those people could be divided in two: the settlers and the conquerors. In North America, there were more of the former, people looking for a new home where they could rebuild their families and lives. In Meso-America, however, the goal was to exploit the lands in order to produce and extract new goods which they could trade.
Many slaves reacted by going against their owners rights and running away from the harsh conditions that were brought upon themselves. Due to the Atlantic trade England brought many Africans to the Americas in order to work on the crops that needed to be sent to the mother country. While giving the indentured servants minimal work, due to their skin color. The impact of such harsh conditions enforced on the Africans led to the uprising against the whites in the American colonies. Also, it led to a new social hierarchal system in the
They had to work from sunrise to sunset and even in terrible conditions. They were treated badly and some died because they wouldn’t eat or the Europeans would kill them. Some Slaves tried to escape but sadly many died because they would get
The slave colony I’ve chosen to focus on was in the state of Georgia in the United States. The European power that controlled it was the British. The conditions of the Georgian slaves differed depending on their masters and their place of residence. Most of the Georgian slave population worked on cotton plantations, but there was also a portion that worked on rice plantations. The slaves who worked on cotton plantations usually had some sense of community among themselves, but were surrounded by more white people.
In the southern colonies the main people that inhabited the area were Catholics and protestants. The southern colonies ended up becoming excessively dependent on a plantation company that required slavery. Slavery was not a great solution to the labor problem but because a large portion or people owned a lot slaves and since that ownership was viewed as their wealth they were loathed to give up those slaves without financial compensation. Slavery was allowed in New England but very few people owned slaves. The Northern Colonies decided to take the weakling way out.
