“Truth it is that through our long peace and seldom
sickness…we are grown more populous than ever
heretofore; so that now that there are…so many, that can
hardly live by one another,…yea many thousands of idle
persons are within this realm.”
Richard Hakluyt, “A Rationale for New World Colonization”
According to Captain John Smith, Jamestown was a “ ‘fruitfull
and delightsome land’ where “‘heaven and earth never
agreed better to frame a place for mans habitation.’”
Cited in Davidson, “Serving Time in Virginia”, p. 7.
“As described by historian Abbot Emerson Smith, they
included convicts, ‘rogues, vagabonds, whores, cheats, and
rabble of all descriptions, raked from the gutter,’ ‘decoyed,
deceived, seduced, inveigled, or forcibly kidnapped and
carried as servants to the plantations.’ They were regarded
as the ‘surplus inhabitants’ of England.” Ronald Takaki, A
Different Mirror, p. 54
“In sum, this enterprise [Jamestown] will minister matter for
all sorts and states of men to work upon;…yea, old folds,
lame persons, women, and young children, by many
means…shall be kept from idleness, and be made able by
their own honest and easy labour to find themselves without
surcharging others.” Richard Hakluyt, “A Rationale for New
World Colonization”
According to Captain John Smith, Jamestown was a “ ‘fruitfull
and delightsome land’ where “‘heaven and earth never
agreed better to frame a place for mans habitation.’”
Cited in Davidson, “Serving Time in Virginia”, p. 7.
In 1607, 120 colonists arrived in Jamestown and according
to the charter granted to them by King James, their mission
was to “ ‘first to preach and baptize into the Christian
religion… and recover out of the arms of the Devil a number
of poor and miserable souls.’ ”
Charles Johnson and Patricia Smith, Africans in America:
America’s Journey Through Slavery, p. 29
According to Sir Walter Raleigh, “‘I never saw a more
beautiful country, nor more lively prospects…the plains
adjoining without bush or stubble, all fair green grass,…the
air fresh with a gentle easterly wind, and every stone that
we stooped to take up, promised either gold or silver.’” Cited
in Charles Johnson and Patricia Smith, Africans in America:
America’s Journey Through Slavery, p. 31.
“Criminals escapes the gallows by signing up. In some
instances, innocent people were accused of crimes in order
to force them into indentures. People were kidnapped, plied
with alcohol. Children were offered sweets.” Charles Johnson
and Patricia Smith, Africans in America, p. 34.
John Rolfe writing to Sir Edwin Sandys: “About the latter end
of August, a Dutch man of Warr of the burden of 160 tunnes
arriued at Point-Confort…He brought not any thing but 20
and odd Negroes, wch the Governor and Cape Marchant
bought for victualle (whereof he was in greate need as he
pretended) at the best and easiest rate they could.” Engel
Sluiter, “New Light on the ‘20 and Odd Negroes’ Arriving in
Virginia, August 1619”, p. 395-6
Captain John Smith writing in the Generall Historie of
Virginia, “Nay so great was our famine, that a salvage we
slew and buried, the poorer sot tooke him up again and eat
him; and so did divers one another boyled and stewed with
roots and herbs:…”
Charles Johnson and Patricia Smith, Africans in America: , p. 32.
TREATED EQUALLY/ COMMON INTERESTS
“Slavery or modified slavery was a distinct possibility for all
disadvantaged people—Indian as well as black and white
immigrants. So to was open society. Socioeconomic
forces…tobacco…and capitalist planting techniques based on
the use of gang labor tilted the structure in the direction of
Negro slavery.”
Lerone Bennett, Confrontation: Black and White
“Virginia legislated against intermingling in 1662, 1691,
1696, 1705, 1753, 1765. There were similar paroxysms in
other states.” Lerone Bennett, Confrontation: Black and
White
“White and black, they shared a condition of class
exploitation and abuse; they were all unfree laborers.
Sometimes they had to wear iron collars around their necks.
When they were recalcitrant, they were beaten and event
tortured. They were required to have passes whenever they
left their plantations. White and black, laborers experienced
the day-to-day exhaustion and harshness of work.”
Ronald Takaki, A Different Mirror, p. 55.
“A white servant in Virginia was undoubtedly expressing the
anguish of many laborers, whether from Europe or Africa,
when he wrote: ‘I thought no head had been able to hold so
much water as hath and doth daily flow from mine eyes.’”
Ronald Takaki, A Different Mirror, p. 55.
“Their status as free men was always in danger of
debasement: planters bought, sold and traded servants
without their consent, and on occasion they even used them
as stakes in gambling games. There had been ‘many
complaints,’ acknowledged John Rolfe, ‘against the
Governors, Captaines, and Officers in Virginia: for buying
and selling men and boies,’ something that ‘was held in
England a thing most intolerable.’”
Davidson, “Serving Time in Virginia”, p. 16
“One Englishman put the indignity quite succinctly: ‘My
Master Atkins hath sold me for a £150 sterling like a damnd
slave.” Davidson, “Serving Time in Virginia”, p. 16
Elisabeth Key was ½ English and ½ African. She was a
servant to an Englishman from 1636-1645 (9 years) and a
servant to another Englishman, John Mottrom until 1655. In
1656, she sued for her freedom claiming her father was free,
she “was sold for 9 years” [implication that it’s an
indentured servitude contract] and that she was Christian.
[Court recognized her ability to sue.] Court ruled she was
free. After an appeal, she was denied her freedom. The
General Assembly investigated and her owners dropped
their opposition and she was declared free. William M.
Billings, “The Case of Fernando and Elizabeth Key”
“…‘Antonio, a Negro’ is listed as a “servant” in 1625 census.”
“…court records in 1641 indicate that Anthony was master
to a black servant, John Casor.”
“In 1645, a man identified as ‘Anthony the negro’ stated in
court records, ‘now I know myne owne ground and I will
worke when I please and play when I please.’”
By 1650, the Johnsons [Antony and his wife Mary] owned
250 acres of land that they got through the headright
system.
Charles Johnson and Patricia Smith, Africans in America:
America’s Journey Through Slavery, p. 38-39.
“Land patent granted to Anthony Johnson, on 250 acres for
transport of five persons…” Virginia Land Patent Book No. 2,
p. 326,24 July 1651.
3 indentured servants of Hugh Gwyn: Victor the Dutchman,
James Gregory the Scotsman and John Punch the Negro.
They ran away from their master together. They all “shall
receive the punishment of whipping and to have thirty
stripes apiece.” Then Victor and James Gregory owe the
colony 3 years after their service is done but John Punch, the
Negro, must serve for the rest of his life.
H[enry] R[ead] McIllwaine, ed. Minutes of Council and
General Court of Virginia…
“Court records indicted repeated instances of blacks and
whites conspiring to escape together. In one case, the
Virginia court declared, ‘Whereas [six English]…Servants…
and Jno. A negro Servant…hath Run away and Absented
themselves from their…masters Two months, It is ordered
that the Sherriffe…take Care that all of them be
whipped…and Each of them have thirty nine lashes well
layed on…” Ronald Takaki, A Different Mirror, p. 55
1661 law—if you run away from your master, you owe him
double the time of your indenture. If you are English and
you run away with a Negro and the Negro dies, you will have
to pay the Negro’s master 4,500 in tobacco or 4 years of
service. Statues 2:116-117
“White and black, Bacon’s solders formed what
contemporaries described as, ‘an incredible Number of the
meanest People,’ ‘every where Armed.’ They were the ‘tag,
rag, and bobtayle,’ the ‘Rabble’ against ‘the better sort of
people.’”
Ronald Takaki, A Different Mirror, p. 64
Negro women’s children retain the status of their mother.
December 1662, Act XII
Servants cannot go abroad without a license. September
1663, Act XVIII