Slavery: British North America
1619: Dutch ship with Africans arrives at Jamestown – the legal status of
these men are unclear, perhaps they sold as slaves for a limited period of
time or entered into indentured contracts.
1623: Virginia colonial records list some Africans as servants but with no
reference to contracts.
1624: African slaves accompany settlers to what is later known as
Massachusetts Bay Colony.
1626: The first cargo of African slaves was imported by the Dutch West India
Company into New Amsterdam. Slavery in the Dutch colony was an
economic status, rather than a social status.
1630: Dutch West India Company dominates the slave trade until 1650.
1637: Massachusetts Bay Colony sends Pequot Indians as slaves to the
Caribbean sugar islands, receiving African slave in exchange.
1640: First record of a slave in Virginia colony.
1641: The Massachusetts Bay Assembly passed the first slave law, which
specifically linked slavery to Biblical authority, and established for
slaves the set of rules "which the law of God, established in Israel
concerning such people, doth morally require."
1660: After this year, the number of indentured servants coming from
England decreases significantly.
1660: Royal African Company – English joint-stock company founded to
profit from the slave trading industry. By the end of the 17th century GB
has replace Holland as the leader in the slave trade.
1662: First slave code passed by Virginia Assembly – a child born of a slave
mother maintains the status of slavery.
Slavery and the Law in Virginia
1662
Negro women's children to serve accounting to the condition of the
mother.
1667
An act declaring the baptism of slaves doth not exempt them from
bondage.
1669
An act about the casual killing of slaves....If any slaves resist his
master (or other by his master's order correcting him) and by the
extremity of the correction should chance to die, that his death shall
not be attempted felony.
1670
No Negroes nor Indians to buy Christian servants.
1672
An act for the apprehension and suppression of runaways, Negroes
and slaves....If any Negroe, mulatto, Indian slave, or servant for life,
runaway and shall be pursued by the warrant or hue and cry, it shall
and may be lawful for any person who shall endeavour to take them,
upon the resistance of such Negro, mulatto, Indian slave, or servant
for life, to kill or wound him or them so resisting....And if it happen
that such Negroe, mulatto, Indian slave, or servants for life doe dye of
any wound in such their resistance received the master or owner of
such shall receive satisfaction from the public....
1680
An act for preventing Negroes' Insurrections. Whereas the frequent
meeting of considerable numbers of Negroe slaves under pretence of
feasts and burials is judged of dangerous consequence...it shall not be
lawful for any Negroe or other slave to carry or arm himself with any
club, staff, gun, sword, or any other weapon of defense or offense, not
to goe or depart from his master's ground without a certificate from
his master...and such permission not to be granted but upon particular
and necessary operations; and every Negroe or slave so offending not
having a certificate...[will receive] twenty lashes on his bare back well
laid....If any Negroe or other slave shall absent himself from his
master's service and lie hid and lurking in obscure places...it shall be
lawful...to kill the said Negroe or slave....
1682
An additional act for the better preventing insurrections by
Negroes....No master or overseer knowingly permit or suffer...any
Negroe or slave not properly belonging to him or them, to remain or
be upon his or their plantation above the space of four hours at any
one time....
1691
Virginia voted to banish any white man or woman who married a
black, mulatto, or Indian. Any white woman who gave birth to a
mulatto child was required to pay a heavy fine or be sold for a five
year term of servitude.
1705: The Virginia Assembly passes the Slave Codes. These laws limited the
personal liberties and rights of black slaves.
"All servants imported and brought into the Country...who were not Christians
in their native Country...shall be accounted and be slaves. All Negro, mulatto
and Indian slaves within this dominion...shall be held to be real estate. If any
slave resist his master...correcting such slave, and shall happen to be killed in
such correction...the master shall be free of all punishment...as if such accident
never happened."
1720 – 1750s: Slaves in Boston were forbidden to buy provisions in market;
carry a stick or a cane; keep hogs or swine; or stroll about the streets,
lanes, or Common at night or at all on Sunday. Punishments for
violation of these laws ranged up to 20 lashes, depending on
aggravating factors. A special law allowed severe whippings for any
black person who hit a white one. Men and women who married or
had a relationship with a person of the other race were severely
punished (slaves more than free of course!).
Additional Information about Slavery in the North:
State
Mass.
N.H.
N.Y.
Conn.
R.I.
Pa.
N.J.
Vt.
European
settlement
1620
1623
1624
1633
1636
1638
1620
1666
First record of
slavery
1629?
1645
1626
1639
1652
1639
1626?
c.1760?
Official end of
slavery
1783
1783
1799
1784
1784
1780
1804
1777
Actual end of
slavery
1783
c.1845?
1827
1848
1842
c.1845?
1865
1777?
Percent black
1790
1.4%
0.6%
7.6%
2.3%
6.3%
2.4%
7.7%
0.3%
Percent black
1860
0.78%
0.15%
1.26%
1.87%
2.26%
1.95%
3.76%
0.22%
Slave Imports into the Americas (1500 – 1870)
Country / Region
British North America
Spanish America
British Caribbean
French Caribbean
Dutch Caribbean
Danish Caribbean
Brazil
Old World
Total
Number of slaves imported
523,000
1,687,000
2,443,000
1,655,000
500,000
50,000
4,190,000
297,000
11,345,000
Slave Population in the Colonies 1650 – 1770
Year
1650
1670
1690
1710
1730
1750
1770
North
880
1,125
3,340
8,303
17,323
30,222
48,460
South
720
3,410
13,389
36,563
73,698
206,198
411,362
Total
1,600
4,535
16,729
44,866
91,021
236,420
459,822