Slavery in Virginia

What impact did bringing slaves to the Americas have on the Americas?

Come up with one short term and one long term impact.

Answer this in your notebooks – today we will be taking some short notes on slavery in Virginia

Indentured Servants

High unemployment in England & a need for labor in the colonies Colonist paid for transport, food, clothing

shelter Servants agreed to work to pay them back

Usually contracted for 4+ years>1/2 died before gaining freedom

By early 1700’s, slavery overtook indentured servitude

Slavery in Virginia

1619 – the first Africans were brought to Virginia 20 Africans captured in Caribbean Slaves or Indentured servants?

Laws did not recognize slavery…yet

By mid-1600’s slavery was legal in Virginia Hereditary system Status of all blacks (free & slave) was lowered

1650 – 300 Africans in Virginia

Anthony JohnsonArrived in Virginia in 1621

“Antonio, a Negro” By 1635, Anthony & his wife were free

Owned over 250 acres of land (tobacco)Also owned a slave

Sad footnote: upon his death in 1670: A court ruled him "a negro and by consequence,

an alien“ Most of his land was seized

Showed fluid race relations in early colonial period

The Middle Passage“At last, when the ship we were in had got in all her cargo,...we were all put under deck, so that we could not see how they managed the vessel. But this disappointment was the least of my sorrow. The stench of the hold while we were on the coast was so intolerably loathsome, that it was dangerous to remain there for any time, and some of us had been permitted to stay on the deck for the fresh air; but now that the whole ship's cargo were confined together, it became absolutely pestilential. The closeness of the place, and the heat of the climate, added to the number in the ship, which was so crowded that each had scarcely room to turn himself, almost suffocated us. This produced copious perspirations, so that the air soon became unfit for respiration, from a variety of loathsome smells, and brought on a sickness among the slaves, of which many died. This wretched situation was again aggravated by the galling of the chains, now became insupportable; and the filth of the necessary tubs, into which the children often fell, and were almost suffocated. The shrieks of the women, and the groans of the dying, rendered the whole a scene of horror almost inconceivable.”

-from The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano

La Amistad (1839)