1. Black People in Colonial
Chapter 3
Black People in Colonial
North America,

2. Ch. 3, Sec. 2: “The Peoples of Eastern North America”
Complex relationships between black people and Indians existed in early America
Race mixing between both groups early on was common

3. The British and Jamestown (p.73)
First permanent British colony in North America (1607)
Tobacco was a profitable crop, but labor intensive
“Undesirables” from England can do it!
Indentured servants – most often white until 1700

4. Ch. 3, Sec. 2: “Africans Arrive In the Chesapeake”
August Dutch ship arrives with Africans
Colony considered them “Unfree,” not slaves because the English
had no law for slavery and
were forbidden to enslave Christians (some of these Africans had been converted!)

5. 1619 Landing of Negroes at Jamestown from a Dutch Man-of-War

6. Black Servitude In the Chesapeake (p. 76)
Indentured servants
Sold their labor (2-7 years) for passage to region
High mortality ~ most died before term expired (due to overwork and/or disease)
Included both blacks and whites
Only skin color distinguished early laborers
Worked, lived, and slept together as “unfree”
Earned freedom at the end of term
Anthony Johnson is an example (p. 77)

7. Curing Tobacco
SOURCE: Courtesy of the Library of Congress
This eighteenth-century woodcut shows enslaved black men, women, and children engaged in the steps involved in the curing of tobacco.

8. Indentured Servant Contract

9. Black Servitude In the Chesapeake (p. 76)
Slowly the idea, “that persons of African descent were alien” took hold in the Chesapeake area leading to
Chattel slavery
Slaves were legal private property on a level with livestock!

10. Race and Origins of Black Slavery (p. 77)
Race and class shaped the character of slavery
Believed Africans were inferior to English (like the Irish and Native Americans before)
By 1640s Africans could not
bear arms
become Christian
Discrimination in colonial policies

11. The Emergence of Chattel Slavery (p. 79)
From “unfree” to slave for life
Mid-17th century men, women, and children served masters for life
Slavery followed the mother

12. The Emergence of Chattel Slavery (p. 79), cont.
Slave codes ( ) aimed to control and exploit
owning property, making contracts, leaving without a pass
Christianity offered no protection against enslavement
This is the form of slavery that remains in effect until the American Civil War!