Colonial Slavery in the Western Hemisphere prior to 1793 Thomas Paine.

Essay by Scott07High School, 11th grade October 2005

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Colonial Slavery started back in 1619 when a Dutch ship had brought African Americans to Jamestown, Virginia to work on tobacco plantations. At this time they, also like poor Englishmen, were only considered indentured servants who would be released after they have paid off their debt to their owner. As the population in the Americas grew over time, so did the size and amount of plantations that they had. The owners could not work the plantations alone and they found out that they could get cheap labor by having a mass of indentured servants. However, over the course of the 17th century, a race-based system formed. This led to the idea of shipping Africans over to the Americas from the west coast of Africa. These Africans were then the main source of labors in the Americas. They were slaves that were bound for life to there owner, and could be sold or killed as property.

On the African west coast they captured Africans by kidnapping them or raiding there villages. When the Dutch ship arrived in Jamestown, they needed supplies, so they sold and traded the Africans for food.

The idea of changing to slavery of Africans was influenced by the Caribbean islands. Here they grew sugarcane, a very valuable crop, with a huge group of slaves. Life here was harsh for they were fed little and life expectation was very short. Since slaves were considered property, they figured that if a child was born from a slave, then they also owned them. This led to the idea of breeding humans for agricultural use, just like other livestock. Once the child was born, owners would feed them a little more to allow them to grow fast and stronger. This way the child would be able to work the fields at...