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Slavery in America during the late 1700s
Slavery in America during the late 1700s
Slavery in the 18th and 19th century
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Bacon’s Rebellion Produces Freedom and Slavery The problems occurring in Virginia at the time, the response to problems occurring, and the passion for change by both the Africans and white laborer contributed to the birth of slavery and freedom both during and after Bacon’s Rebellion. Nathaniel Bacon was a wealthy landowner, who brought men together because of the issues occurring under the rule of Governor Berkeley. The quote, “Bacon’s Rebellion marks a turning point in American ideas of race, giving birth to black slavery and American freedom,” is true because it showed the government how strong the Africans and white men became when they united for a cause, the government then had to take actions to make sure this would never happen again. …show more content…
Many of the decisions and actions because of Bacon’s Rebellion caused repercussions, which produced the segregated jobs of slave and slave owner seen throughout history.
The problems that were occurring in Virginia at the time played a crucial part in the formation of Bacon’s Rebellion. Life in the Chesapeake region in the seventeenth century was unpleasant. Most men and women did not live over twenty. Many diseases such as malaria and typhoid were being passed around. Many of the immigrants and colonists were men. This caused an imbalance between men and women, which meant that many men did not marry. Families were also fragile and undone. As the eighteenth century came around, it began to become more stable. Their main profit was tobacco. To produce as much tobacco as they needed for their profit they needed a lot of workers. Indians died fairly quickly and Africans at the time were too expensive. This caused the colonists to use indentured servants. These men volunteered to work for a certain amount of time. Virginia used the head-right system, which was when wealthy men would pay to send servants to America and in return were rewarded with land. The indentured servants were working for land, but as land grew scarce, many masters did not give the land they had promised. These events led many servants to …show more content…
become aggravated they were penniless, jobless, land-less, and wifeless. Nathaniel Bacon who had worked with Governor William Berkeley before reached out to him because Native Americans had been attacking. Berkeley had no response because he did not want to ruin his relationship with the Indians, who helped him make a large personal profit in the fur market. Some former servants and penniless men were also not given any rights, which included not being able to vote. Due to these problems and lack of answers to pleas of justice, men became aggravated and looked towards Bacon. These men gathered together and under Bacon attacked the Indians, threw Berkeley out of Jamestown, and put up a fire. Bacon also created the “Declaration in the Name of the People,” in which he stated the many faults of Berkeley. Bacon and his followers, of which were both African and white affected how society was built in the coming years. The actions of Bacon in response to Berkeley caused a new defining in society, which had not been there before.
Before Bacon’s Rebellion there was an open viewed society, Africans were masters, whites were slaves, and more variations. But, after the rebellion the government needed to control the refuted laws they had set, which caused the catastrophic outbreak. The masters, put their minds on Africa for less rambunctious servants and slaves. In 1662, “slave codes” were established in Virginia, which delineated the hazy line that had once been drawn for the difference of servants and slaves. The “slave codes” made slavery hereditary and they were based on race. The line of color, which had been produced slavery built by race and slavery shaping society, eventually made boundaries from decrees and laws that separated them. Before Bacon’s rebellion any person could be called a slave, but now as nervous landowners and masters wanted the easiest and least problematic laborers, they made the laws. Another affect from Bacon’s Rebellion was the rights given to white men. They were given land and farms, although this was a step onto the ladder of power, they still were not allowed political positions to give their opinion. No other uprising caused by slaves amounted to the scale of Bacon’s Rebellion. The Protestant Reformation is a foundational event, like Bacon’s Rebellion, which caused societal changes. The Protestant Reformation started by Martin Luther ignited a flame for
religious reform that many men and women wanted to follow. The reformations included problems, like Bacon’s Rebellion that were caused by the government. This small effort became a large exertion in Europe. This eventually produced Calvinism and Puritanism. Unlike Bacon’s Rebellion the repercussions caused by the reformation did not cause defining lines to be made between each individual, rather big denominational religions. A South Carolina slave revolt in 1739, in which fifty blacks at the Stono River tried to invade Spanish Florida, was stopped by military. These African slaves ended up being more tightly chained by labor forced, than the indentured servants had been. This invasion in Carolina and many others never amounted to anything, other than harsher laws and restriction, unlike the vicissitudes caused by Bacon. Bacon’s Rebellion causing a change in views and restrictions in society is similar to other events that produced societal alterations. Other slave rebellions, such as Nat Turner’s Slave Rebellion, throughout the centuries following were caused by the harsh restrictions put on Africans. These processes of revolt against these conformities were essentially non-moral. They connect to the bigger theme in history of isolation and exclusion positioned upon blacks. This theme started as slavery became relevant, was delineated through rebellions such as Bacon, and finally eliminated by Martin Luther King Jr., and many other great men and women before and after his time who worked for change. The complications in Virginia before Bacon’s Rebellion, the responses to these troubles, and the excitement for change caused by servants and slaves, produced a separated society by color. Some scholars believe that Bacon’s Rebellion only made a highlighting of what society was. But, society was not built on separation of white and black; it was molded to fit that. It did indeed create a change in slavery and freedom, in one instant.
Many people know about the Revolutionary war and how the colonists seized their independence from the British. What most do not understand is that there was a series of events that steared the colonists onto the road to independence. They began to think for themselves and started to challenge authority. Coming to the New World, the colonists reached for power and financial opportunity when challenging authority in these three examples: the Witchcraft Trials, Bacon’s Rebellion, and the Boston Tea Party.
Both the Slaves and Virginian farmers were able to orchestrate precise blows to their oppressors in an effort to gain their rights. The Virginian farmers did this by attacking the seat of government in the region while the African slaves forged a path towards the free Spanish Florida. These pushes towards a future with more rights were not possible without the unifying of numerous slaves, and farmers alike. As one the farmers and slaves could do nothing, but under the leadership of men such as Nathaniel Bacon and Jemmy (leader of the Stono Rebellion), they were able to make a lasting impact on their governments. Unified as one force these groups were able to seize the capital of Virginia and stand face to face with their enemy who denied them basic human
The use of labor came in two forms; indenture servitude and Slavery used on plantations in the south particularly in Virginia. The southern colonies such as Virginia were based on a plantation economy due to factors such as fertile soil and arable land that can be used to grow important crops, the plantations in the south demanded rigorous amounts of labor and required large amounts of time, the plantation owners had to employ laborers in order to grow crops and sell them to make a profit. Labor had become needed on the plantation system and in order to extract cheap labor slaves were brought to the south in order to work on the plantations. The shift from indentured servitude to slavery was an important time as well as the factors that contributed to that shift, this shift affected the future generations of African American descent. The history of colonial settlements involved altercations and many compromises, such as Bacons Rebellion, and slavery one of the most debated topics in the history of the United States of America. The different problems that occurred in the past has molded into what is the United States of America, the reflection in the past provides the vast amount of effort made by the settlers to make a place that was worth living on and worth exploring.
Since it was easier to grow grain and livestock in the Mid-Atlantic region, there was a diverse group of farmers, fishermen, and merchants who worked in those colonies. The environmental conditions were ideal for farms of various sizes and the Middle colonists could trade in market areas where the colonial regions met. Although a lot of money could be made by growing tobacco (in Maryland especially) and other cash crops, they were bad for the soil and people needed more land. However, this resulted in a newfound lack of labor, which was an issue. For instance, families procreated too slowly, there was a high infant mortality rate, African slaves cost too much, and, according to the colonists, Native Americans didn’t make good slaves. Eventually white indentured servants from Europe were recruited to work on plantations, but it was a difficult life for them- even after they were freed they continued to earn low wages. This high demand of cash crops in Maryland and other Middle colonies led to an overall decline in the wellness of the
Bacon's rebellion was also known as a civil war. Nathaniel Bacon led the rebellion against Governor Berkeley due the corruption within the tobacco farmer wealthiest. Bacon rebelled because he felt the government mainly Berkeley was showing favoritism to the Indians by not letting poorer farms us the Indians lands and not caring enough about their own colonists. The reason being Bacon felt the Indians where a problem to the economy when in reality they were not the cause of the economy decline. This shows how prejudice Bacon is toward the Indians and their contribution to the trading policy. Bacon and Berkeley where both very selfish men in history's view point they both saw the running of the government in different lights. Bacon was against
...ve in Virginia did not mean immigrants were free from its rule. Upon departing England, those leaving would take an “oath of allegiance and supremacy” (Virginia Ship’s List). This meant that the people owed their loyalty to the monarch of England, not to Virginia itself. The colonists of Virginia could have been frustrated that their head official was chosen by a single person, a person who had no place within their community. In fact, Berkeley, the governor the monarch of England elected, “brought high taxes on the people, increased his power at the expense of local officials and created a monopoly on Indian trade” (Divine, 85). This abuse of power is possibly one of the causes of rebellions, specifically Bacon’s rebellion. This republic government leading the Virginia Colony was an increasingly stark contrast to the Massachusetts’ Colony’s democratic government.
Mainly because so many of the settlers that came during that time were indentured servants. “Of the 120,000 English immigrants who entered the Chesapeake region during the seventeenth century, three-quarters came as servants” (Foner 61). Although many of them died while they were still under contract, a very large number of them were able to settle in the colonies. They were an important part of life just as every African slave was. They did almost all of the work that was involved in handling crops of corn, cotton, and mostly tobacco that was used during that time. They were a normal part of life during that time period that was essential to the settlement of America. Indentured servants also had an impact in the ratio of men to women in the colonies. “Men in the Chesapeake outnumbered women for most of the seventeenth century by our or five to one. The vast majority of women who emigrated to the region came as indentured servants. Since they usually had to complete their terms of service before marrying, they did not begin to form families until their mid-twenties. The high death rate, unequal ratio between the sexes, and late age of marriage for those who found partners retarded population growth and produced a society with large umbers of single men, widows, and orphans” (Foner
The American Revolution was a “light at the end of the tunnel” for slaves, or at least some. African Americans played a huge part in the war for both sides. Lord Dunmore, a governor of Virginia, promised freedom to any slave that enlisted into the British army. Colonists’ previously denied enlistment to African American’s because of the response of the South, but hesitantly changed their minds in fear of slaves rebelling against them. The north had become to despise slavery and wanted it gone. On the contrary, the booming cash crops of the south were making huge profits for landowners, making slavery widely popular. After the war, slaves began to petition the government for their freedom using the ideas of the Declaration of Independence,” including the idea of natural rights and the notion that government rested on the consent of the governed.” (Keene 122). The north began to fr...
...owners holding too much political and economic power, as personified by Governor Berkeley. Thus the landless, freed indentured servants revolted in 1676 in Bacon's Rebellion, as is stated in Bacon's Manifesto symbolizing the conflict in Virginia between its aristocratic and poor inhabitants of the back county over the aristocracy's concentration of power and refusal to help those living in the frontier.
There were many views on the issue of slavery during the Enlightenment and the French Revolution, and the resolution of slavery affected. economics, politics, and social order. The slave trade triangle between Europe, West Africa, and the Indies. great effect on European economics during this time. The only way for this elaborate trade triangle to work is if there were black Africans available for export to the Indies as slaves.
The first arrivals of Africans in America were treated similarly to the indentured servants in Europe. Black servants were treated differently from the white servants and by 1740 the slavery system in colonial America was fully developed.
Rebellions have always been prominent in America; most recently the Ferguson riots in Missouri. These citizens are rebelling against American police, because they believe blacks aren’t treated with the same respect than white people. Although, The first recorded rebellion that occurred in America is known as the Bacon’s Rebellion. A rebellion against the English government by a man named Nathaniel Bacon. Nathaniel Bacon was brought up as a moderately rich and powerful man. He was known as a “young, bold, active, of an inviting aspect, and powerful elocution” (Beverley pg. 2). Nathaniel Bacon can be remembered as a hero for leading a lower class against a “corrupt” government and creating unity between communities, but it also can be argued
Slavery was created in pre-revolutionary America at the start of the seventeenth century. By the time of the Revolution, slavery had undergone drastic changes and was nothing at all what it was like when it was started. In fact the beginning of slavery did not even start with the enslavement of African Americans. Not only did the people who were enslaved change, but the treatment of slaves and the culture that each generation lived in, changed as well.
Slavery was the main resource used in the Chesapeake tobacco plantations. The conditions in the Chesapeake region were difficult, which lead to malnutrition, disease, and even death. Slaves were a cheap and an abundant resource, which could be easily replaced at any time. The Chesapeake region’s tobacco industries grew and flourished on the intolerable and inhumane acts of slavery.
Farming, sewing, and taking care of livestock were just a few responsibilities that were left to slaves during the 1600's. White families received all of the benefits from the work done, yet they rarely had to lift a finger, unless it was to correct a slave. Today's generation reads about slavery and regards it as morally wrong. While I agree that slavery was one of America's greatest wrongdoings, it paved the way for America as we know it today.