Slavery In New York Essay

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Slavery in New York

Using of slaves began in New York when the Dutch West India Company imported 11 African slaves to New Amsterdam in 1626, and the first slave sale being held in New Amsterdam was in 1655. The company imported slaves to New Amsterdam in order to clear the forests, lay roads, build houses and public buildings, and grow foods. It was company-owned slave labor that developed the foundations of modern New York, and made agriculture flourish in the colony so that later white traders turned from fur trapping to farming. Later,the British expanded the use of slavery and in 1703, more than 42 percent of New York City households held slaves, often used as domestic servants and labors. However,the treatments to the slaves were always inhumane and cruel,but slaves were finally obtained the rights through the manumission.

There was 20 percent of New Yorkers were enslaved Africans during the colonial period. Dutch and English merchants relied on slave trade and what slaves produced,such as sugar, tobacco, indigo, coffee, chocolate, and cotton. New York ship captains and merchants bought and sold slaves along the coast of Africa and in the taverns of their own city. During the colonial period, 42 perent of the city's households had slaves, compared to 6 percent in Philadelphia and 2 percent in Boston,only Charleston, South Carolina can matched with New York in the use of slaves that penetrated everyday life. In general, each slaveholding New Yorker usually owned only one or two slaves.

Treatments to slaves in North was not actually better than in South. According to the article"Slavery in New York":"The city's Common Council passed one restrictive law after another: forbi...

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...rk Manumission Society was founded in 1785, and worked to prohibit the international slave trade and to achieve abolition. It established the African Free School in New York City, the first formal educational institution for blacks in North America and it served for both free blacks and the children of slaves." Even though every slave was not get freed yet,but such kind conducts will finally emancipate all the slaves in New York.

Slavery in New York, illuminates the History of slaves in New York,tells the previous utilization and the status of slaves,but also thier treatment. In any case,Slavery should be consider as a key institution in the development of New York. It also reveals a part of history which most people are unaware,and illuminates the contributions of the slaves in the past and explored the role of slavery played in the founding of New York.

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