Search results
Results From The WOW.Com Content Network
Slaves having a stick fight. A white indentured servant is standing on the left. In 1643, the European population of Barbados was 37,200 [23] (86% of the population). [24] During the Wars of the Three Kingdoms, at least 10,000 Scottish and Irish prisoners of war were transported as indentured laborers to the colonies. [25]
Indentured servitude in British America was the prominent system of labor in the British American colonies until it was eventually supplanted by slavery. [1] During its time, the system was so prominent that more than half of all immigrants to British colonies south of New England were white servants, and that nearly half of total white ...
Though Casor was the first person who was declared an enslaved person in a civil case, there were both black and white indentured servants sentenced to lifetime servitude before him. Many historians describe indentured servant John Punch as the first documented slave (or slave for life) in America as punishment for escaping his captors in 1640 ...
In 1654, John Casor, a black indentured servant in colonial Virginia, was the first man to be declared a slave in a civil case. He had claimed to an officer that his master, Anthony Johnson, had held him past his indenture term.
Most historians argue that John Punch, an African who was ordered indentured for life in 1640, should be considered the first documented slave in Virginia. Punch had escaped along with two white indentured servants, one from the United Provinces and the other from Scotland. When they were captured, all three were sentenced to whippings.
Before the passing of the 1705 Virginia Slave Code Act, African Americans served as indentured servants. [citation needed] [clarification needed] This law, after being passed, transformed servitude into slavery, turning many African Americans from extended servitude to a bonded and forced lifetime commitment to slavery.
Thus, the black man, John Punch, became a slave unlike the two white indentured servants who merely had to serve a longer term. This was the first known case in Virginia involving slavery. [ 27 ] It was significant because it was documented.
The first indentured servitude contract, 1609–1619: The first form of indentured servitude contract was designed and implemented in 1609 and was used until 1619. Under this contract, the Virginia Company's funds were used to pay transportation costs for immigrants.