Chapter 4American Life in the 17th Century 1607-1692

Unhealthy Chesapeake

• Nasty, burtish and short– Malaria, dysentery, typhoid– Half people died before age 20

• Majority of immigrants were:– Single men– Late teens/early twenties– Likely to perish after arrival– Few women

Unhealthy Chesapeake

• Marriages didn’t last long in Chesapeake

• Eventually immunity was acquired• By end of 17C white population began

to grow• By 1700 largest colony w/59k

population

Tobacco Economy

• Intense tobacco cultivation exhausts soil• More land wanted, since soil not working• Growers move into native lands, leads to

attacks• More tobacco = more labor needed• Native Americans died to quickly

– Not a reliable labor force• African slaves = too much $• GB had “surplus” of displaced farmers

– Become Indentured Servants

Tobacco Economy

• Headright System:– Encourages importation of servant

workers– Whoever paid passage of a laborer got 50

acres of land– Encouraged men of moderate means to

“gamble” with investments and were able to acquire huge plantations•Became merchant-planters

– Chesapeake planters brought 100k indentured servants to the region by 1700•= more than ¾ of all immigrants to VA

and MD in 17C

Tobacco Economy

• Indentured Servants:– Led hard life (but hopeful)– Hoped to be free and acquire land– BUT land became scarce– Masters started to not give land as part

of “freedom dues”– Servant’s lot became harsher as 17C

continued– Misbehaving servants were often

punished with extended term of service– Some freed, would have to work for

former masters for pennies

Frustrated Freemen & Bacon’s Rebellion

• Many frustrated young men now in Chesapeake (late 17C)– Why?

•No land•No women to marry

• So?– These unruly bachelors rattle

established planters• So?

– VA assembly disfranchises landless in 1670

Frustrated Freemen & Bacon’s Rebellion

• 1000 Virginians led by Nathanial Bacon rebel– Most from backcountry– Resent Berkeley's friendly Indian policies

•He thrived on fur trade•He refused to retaliate for a series of

brutal Indian attacks• Rebels attacked Native Americans (both

hostile and friendly)• Chaos reigns in colony

Frustrated Freemen & Bacon’s Rebellion

• Bacon dies of disease• Berkeley crushes uprising (hangs 20

rebels)• So?

– Well, England couldn’t understand all this

• Tensions remain• VA begins to look for less troublesome

laborers…African slaves

Colonial Slavery

• The Stats:– Approx. 10 million Africans brought to New

World before American Revolution– Only about 400k came to North America– Most came after 1700– Early slave ships run by Spanish and Portuguese

• Went to South Am. Or West Indies– Appeared in Jamestown around 1619– By 1670 only = 7% of population of all plantation

colonies– Why?

• Too expensive and too risky (they die)

Colonial Slavery• After 1680s things change:

– Wages increase in England = less indentured servants

– Former servants in plantation colonies were demanding rights/land

– 1698: Royal African company looses exclusive slave trade monopoly• So?

– Some Americans (esp Rhode Islanders) began to supply slaves in great numbers

– 1700-1710 10k+ slaves come to America, and many more in next ½ century

– In South Carolina 2:1 slave population

Colonial Slavery

• Where’d they come from?– West African coast– Captured by African coastal tribes– Traded then to flesh merchants from

Europe/America• Would be branded and bound• Middle Passage:

– Travel from Africa to Americas– High death rates (20% at least)– Terrifying

• Popular slave trade ports included Charleston, SC or Newport, RI

Colonial Slavery

• Early, early slaves might have earned freedom– Legal difference b/w slave and

servant was blurred– By 1662 racial ordinance appear in

Virginia•Slave codes said blacks and their

children = property of masters• More slaves = less freedom (perceived

racial threat)

Beginning in 1662 Beginning in 1662 “Slave Codes”“Slave Codes”

Made blacks [and their children] Made blacks [and their children] property, or property, or chattelchattel for life of white for life of white masters.masters.

In some colonies, it was a crime to In some colonies, it was a crime to teach teach a slave to read or write.a slave to read or write.

Conversion to Conversion to Christianity did Christianity did not qualify the not qualify the slave for slave for freedom.freedom.

Colonial SlaveryColonial SlaveryColonial SlaveryColonial Slavery

Africans in America

• Deeper south (ie: SC) meant more severe life– Harsh climate– Harsh labor (rice and indigo)– Mainly men, who’d die and be replaced– Plantations far apart = lonely

• Chesapeake– Less harsh than southern counterparts– Tobacco = closer plantations = more

contact with family/friends– More women = more families– Slave culture develops

Africans in America

• Slave revolts:– NYC 1712 revolt cost dozen lives of

whites and execution of 21 blacks •Some burned at the stake….slowly

– Stono Slave Rebellion:•South Carolina 1739•Slaves revolted (50 or so) and were

stopped by local militia–Harsher treatment after rebellion–Not as big as Bacon’s Rebellion

Southern Society

• Social Hierarchy– Great Planters at top

• Owned gangs of slaves and lots of land• Ruled economy• Monopolized politics• Names?

– Lees, Fitzhughs, Washingtons• In VA dominated House of Burgesses

(before Am. Rev. 70% of legislature came from these families)

• Dubbed FFVs (First Families of Virginia)

Southern Society

• Great Planters (cont)– Not lavish (like English countrymen)– Most were hard-working busineslike

• Small Farmers (under merchant-planters)– Largest social group– Maybe own 1-2 slaves– Lived modestly

• Landless Whites– Luckless former indentured servants

• Indentured Servants• African Slaves

Southern Society

• Few cities in the South– = few urban professionals (lawyers,

financiers)• Life revolves around plantation• Waterways = transportation

New England Family

• Climate = better in North– =fewer diseases– Lived 10 years longer than southerners

• Migration patterns– Unlike southerners came to America with

entire family• Family = center of New England life from the

beginning– Early marriage (women in their 20s) = many

babies (every 2 years)– Child rearing was full-time occupation

New England Family

• Longevity = family stability– Children expected to be obedient– Guidance from parents & grandparents– *** low premarital pregnancy (higher in

Chesapeake)• Property ownership

– Women didn’t own separate property• Believed to undercut unity of marriage• ***Southern women retained some property

rights, including right to inherit land• Did have more property rights than in

England

New England Family

• Political rights– No vote– Perceived to be weaker than men

• Legal rights– Abusive spouses could be restrained– Protected marriage

•Divorce rare (granted for adultery or abandonment)

• Roles of women– Ok to be a midwife

Life in New England Towns

• Tight-knit society– Anchored by geography– Unity a purpose of Puritanism– Grew in an orderly manner

• Typical example:– Charter was granted for new town– Proprietors would be entrusted to distribute land

• Usually family-men– Towns included a meetinghouse = worship place and

townhall, would be surrounded by houses– Also included a village green (militia would drill here)– Men received land parcels & woodlot for fuel

• Two tracts that could grow crops and pasture animals

Life in New England Towns

• **different in the Chesapeake– Settlement was taken on haphazardly– Often settlement was spawned by a “lone-

wolf” planter• When towns had 50 families, must provide

public school• Harvard established only 8 years after colony’s

founding– Purpose was to train boys for ministry

• ***colleges didn’t appear in Virginia until 1693 = William and Mary

Life in New England Towns

• Puritan churches run by the people– Logical that Congregational Church

govt would lead to democracy in political govt

• NE males gathered regularly– Elected officials– Appoint school masters– Discuss municipal matters

Half-way Covenant & the Salem Witch Trials• As time went on, religious zeal diminishes

• Preachers worried:– Fewer conversions

• Meant fewer men admitted to church as members of the elect

• So?– Half-Way Covenant (1662)=

»A way to confer partial membership rights to children of existing members

»Weakened distinction between “elect” and others

»Led to church being fully opened to all comers, converted or not

• Halfway Covenant leads to…– Less piety, but more religious participation– After it’s introduction, women become the

majority in Puritan Congregations.• Witch hunt

– Women play prominent role– Salem Witch Trials:

•Girls claim to be bewitched by some older women

•Witch hunt ensues, 19 hanged

Half-way Covenant & the Salem Witch Trials

• Side notes about Salem:– Many of the accused came from families

associated with the growing market economy

– Accusers from subsistence farming families.

– Reflects social stratification & fear of religious traditionalist being overshadowed by Yankee commercialism

• Hysteria ends in 1693-(governor’s wife is accused, pardons those already convicted)

Half-way Covenant & the Salem Witch Trials

The New England Way of Life• Hard soil, hardened the soul

– Encouraged diversified agriculture and industry• Less ethnically mixed than the South• Conflicted with Native Americans

– Nat Ams believed that one could use the land, not own it– English believed Nat Ams were wasting the land & their

duty to improve the land• Their way of life (using land for pasture) meant continual need

to clear forest– Also, their animals had hooves that compacted the soil =

erosion • Terrain was helpful in providing tools for shipbuilding &

commerce• Fish = “goldmines of New England”

Early Settlers’ Days and Ways

• All American colonists lived by the cycles of the seasons

• Men worked the land and women kept the home. Children did what they could.

• Compared to Europe, they lived an affluent existence

• *** most migrants from Europe were of the middling rank (exception = indentured servants)– They modeled their social structure on the Old

World, but considered themselves a “better sort”• Still it was a weak attempt • democracy began its reign (at least for white

folk)