Immigration and Slavery

Europeans Migrate to the Colonies

• By 1700, 250,000 people of European background lived in the colonies.

• 90% of them are English.

• Over half are indentured servants.

• What are those?

Europeans Migrate to the Colonies

• Indentured Servants – agreed to work for 4 to 7 years for passage (headright system)

• Only basic food, clothing, and shelter.

• At the end of their term, they are supposed to receive tools, clothes, and land.

Europeans Migrate to the Colonies

• After 1660, the English economy improved, so migration slowed down.

• Scottish immigration would soar, however.

• Scottish merchants would capture a lot of the tobacco trade – meaning they took it over.

European Migrate to the Colonies

• Nearly 250,000 Scotch-Irish came to the colonies in the 1700s.

• Many moved west to the “back country” that stretched from Pennsylvania to the Carolinas.

• A lot of farmers; would follow a “rebellion”.

Europeans Migrate to the Colonies

• The Germans –• Second to only Scotch-

Irish in numbers; 100,000 Germans immigrated to British America in the 1700s.

• Almost entirely Protestant.

• What do you predict the push factors for the influx of Germans was?

Europeans Migrate to the Colonies

• 1. They felt pushed by war.

• 2. They felt pushed by taxes.

• 3. They felt pushed by religious persecution.

• In Germany, the princes were fighting amongst each other and demanded religious conformity.

• Very little farmland, too.

Europeans Migrate to the Colonies• In 1682, William Penn

recruited Germans to settle Pennsylvania.

• In PA, wages were high and land and food were cheap.– Farms 6 times bigger than

in Germany.– Almost no taxes; didn’t

have to become to soldiers.

Europeans Migrate to the Colonies

• Diversity! –• Immigration naturally

brings change.• Scottish and Germans

didn’t trust each other at first, but both realized they could buy and trade with one another.

Africans Are Transported to America

• During the 1600s, indentured servants were used to work the fields.

• English immigration would decline, but the demand for labor grew.

• Colonists began looking for a new source of labor --

Africans Are Transported to America

• Slavery Begins –• In the early 1600s, slaves

were treated the same as indentured servants.

• Freed blacks could own land, vote, and even buy their own slaves.

• This changed by the mid 1600s; colonies began passing laws for permanent enslavement.

Africans Are Transported to America

• “All servants imported who were not Christians in their native Country shall be accounted and be slaves.” – Virginia General Assembly

• Change in legal status promoted racism; Africans now thought to be inferior to whites.

Africans Are Transported to America

• The Transatlantic Slave Trade –

• Slavery would expand rapidly during the 1700s.

• 1.5 million slaves transported to the colonies.

• Most to the West Indies, but 250,000 to the 13 colonies.

Africans Are Transported to America

• Slaves purchase by traders from merchants and even African kings.

• Most slaves were kidnapped or captured during war between African kingdoms.

• Triangular Trade; Europe to Africa to America and back to Europe.

Africans Are Transported to America

• Part of the Triangular Trade is called the Middle Passage.

• This is where slaves go from Africa to American colonies.

• Extreme brutality; lasted 2 months or more.

• Psychological trauma, branded with hot irons, shackles, suffocation, disease.

Africans in the Americas

• Africans, if they made it, faced a rough life in the Americas.

• Slave traders purposely broke up families – why?

• Rivals – Ashantis, Fulanis, Ibos, and many others formed a new cultural identity as African Americans.

Africans in the Americas

• Slavery varied considerably by region.

• In 1750, African Americans were a small minority in New England and Middle Colonies.

• There, most were farmhands, dockworkers, sailors, house servants.

Africans in the Americas

• Most African Americans lived in the southern colonies.

• Labor intensive crops like tobacco, rice, and sugar.

• 40% of the total population in the Chesapeake region; outnumbered whites in South Carolina.

Africans in the Americas

• Most slaves were forced to live in crude huts.

• Dirt floors• No windows• Forced to work 12 hour

days.• Whipped if they

resisted.

Africans in the Americas

• Developing a New Culture –

• African American culture would be very unique

• Blend of African, plantation, farm, and city culture.

• Most adopted Christianity

Africans in the Americas

• Rebels and Runaways –• 1739 c.e. in Stono,

South Carolina– Uprising saw the killing

of 100 slaves and 20 whites.