FIRST slave owner in the Colonies - Anthony Johnson - Forgotten History

Forgotten History ^ | 22/3/23 | Colin Heaton

[Tell It Right]

I haven’t forgotten. See post # 7.

[Vaduz]

Negro property owners in America

Biden and his Clan members miss the good old days as they call them.

[Paal Gulli]

Anthony Johnson WAS NOT the first slave-owner in the American colonies.

For starters, slavery traditionally was not necessarily a permanent condition. In many ancient civilizations (including classic Rome, where a slave owner had unlimited power of life and death over his slaves), slavery ordinarily was a life-long condition except slaves could (and did) routinely negotiate for (or buy) their emancipation. Americans tend to think it can't be slavery if it's a temporary condition but that's a historically inaccurate perception.

Second, chattel slavery existed among some Indian tribes even before the first Europeans arrived. All of the "Five Civilized Tribes" of the American Indians practiced chattel slavery.

Third, there are several types of slavery apart from chattel slavery (if it was the only form of slavery, why did it need be qualified as "chattel" slavery?), and there were many indentured servants, bond slaves, child slaves, forced child marriages and forced domestic servants in the Colonies long before the American form of chattel slavery that was limited exclusively to black Africans arose.

It's ironic that someone who writes a a column called "forgotten history" knows so little about it himself.