White privilege much?
Some whites who came to America were indentured servants and they served 7 years. Some were from debtors prison. If a man could not pay his debts he might have to go to prison or I guess to America.
Indentured servitude was a contractual agreement and yes many early black “slaves” were actually indentured servants.
Anthony Johnson was the indentured servant who served his end of the agreement and went on to become the first slave owner in America (he was from Angola)
I have an ancestor who was captured and “enslaved” by the indians twice. The second time he decided to marry within the tribe. The tribe later split with my ancestor’s group choosing to take up farming and living in cabins like whites.
I am Irish and native American Indian! I demand DOUBLE Reparations!
Make that TRIPLE, as I am also a WOMAN!
30,000 Irish in 1625 and now we are overrun with them.
My Irish Catholics came in 1720 as indentured servants to the Livingston planation south of Renssalaer, NY...
Watch the old Errol Flynn movie “Captain Blood.” In it the supports of those who were rebelling against the king were captured and condemned to be sent to the British colonies in the Carribbean and to be SOLD AS SLAVES. Thus, English men being sold as slaves to other Englishment in the New World.
And you are correct about indentured servitude.
We studied this in eighth grade history. I suspect it was long ago ditched from the school curriculum.
Yes, the standard narrative of slavery in America is very slapdash and only approximately true.
You’ve documented white Europeans being held as chattel slaves, and mentioned a single black slave-owner (ironically, if your account is correct, the first slave owner in what became the United States), but there were many (not so many as white slave-owners, but enough that the account of the dynamics of slavery as purely racist in basis is dubious), and another poster mentioned American Indians holding slaves. Look up the documentation of the Trail of Tears deportation to Oklahoma, and you’ll find that a great many Indians were accompanied by their slaves.
And, there were free blacks in the antebellum South who weren’t slave-owners.
You forgot to mention blacks were valued at 10x the dollar amount as white indentured servants, so there were fewer blacks under servitude than whites. Frequently owners would breed 10 white women to one black slave.
Which explains the lines from the Irish rebel song "The Men Behind the Wire":
'Round the world the truth will echo,
Cromwell's men are here again,
England's name again is sullied
In the eyes of honest men.
Indentured servants and chattel slaves were quite different, both in practice and in law. Chattel slaves were slaves for life and their offspring became slaves for life. There was no escape unless they were freed by their owners.
Indenture servants were released from their contract at a period of time stipulated in the contract. In most colonies they received a piece of land and farm implements when they released from their indenture. Their children were not bound under the indenture. The most common form of indenture came from the debt that was owed to a ship owner whom had provided passage to the New World. The ship captain would sell the indenture to planters who needed laborers. When those servants had worked off their debt, they became free.
I was wondering why all the british here at work were not wearing green on st. patricks day last week.
Now I know why!
And that is how CAPTAIN PETER BLOOD came to the Caribbean, as a slave.
I have an ancestor from Isle of Jura, Scotland, who came to American in the mid-1600’s (don’t recall the exact date off the top of my head). He was on a ship’s manifest with a ‘P’ next to his name. I have been told this stood for Prisoner of the Crown. I am wondering if this is similar to what was going on with the Irish at the time. Any idea? I have assumed that someone paid for his passage to avoid prison and he would have to work off the cost of the passage.
While I was aware that the British used a 'Debtors Prison' System ,
I have been historialy unaware of 'white slavery' of the Irish by the Brits.
After three hundred years of indentured servitude , white slavery , and distant penal colonies, I now have a new appreciation for the AOH and the IRA in Irish History.
My Irish ancestors came as a result of the need for freedom from the subtle economic Irish caste system, and "AN GORTA MOR"('the great hunger')
I identify as an American , with Irish heritage, and the fact that all three of my children are redheads, includes a Viking heritage, or a Norwegian milkman who lingered. .. /s
Regardles ,"Ben Mugged" , thank you for additional heritage of which I was previously unaware.
Slavery is still practiced in the United States today. Except its called income taxes.
White slaves. Black slaves. Slavery is bad no matter who is the owner and who is the slave.
Pointing out white slaves doesn’t justify it anyway. It was the culture at the time. It was wrong then. It is wrong now.
I actually had one of the last good history teachers and we were actually taught about this in high school. I’d hate to see a modern history book. It probably goes no further than Jan 20th 2009.