By the time of the American Revolution, blacks made up 20 percent of the colonial population. Early in colonial history, many blacks who came to America were indentured servants who served out their contracts and then settled in the colonies as free men. Over time, however, more and more blacks arrived as slaves, and the position of blacks in colonial society suffered precipitous decline. This book discusses the lives of blacks, both slave and free, as they struggled to make homes for themselves among the white European settlers in the New World. The author thoroughly examines colonial slavery and the laws supporting it (as early as 1686, for example, New Jersey had laws demanding the return of fugitive slaves) as well as the emancipation movement, active from the beginning of the slave trade. Other topics include blacks and the practice of Christianity in the colonies, and the service of blacks in the Revolution.

What are the origins of slavery and race-based prejudice in the mainland American colonies? How did the Atlantic slave trade operate to supply African labor to colonial America? How did African-American culture form and evolve? How did the American Revolution affect men and women of African descent? Previous editions of this work depicted African-Americans in the American mainland colonies as their contemporaries saw them: as persons from one of the four continents who interacted economically, socially, and politically in a vast, complex Atlantic world. It showed how the society that resulted in colonial America reflected the mix of Atlantic cultures and that a group of these people eventually used European ideas to support creation of a favorable situation for those largely of European descent, omitting Africans, who constituted their primary labor force. In this fourth edition of African Americans in the Colonial Era: From African Origins through the American Revolution, acclaimed scholar Donald R. Wright offers new interpretations to provide a clear understanding of the Atlantic slave trade and the nature of the early African-American experience. This revised edition incorporates the latest data, a fresh Atlantic perspective, and an updated bibliographical essay to thoroughly explore African-Americans’ African origins, their experience crossing the Atlantic, and their existence in colonial America in a broadened, more nuanced way.

By the time of the American Revolution, blacks made up 20 percent of the colonial population. Early in colonial history, many blacks who came to America were indentured servants who served out their contracts and then settled in the colonies as free men. Over time, however, more and more blacks arrived as slaves, and the position of blacks in colonial society suffered precipitous decline. This book discusses the lives of blacks, both slave and free, as they struggled to make homes for themselves among the white European settlers in the New World. The author thoroughly examines colonial slavery and the laws supporting it (as early as 1686, for example, New Jersey had laws demanding the return of fugitive slaves) as well as the emancipation movement, active from the beginning of the slave trade. Other topics include blacks and the practice of Christianity in the colonies, and the service of blacks in the Revolution.

This third volume of the critically acclaimed From African Beginnings series explores the tumultuous colonial period in African-American history. Powerfully written text by James Haskins and Kathleen Benson and evocative illustrations by award-winning artist James Ransome bring to life the time when America became dependent on slave labor and slaves struggled to maintain the traditions of their rich African culture and resist oppression in the new world.

"This guide lists the numerous examples of government documents, manuscripts, books, photographs, recordings and films in the collections of the Library of Congress which examine African-American life. Works by and about African-Americans on the topics of slavery, music, art, literature, the military, sports, civil rights and other pertinent subjects are discussed"--

Asking readers to imagine a history of Mexico narrated through the experiences of Africans and their descendants, this book offers a radical reconfiguration of Latin American history. Using ecclesiastical and inquisitorial records, Herman L. Bennett frames the history of Mexico around the private lives and liberty that Catholicism engendered among enslaved Africans and free blacks, who became majority populations soon after the Spanish conquest. The resulting history of 17th-century Mexico brings forth tantalizing personal and family dramas, body politics, and stories of lost virtue and sullen honor. By focusing on these phenomena among peoples of African descent, rather than the conventional history of Mexico with the narrative of slavery to freedom figured in, Colonial Blackness presents the colonial drama in all its untidy detail.

White Cargo is the forgotten story of the thousands of Britons who lived and died in bondage in Britain's American colonies. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, more than 300,000 white people were shipped to America as slaves. Urchins were swept up from London's streets to labor in the tobacco fields, where life expectancy was no more than two years. Brothels were raided to provide "breeders" for Virginia. Hopeful migrants were duped into signing as indentured servants, unaware they would become personal property who could be bought, sold, and even gambled away. Transported convicts were paraded for sale like livestock. Drawing on letters crying for help, diaries, and court and government archives, Don Jordan and Michael Walsh demonstrate that the brutalities usually associated with black slavery alone were perpetrated on whites throughout British rule. The trade ended with American independence, but the British still tried to sell convicts in their former colonies, which prompted one of the most audacious plots in Anglo-American history. This is a saga of exploration and cruelty spanning 170 years that has been submerged under the overwhelming memory of black slavery. White Cargo brings the brutal, uncomfortable story to the surface.