A Social History of the American Negro | Page 7

to the Spanish colonies in
America. When in the course of the eighteenth century the trade
became fully developed, scores of vessels went forth each year to

engage in it; but just how many slaves were brought to the present
United States and how many were taken to the West Indies or South
America, it is impossible to say. In 1726 the three cities of London,
Bristol, and Liverpool alone had 171 ships engaged in the traffic, and
the profits were said to warrant a thousand more, though such a number
was probably never reached so far as England alone was concerned.[3]
[Footnote 1: Bogart: Economic History, 72.]
[Footnote 2: Coman: Industrial History, 78.]
[Footnote 3: Ballagh: Slavery in Virginia, 12.]
4. Planting of Slavery in the Colonies
It is only for Virginia that we can state with definiteness the year in
which Negro slaves were first brought to an English colony on the
mainland. When legislation on the subject of slavery first appears
elsewhere, slaves are already present. "About the last of August
(1619)," says John Rolfe in John Smith's Generall Historie, "came in a
Dutch man of warre, that sold us twenty Negars." These Negroes were
sold into servitude, and Virginia did not give statutory recognition to
slavery as a system until 1661, the importations being too small to
make the matter one of importance. In this year, however, an act of
assembly stated that Negroes were "incapable of making satisfaction
for the time lost in running away by addition of time"; [1] and thus
slavery gained a firm place in the oldest of the colonies.
[Footnote 1: Hening: Statutes, II, 26.]
Negroes were first imported into Massachusetts from Barbadoes a year
or two before 1638, but in John Winthrop's Journal, under date
February 26 of this year, we have positive evidence on the subject as
follows: "Mr. Pierce in the Salem ship, the Desire, returned from the
West Indies after seven months. He had been at Providence, and
brought some cotton, and tobacco, and Negroes, etc., from thence, and
salt from Tertugos. Dry fish and strong liquors are the only
commodities for those parts. He met there two men-of-war, sent forth

by the lords, etc., of Providence with letters of mart, who had taken
divers prizes from the Spaniard and many Negroes." It was in 1641 that
there was passed in Massachusetts the first act on the subject of slavery,
and this was the first positive statement in any of the colonies with
reference to the matter. Said this act: "There shall never be any bond
slavery, villeinage, nor captivity among us, unless it be lawful captives,
taken in just wars, and such strangers as willingly sell themselves or are
sold to us, and these shall have all the liberties and Christian usages
which the law of God established in Israel requires." This article clearly
sanctioned slavery. Of the three classes of persons referred to, the first
was made up of Indians, the second of white people under the system
of indenture, and the third of Negroes. In this whole matter, as in many
others, Massachusetts moved in advance of the other colonies. The first
definitely to legalize slavery, in course of time she became also the
foremost representative of sentiment against the system. In 1646 one
John Smith brought home two Negroes from the Guinea Coast, where
we are told he "had been the means of killing near a hundred more."
The General Court, "conceiving themselves bound by the first
opportunity to bear witness against the heinous and crying sin of
man-stealing," ordered that the Negroes be sent at public expense to
their native country.[1] In later cases, however, Massachusetts did not
find herself able to follow this precedent. In general in these early years
New England was more concerned about Indians than about Negroes,
as the presence of the former in large numbers was a constant menace,
while Negro slavery had not yet assumed its most serious aspects.
[Footnote 1: Coffin: Slave Insurrections, 8.]
In New York slavery began under the Dutch rule and continued under
the English. Before or about 1650 the Dutch West India Company
brought some Negroes to New Netherland. Most of these continued to
belong to the company, though after a period of labor (under the
common system of indenture) some of the more trusty were permitted
to have small farms, from the produce of which they made return to the
company. Their children, however, continued to be slaves. In 1664
New Netherland became New York. The next year, in the code of
English laws that was drawn up, it was enacted that "no Christian shall

be kept in bond slavery, villeinage, or captivity, except who shall be
judged thereunto by authority, or such as willingly have sold or shall
sell themselves." As at