The Journal of Negro History, Volume 8, 1923

by Various

Servitude Distinguished from Slavery

The first Negroes in the American colonies were called Africans, Blackamores, Moores, Negars, Negers, Negros, Negroes, and the like.[1] It is highly probable that Negroes were brought to America by some of the early colonists before 1619, for Negroes had been in England since 1553.[2] James Otis said: "Our colonial charters made no difference between black and white."[3] Some of such early Negro settlers might have been brought over from Barbadoes or other islands. The English colonists often went to and from the mainland for settlement and trade, and by 1674 Barbadoes was a "flourishing state" with a white population of 50,000 and 100,000 "Negroes and colored."[4] Negroes, along with Spanish explorers, are known to have been in North and South Carolina, Florida, Alabama, New Mexico, and California as early as 1526, 1527, 1540, 1542, and 1537, respectively.[5] However, the first Negroes, thus far known, in the American colonies, were the "twenty negars" introduced at Jamestown, in 1619, by the Dutch frigate.[6]

The first status of these Negroes early imported is of some importance. Although the historians do not always mention the fact, there is nevertheless ample proof of the existence of Negro servitude in most of the American colonies. The servitude did not always precede slavery in every case, nor was it ever firmly established as slavery eventually became. Still it is an interesting fact that Negro servitude frequently preceded and sometimes followed Negro slavery. In colonies where servitude followed slavery, it was due to the fact that these colonies were founded after the change of Negro servitude into slavery was well advanced. Even here, servitude accompanied slavery. In some of the colonies, the question of priority resolves itself into the question of the priority of customary servitude to customary slavery. In this case, however, it is probable that servitude was first, even though slavery was first recognized in law. In certain instances, the records make it certain that servitude preceded slavery. This was the case in Virginia.

Several authorities have shown the extent to which the priority of Negro servitude has been recognized. "At first the African slave was looked upon as but an improved variety of indented servant whose term of labor was for life instead of a few years."[7] "As has been mentioned, some Negroes were bound as slaves for a term of years only."[8] The Negroes of 1619 and "others brought by early privateers were not reduced to slavery, but to limited servitude, a legalized status of Indian, white, and negro servants, preceding slavery in most, if not all, of the English mainland colonies."[9] "Negro and Indian servitude thus preceded negro and Indian slavery, and together with white servitude in instances continued even after the institution of slavery was fully developed."[10]

Furthermore, there is not the slightest evidence that the colonists were disposed to treat as slaves the first Negroes who landed in the colonies. They had no tradition of slavery in England at that time. "Whatever may have been the intent and hope of the persons in possession of the negroes as regards their ultimate enslavement, no attempt to do so legally seems for a long time to have been made ... for some reasons the notion of enslavement gained ground but slowly, and although conditions surrounding a negro or Indian in possession could easily make him a defacto slave, the colonist seems to have preferred to retain him only as a servant...."[11] Servitude, on the other hand, was familiar enough, although not in the form which it eventually assumed in the colonies. The attitude of the colonists, when they first became confronted with the Negro question, was the attitude of Queen Elizabeth and Hawkins when it was proposed to go to Africa to barter for African servants.[12]

It was just as true in the colonial days as now that the attitude which the community takes towards the Negro population is largely determined by their relative numbers. If the Negroes had been numerous in the colonies immediately after 1619, it is reasonable to suppose that their status would have been defined earlier and more sharply than it was. But the numbers were not there.[13] Six years after the introduction of the first Negroes in Virginia, there were but twenty-three in the colony. Meanwhile the white population was about 2500. All through the first half of the century importation of Negroes was of an "occasional nature."[14] Forty years after the first introduction there were but three hundred Negroes in the colony.[15] It was during the last quarter of the seventeenth century that the number of Negroes in Virginia showed a noticeable increase. By 1683 there were three thousand; between 1700 and 1750, the increase was even more noticeable.[16] In Maryland, Negroes were not extensively introduced until the eighteenth century.[17] In 1665 a few slaves were brought to North Carolina and it was not until 1700 and after that their number reached eight hundred.[18] After their introduction by Sir John Yeamans in 1671 it was not until 1708 that the number of Negroes in South Carolina became a considerable part of the population.[19] In Pennsylvania, as early as 1639, a number of Negroes served a Swedish company. How many there were is not known.[20] In 1644, 1657, 1664 and 1677 several Negroes singly and in groups are known to have been in the region which afterwards became Pennsylvania. In this colony they were spoken of as "numerous" in 1702, but numerous then did not mean so many. Later their number is noticeable.[21] In Massachusetts, from 1638, when the Salem ship, Desire, returned from the West Indies with cotton, tobacco, and Negroes, to the close of the seventeenth century the number of Negroes was comparatively small.[22] Josselyn saw Negroes in the colony when he visited it in 1638-39.[23] In 1678, there were 200 in the colony and in 1678 Governor Andros reported that there were but a few. In 1680, Governor Bradstreet said no blacks or slaves had been brought in the colony in the space of fifty years except between forty and fifty one time and two or three now and then. In the nine years from 1698 to 1707, two hundred arrived and in 1735 there were 2,600 in the Province.[24] Immediately after 1619, then, the number of Negroes scattered throughout the colonies was comparatively small. It seems likely that their condition may be described as that of servitude, which at that time universally prevailed, rather than slavery.

We are likely to think of the status of the early Negroes in America as having been inherited or transplanted. Far from this, the status of the Negro in the early period, like slavery itself, was purely a local development.[25] The status of the early Negroes shows unmistakably that it developed in lines parallel to that of white servitude.[26] The motives which determined the growth of white servitude and Negro slavery are peculiar to the social and economic conditions of the colony of Virginia and its neighbors, whose inhabitants were primarily imported settlers and laborers. White servitude and black servitude were but different aspects of the same institution. As white servitude disappeared, Negro slavery succeeded it.[27]

The reason the early Negroes were not given at once the status of slaves is that there was at this time no legal basis for slavery. The Dutch who settled in New York seem to have defined the status of the Negro slave on the civil law of Holland. In the English colonies it was a local development.[28] Clearly, the ownership in the Negroes was widely recognized and practiced in custom and in law. It is equally clear, however, that white servitude and some form of black servitude existed for a long time side by side with Negro slavery. This recognition of slavery in custom and practice, moreover, makes its appearance near the date of the statutory recognition of slavery by the colonies.[29] Hence, the dates of this statutory recognition fix the "upper limit to the period" in which slavery may be said to have had a beginning.[30] In a number of the colonies, not only is absolute ownership in Negroes, hence slavery, conspicuous, by the absence of any records of it, but the priority of Negro servitude and of a free Negro class is established. Ownership in the services but not of the person was characteristic of both whites and Negroes in this early period.[32]

"Prior to 1619 every inhabitant of Virginia was practically a 'servant manipulated in the interest of the company, held in servitude beyond a stipulated term.'" "It was not an uncommon practice in the early period for shipmasters to sell white servants to the planters." By 1619 servitude was already recognized in the law of Virginia.[33]

In this early period the Company, as represented locally by its officials, was the sole controlling and directing power of the colony.[34] The Company was at the outset doubtful about the advantages of bringing in slaves, partly because they were not sure of the value of slave labor, and partly because they feared the Negro would not become a permanent settler and so contribute to the building up and defending the colony. The opposition of the trustees of Georgia to the importation of Negroes was rested on these grounds.[35] Early legislation in order to prohibit the trade in the colonies imposed duties on slaves imported.[36] Moreover, it appears that the Company generally held and worked the Negroes, who were purchased, in the interest of the government, frequently distributing them among the officers and planters. This was done, for example, in the island colony, the Bermudas, in Virginia, and in Providence Island.[37]

Established and universal as white servitude was it not only became the model of Negro servitude but also decidedly influenced its transition to slavery. When Negro servitude passed into slavery, it was white servitude that lent that slavery the mild character which it possessed until the early part of the nineteenth century.[38]

The earliest authorized effort of England for Negro servants further elucidates this point. In 1562, Sir John Hawkins proposed to take Negroes from Africa and sell them. Queen Elizabeth did not at first approve Hawkins' plan but questioned the justice of it. Hawkins argued that bringing the Africans from a wild and barren country would be eminently just and beneficial to the Africans and to the world. He seemed not to have had the purpose of selling the Africans into perpetual servitude: "Hawkins told her, that he considered it as an act of humanity to carry men from a worse condition to a better ... from a state of wild barbarism to another where they might share the blessings of civil society and Christianity; from poverty, nakedness and want to plenty and felicity. He assured her that in no expedition where he had command should any Africans be carried away without their own free will and consent, except such captives as were taken in war and doomed to death;.... Indeed it would appear that Hawkins had no idea of perpetual slavery, but expected that they would be treated as free servants after they had by their labor brought their masters an equivalent for the expenses of their purchase."[39] After this, Hawkins received approval and support from the Queen, and with three ships and crews he went on his trip to Africa.

Upon his arrival he began traffic with the natives. He sought at first to persuade the blacks to go with him, offering them glittering rewards. When the natives did not respond so readily to his entreaty, members of his crew, under the influence of rum, undertook to coerce the Africans.[40] Hawkins sought to dissuade them and reminded the men of his promise to the Queen. They finally succeeded in getting on board a number of Africans and set sail for the Spanish islands where the Africans were to be sold as servants.[41]

The early Negroes of Virginia, moreover, were servants. On the status of "the 1619 Negroes" historians are uncertain, but the popular conception of the situation is undoubtedly erroneous. The Dutch frigate sold the Negroes to the Company which controlled and distributed them. Some of them were clearly retained by the officers while others "were put to work upon public lands to support the governor and other officers of the government." There is no evidence that any of these Negroes were made slaves, while evidence that they were servants is abundant.[42]

The statutes of Virginia up to 1661 indicate the existence of Negro servitude rather than that of slavery.[43] In 1630, whites were whipped for fornication with the blacks "before an assembly of negroes." In 1639 and 1640, all persons except Negroes were to be provided with arms and ammunition or be fined.[44] Up to that time the acts do not indicate slavery. The act of 1655 refers to Indian slavery.[45] The act of 1659 does not show that Negro slavery existed in the colony, but apparently aims to prevent it.[46] No other acts, in the statutes, throw any light on the status of the Negro before the act of 1661. This acts reads, "In case any English servant shall run away in company with any negroes who are incapable of making satisfaction by addition of time, be it enacted that the English so running away in company with them shall serve for the time of the said negroes absence as they are to do for their own by a former act."[47] The inferences from this act are three: some of the Negroes in the colony were slaves, others free, and still others servants. The repetition of this act the following year made provision for runaway Negro servants also by a change of statement.[48]

Notwithstanding the statutes, Russel found that in the records of county courts dating from 1632 to 1661 negroes are designated as 'servants,' 'negro servants,' or simply as 'negroes,' but never in the records were the Negroes termed 'slaves'. From the context of the records, moreover, "servant" was distinctly meant and not "slave." Again, according to the census taken in 1624-1625, there were twenty-three persons of the African race in Virginia and they are listed as "servants."[49] In several musters of settlements the names of Negroes appear under the heading, "Servants"; sometimes only "Negro" appears.[50] The General Court in October, 1625, had before it for the first time a question involving the legal status of the Negro in America. A Negro named Brass had been brought to the colony by the captain of a ship. Upon handing down the decision as to what should be done with Brass, since his master had died, the Court "ordered that he should belong to Sir Francis Wyatt, Governor," evidently as servant.[51] Anthony Johnson and Mary, his wife, whose names appeared as servants in the census mentioned above, were, at sometime before 1652, given their freedom from servitude, for in that year they were exempted from payment of taxes by the county court on account of the burning of their home. The order of the court in reference to Johnson and his wife mentioned that "they have been inhabitants in Virginia above thirty years." According to this, they had been in the colony at least from 1621 which approaches 1619. It appears that they were among the first Negroes sold at Jamestown. And this, with the understanding that they were not free at first establishes quite well their original status as servants as well as that of the 1619 Negroes and other Negroes in the colony.

The free Negro, Anthony Johnson, in 1653 owned John Castor, another Negro of Northampton County, as his indented servant. In 1655, a Negro was bound to serve George Light for a period of five years.[52] The court record of the discharge of Francis Pryne in 1656 is an example of the discharge certificate of Negro servants:

"I Mrs. Jane Elkonhead ... have hereunto sett my hand yt ye aforesd Pryne

Jane Elkonhead"[53]

In some cases, as it was with the white servants, Negroes were given written indentures, of which Russell gives several examples. It was an early practice of the colony to allow "head rights," a certain number of acres of land for every servant imported. In 1651 "head rights" were allowed on the importation of a Negro whose name was Richard Johnson. "Only three years later a patent calling for one hundred acres of land was issued to this negro for importing two other persons. Hence, it appears that Richard Johnson came in as a free negro or remained in a condition of servitude for not more than three years."[54] It was a practice also of those who held servants to allow them the privilege of raising hogs and poultry and of tilling a small plot of ground. The court records show that by this means John Geaween, Emanuel Dregis, and Bashasar Farando, as Negro servants, between 1649 and 1652, accumulated property. Again, there are cases illustrating that the Negro servant received "freedom dues" as the white servants at the close of the term of service.[55] Thus the first and early Negroes of Virginia were servants, not slaves. They were not only servants at first, but also servants in general for a period of years.