Question

In the Chesapeake region during the mid-17^th century how similar was the experience of an independent servant to that of an enslaved person?

Answer 1

The establishment of new colonies in the north , a declining birth rate in England,increasing economic prosperity in England are those main factors contributed to the shift from indentured servitude to chattel slavery in Chesapeake region. By 1750, three out of five slaves in the area that would become the United states in the Chesapeake region .

Most of the first slaves in the Chesapeake region came by the way of Barbados and New Netherlands. In the mid 17th centuries the indentured servants of the Chesapeake colonies were overwhelmingly male who owned their contracts at the mercy of employers. Servant labour system were the predominant labour system used in Chesapeake region in which the indentured servants agreed to a contract called indentured or form of credit worked as servants for 4-7 years in the North America and then freed.

Chesapeake planters profited from the indentured system , first year of labour paid for indenture and remaining years were just profit more hands to grow more tobacco. Slaves planted, harvested,cured tlsmd packaged tobacco in an extremely labor intensive process.

Land owners on the top that dominated society . Economy depend on tobacco ,believed in slavery and unequal society. Free man who came to the world as indentured servants but worked off their dept ,they are poor largest class . For a long period of time African slaves were not prominent in Chesapeake region because they were unaffordable. If an African slave were to die on the journey to America ,farmers would have to pay huge amount of money for nothing. The white slaves were less costly . The demand for African slaves rose the many companies started to sell them .Indentured servants dwindled when black slaves increased in amount . They were aslso known as the landless white ,the former indentured servants ,they had more rights than indentured servants but not right to vote.