Slavery In America

995 Words2 Pages

Slavery has been in the Americas since Europe discovered them. It helped the colonies that settled grow and develop so that they were able to survive on their own away from Britain, France, and Spain. It also allowed the mother countries to make a profit from the colonies, resulting them in spending more on the colonies so that they would continue to grow and expand through the continent. The treatment of slaves though was harsh and unnecessary for the circumstances. Slavery, while inhumane, had an important role in the growth and development of the colonies by being an abundant source of free labor to build the agricultural economy. According to historian Rob Voss, “Slavery started in the America’s when Christopher Columbus first arrived …show more content…

Laws were also set up that prevented the colonies from enslaving people based on their religion which then caused the colonies to claim that it was race-based slavery. When blacks were first brought to the colonies, they were not slaves, instead they were indentured servants who worked for a set period of time and eventually earned their freedom and could do as they wish. The servants could “get three times the wages for their labor as they [could] in England. ” This did not draw enough European laborers to the colonies though to keep up with the rapidly growing agriculture, resulting in the European countries turning to Africa for labor. Labor was incredibly important in the economic growth of the colonies because “slave plantations of the West Indies became the largest marked for American fish, oats, corn, flour, lumber, peas, beans, hogs, and horses. ” While selling slaves did not bring in a lot of profit for the European countries, it “[produced] the major …show more content…

Some countries in Africa already had slaves, while others were at war due to crippling governments. European countries set up slave trade posts along the costs but a majority of slaves were captured by other Africans, some were prisoners of war, others were arrested for petty crimes, and sometimes entire villages were raided in attempt to capture slaves. This was rather brutal as countries at war would trade slaves for resources they needed like guns and irons. Gomes Eannes de Azurara, a seaman who documented “one of the earliest first-hand accounts of African slave trade… witnessed a Portuguese raid on an African village. He said that some captives “drowned themselves in the water; others thought to escape by hiding under their huts; others shoved their children among the seaweed. ”” Slaves were packed onto ships sent for the new world and of the approximate 10 million captured and sent, about 1 million of them died on the

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