Slavery In Colonial America

It’s 1619 in Virginia and a cargo of slaves was stolen from the Dutch in the Caribbean. From the sixteenth century to the nineteenth century, almost eleven million African Americans were carried to the Americas by slave traders. Only a small number reached the Americas, but the rest were either sent to the Caribbean or Brazil. As slaves started settling in Colonial America, a number of factors such as religion, society, politics and the economy influenced these certain slaves’ lives.

During one of the most darkest times of this nation’s history, the slaves that endured the horrible treatings of their masters found peace and happiness in religion. The African slaves were being shipped away from their homelands and many of these slaves had different

In South Carolina, the life of a slave was filled of hardships and struggles. From the many hours they had to work to the way their masters treated these slaves, it shaped the daily life of a South Carolinian slave. The slaves worked long-exhausting hours, from sunrise to sunset, day after day, for many years of their lives. Neither small children nor the aged were free from these working hours. In the other hand, slaves in New England and Middle Colonies, the contact between them and the whites was much more recurrent than those slaves in South Carolina or Georgia. This had a huge impact on the slaves of New England which resulted in their “African Identity” to diminish. More north, there were several African slaves that lived with their masters in the same household and lost most of the connections they had with African people. In spite of the strenuous labor and the abuse, the Africans were able to keep some of their native customs. This process meant that the Africans were no longer Africans but African American. By the early 18th century, the Africans were reproducing successfully meaning that there were more babies being born than people dying. The creole population that were considered African Americans began to protest because they were still being considered slaves, even though they lived longer than the black people of the Caribbean or South American colonies. This was called the Stono Uprising, which took place in September of 1739. Almost 200 blacks of South Carolina rose up with weapons in hand and murdered quite a few white planters. The South Carolinians started to march towards Florida where they were granted freedom since Florida was of a Spanish Colony. The military soon outstripped the slaves and killed a vast majority of them. Although the Stono Uprising didn’t last very long, the whites feared that there would be a bloody revolt with the blacks. The life of a slave