In the early 1600s, companies that were given charters by the British crown established colonies in North America. These colonies served to provide the mother country with raw materials. Previously, the only people who could afford come to America were wealthy people. With the idea of indentured servitude developed by joint-stock companies, anyone willing to work for a certain number of years could come to the New World. This system worked for numerous years, however, according to a graph of servants and slaves per probate inventory in York County, Virginia, from the years 1665 to 1695, the number of indentured servants decreased immensely while, from 1680 to 1895, the number of slaves increased. (Doc 1) The graph serves to show the progression…
The search for a viable labor source affected the southern colonies in many ways. Without forced labor the southern colonies wouldn’t have been able to keep their economy up the way they did. The southern colonies developed with a focus on agriculture as the primary economic activity. Unfortunately the technology to decrease the labor demands such as the cotton gin or spinning jenny weren’t invented during the colonial times. Without that technology the southerners instead took advantage of the immigration and came up with the indentured servants. The indentured servants were I guess you can say happy for having the opportunity for acquiring their own land and freedom for a few years of labor. Even though most of the servants were young and healthy men, most of them died before completing their seven years of labor.…
The massive demand and supply of the sugar industry required a massive work force to maintain and farm the sugar. On one small island there is 60,000 acres of sugar cultivation, alone. The high need was accommodated by document 3, which showed a large migration of indentured servants to small islands and many other places where manual labor was needed. Document 4 showed the data of document 3 in a table. Mauritius’ need for a massive amount labor was met by the high amount (455,000) of immigrant indentured labor to the island. In document 1, a British secretary attempts to explain the amount of servants by comparing them to slaves. He states that they are not working under the “lash” or working due to force; they are being paid and are being raised. Many are being trained in a way he compared to the…
2) Indentured servitude was a way to resolve the growing demand of labor in the colonies. In a way, it was similar to a short-term apprenticeship.…
Instead peasants were transferred into working in factories due to the increase of industrialization in this period. The factories proved to need more labor in them to produce a significant amount of goods. The demand for peasant workers was not as high as it used to be because of slave labor. As more people began to own slaves, they did not find much use for indentured servants anymore. Some freedom of the peasants was also being taken away.…
Indentured servitude and slavery existed in the ‘New World’ primarily for economic and population growth. In the book, Going to the Source, Slavery was defined as “hereditary” and “a lifetime status” and the slave must serve for life, however, on the other hand indentured servitude was “contractual” and “voluntary” although the servant is forced to serve for a fixed amount of years. Indentured servitude and slavery are strikingly parallel to each other from the fact that both parties participate in physically demanding labor and endure severe punishments induced by their master, nevertheless, the contractual agreement to each party is quite different, plus the primary skin color of the of party heavily impacts the treatment and escape punishments…
Indentured servants were people of a lower economic class who worked for people of a higher economic background. These servants worked for a given amount of time, usually between five and seven years and either worked for money, food, shelter, or freedom. Indentured servants were originally made up of mostly young white males who were trading their time in prison or their poverty for time working as a servant.…
though, because 30 years after 1793, comes the cotton gin which will raise the importance of…
As people realize that profits can be made in America more settlers came over as well as indentured servants through the head right system which gave about 50 acres to colonists who brought indentured servants into America. As native are dying due to diseases the indentured servants become better source of labor which increase productivity and rapid growth in…
One of the main ways the Europeans received more workers was by what was called indentured servitude, which allowed young European males to have the possibility of making a new life for themselves in new lands. However, indentured servitude was not very successful because it did not provide enough people to work the…
gotten here but sickness and death”. Because of the water that they were served it often caused…
1 Thomas Gordon Indentured Servitude vs. Slavery 13 January 2015 US History University of Phoenix In the beginning of the 1600’s the term slavery in the U.S. wasn’t even thought of. It was more in the terms of indentured servants. In 1607 indentured servants first arrived in America in the decade of the settlement of Jamestown by the Virginia Company. The idea was formed in the thought of servitude was born for a need for cheap labor vs hiring a person and paying them a lot of money.…
Although Indentured servitude and slavery have similarities they are also quite different. Indentured servants were young men looking to work in exchange for land or money in America. Slaves were brought to America and forced to work for the colonists receiving nothing in return. Indentured servants and slavery were both groups that were involved in America’s first colonization and although they were frequently taken advantage of, they were very important in building this new nation’s…
The trip from Europe to America and the setup of a new home upon arrival was an expensive conquest. To offset this debt, they were bound to masters for a period of four to seven years as domestic servants (Archdeacon). Indentured servitude was a win-win situation. The immigrant had a guaranteed trip, food and shelter and the master gained laborers and extra land grants per servant imported (Brinkley, 69). Indentured servants had options; there were multiple colonies to choose from.…
Author Abbot E. Smith, in his book Colonists in Bondage, highlighted that, “the rate of growth of the servant population dissipated in almost direct correlation with the exponential growth of the slave population” (Smith 264). With the fact that slave population was growing faster than that of the servant population while colonial culture was socially dividing the slaves from everyone else, the idea of bringing in more servants, who not only cost more but had to be trained against the slaves, made no sense. As a result, indentured servitude had faded out of use by the time of the first stages of the American…