indentured servant

Examples of indentured servant in the following topics:

• Indentured Servants

  • Some indentured servants were deported from their country and sent to the New World as punishment for law breaking.
  • When the ship arrived, the captain would often advertise in a newspaper that indentured servants were for sale.
  • In the 17th century, nearly two-thirds of English settlers came as indentured servants.
  • Abuse of indentured servants on board ships is well documented.
  • Thereafter, Africans began to replace indentured servants in both skilled and unskilled positions.

• Poverty in the Colonies

  • The poorest inhabitants of the American colonies tended to be subsistence farmers, day laborers, indentured servants, and slaves.
  • To meet the increasing labor demands of the colonies, many farmers, merchants, and planters relied on indentured servants.
  • In return, indentured servants received paid passage to America and food, clothing, and lodging, or sometimes acquittal for a crime.
  • Indentured servants could not marry, and they were subject to the will of the farmers or merchants who bought their labor contracts.
  • At the time of the rebellion, indentured servants made up the majority of laborers in the region.

• Toward Free Labor

  • Indentured servants included men and women; most were under the age of 21, and most became helpers on farms or house servants.
  • During that indenture period, the servants were not paid wages, but they were provided food, room, clothing, and training.
  • Most white immigrants arrived in Colonial America as indentured servants, usually as young men and women from Britain or Germany.
  • In the 17th century, nearly two-thirds of English settlers came as indentured servants, although indentured servitude was not a guaranteed route to economic autonomy.
  • Thereafter, Africans began to replace indentured servants in both skilled and unskilled positions.

• Chesapeake Slavery

  • At first, Chesapeake farmers hired indentured servants, men and women from England who sold their labor for a period of five to seven years in exchange for passage to the American colonies, to harvest tobacco crops.
  • The scarcity of indentured servants meant that the price of their labor contracts increased, and Chesapeake farmers began to look for alternative, cheaper sources of bonded labor.
  • In the late 17th century, indentured servants made up the majority of laborers in the region.
  • Replacing indentured servitude with black slavery diminished these risks, alleviating the reliance on white indentured servants, who were often dissatisfied and troublesome, and creating a caste of racially defined laborers whose movements were strictly controlled.
  • As African slaves were generally more expensive to purchase than indentured servants, the wealthy planters invested heavily in African slaves and agricultural technology and expanded their lands, while poor farmers struggled to maintain their smaller agricultural enterprises.

• An Empire of Commerce

  • In the 17th century, indentured servants worked the farms to pay back their passage to America and, once their debts were paid, earn land.
  • Many of these servants died before their indentures ended.
  • In 1676, indentured servants rebelled.
  • After Bacon's Rebellion, plantations began to rely on African slave labor instead of indentured servants.
  • During the same period, tens of thousands of British men and women were imported to the American colonies, especially to Virginia and the Carolinas, as indentured servants or as a punishment for criminals.

• A Growing Population and Expanding Economy in British North America

  • After 1700, most immigrants to Colonial America arrived as indentured servants—young unmarried men and women seeking a new life.
  • By the late 17th century, Virginia's export economy was largely based on tobacco, and new, richer settlers came in to take up large portions of land, build large plantations, and import indentured servants and slaves.
  • By the end of the century, African slaves had largely replaced indentured servants as Virginia's main labor force.

• Settling the Colonial South and the Chesapeake

  • Indentured servants provided the labor needed to grow plantation crops.
  • By the late 17th century, Virginia's export economy was largely based on tobacco, and new, richer settlers came in to take up large portions of land, build large plantations, and import indentured servants and slaves.
  • As a result, society became polarized between those who owned large tracts of land near the Atlantic and people whose land was subject to Indian attack, as well as former indentured servants who couldn't afford the favored land.
  • Because Native Americans proved independent and difficult to enslave for forced cultivation and indentured servants were only temporary, plantation owners began to import slaves from Africa to do the work.

• German Migration

  • The tide of German immigration to Pennsylvania swelled between 1725 and 1775, with immigrants arriving as redemptioners or indentured servants.

• Skin Color in the South

  • Many mixed-race families dated back to colonial Virginia, when white women, generally indentured servants, produced children with men of African descent, both slave and free.
  • Many mixed-race house servants were actually related to white members of the household.
  • Sometimes planters used mixed-race slaves as house servants or favored artisans because they were their own children or the children of their relatives.

• The Demographics of the Middle Colonies

  • Indentured servitude was especially common in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and New York in the 18th century, though few such servants worked in agriculture.
  • In an early attempt to encourage European settlement, the New Jersey legislature enacted a prohibitive tariff against imported slaves and in favor of European indentured servitude.