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1510 |
Transatlantic slave trade begins with Spain and Portugal bringing an estimated 367,000 Africans to the New World during the 1500s. By the 1860s an estimated 12 million men, women, and children will have been shipped to a life of slavery in the Americas.
Learn more
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1539 |
Esteban, an African who came to America with Panfilo de Narvaez in 1527, serves as guide and interpreter for an expedition to New Mexico seeking the fabled Seven Cities of Cibola. He also helps explore present-day Arizona before he is killed by Zuni Indians.
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1613 |
The mariner Jan Rodrigues, a Creole, is marooned on Manhattan Island, becoming the first nonindigenous resident of what will become New Amsterdam, and later New York City.
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1619 |
A Dutch frigate sells "twenty and odd negroes" to authorities at Jamestown, Virginia. According to surviving documents, they are the first Africans to arrive in North America, and are classified as indentured servants, not slaves. As with the many English and Europeans who come involuntarily, as indentured servants or redemptioners, it is the Africans' labor—not their person—that is sold.
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1624 |
Isabel, the wife of Anthony Johnson, gives birth to William in Jamestown. William is probably the first black child born in an English mainland North American colony. |
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1624 |
John Phillips, a “negro Christened in England,” is allowed to testify in a Virginia court case involving two whites. |
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1638 |
Black slaves are brought to Boston. They are probably the first slaves sold in the British mainland colonies.
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1639 |
Virginia requires the arming of all white servants, but does not require that black servants be armed. The law does not specifically prohibit blacks from being armed, but the implication of the law is that they are not welcome in the colonial militia. |
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1641 |
Massachusetts gives statutory recognition to slavery in its Body of Liberties. This is the first colony to formally recognize slavery.
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1642
to
1643 |
Virginia law taxes black female servants at the same rate as black and white male servants. White female servants remain untaxed. |
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1644 |
New England merchants send three ships to Africa to trade for gold dust and Negroes.
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1644 |
New Amsterdam authorities grant half-freedom and land to eleven black servants of the Dutch West India Company. |
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1650 |
Connecticut statutes recognize slavery.
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1652 |
Massachusetts requires that all blacks and Indians living in settled parts of the colony be enrolled in the militia.
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1655 |
Elizabeth Key, a slave, sues for her freedom in Virginia. Her case is based on the argument that the status of her father, a free white man, should determine her station in life rather than that of her mother, a slave. William Greensted, her attorney, wins the case and marries Elizabeth. |
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1656 |
Massachusetts repeals its 1652 law and bans blacks and Indians from military service. |
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1660
to
1661 |
Virginia law lowers the tax rate “if the said Dutch or other foreigners shall import any negro slaves.” This incentive to import new slaves into the colony marks the first time Virginia recognizes the legal existence of slavery. |
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1661
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1662 |
Virginia rules that if indentured servants and slaves run away together, the indentured servants, if caught, will have to serve extra years to compensate the master for the loss of the slave's time, and to serve an extra four years if the slave dies or is never recovered.
Learn more
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1662 |
Virginia law establishes that children born in the colony will be free or held bond according to the status of the mother.
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1663 |
The colony Maryland passes an "Act concerning negroes and other slaves,” which recognizes the existence of slavery in the colony.
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1664 |
Maryland bans mixed marriages.
Learn more
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1664 |
The former Dutch colonies of New York and New Jersey pass laws officially recognizing slavery, which existed under the Dutch and continues to exist under the English.
Learn more
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1667 |
Virginia declares that baptism will not affect the status of slaves.
Learn more
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1669 |
John Locke writes the Fundamental Constitutions of South Carolina, providing that “Every freeman of Carolina, shall have absolute power and authority over his negro slaves.”
Learn more
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1669 |
A Virginia act “about the casual killing of slaves” provides that masters and overseers will not be held liable for the death of any slave killed while resisting authority, or slaves who accidentally die during punishment or are killed while resisting their masters. The statute states that there can be no malice assumed if a slave dies during punishment because nothing could “induce any man to destroy his owne estate.”
Learn more
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1676 |
During Bacon's Rebellion in Virginia white settlers in the western part of the colony challenge the authority of the governor. Bacon asks black servants and slaves to join his rebellion, promising them freedom. In addition to fighting colonial officials, Bacon directs his attack against Indians. Virginia later enslaves captured Indians. The rebellion has the effect of pushing Virginia planters to abandon white labor in favor of African slaves. |
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1681 |
Maryland (which passed an anti-amalgamation law in 1664) rules that though a white woman who marries a black slave will remain free, the slave's master and whoever marries the couple are to be fined.
Learn more
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1682 |
South Carolina recognizes the legal existence of slavery.
Learn more
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1688 |
In the first formal antislavery declaration in English America, Quakers in Germantown, Pennsylvania, condemn slavery and the slave trade.
Learn more
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1689 |
Despite earlier bans on black military service, blacks serve in colonial militias in King William's War.
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Transatlantic slave trade begins with Spain and Portugal bringing an estimated 367,000 Africans to the New World during the 1500s. By the 1860s an estimated 12 million men, women, and children will have been shipped to a life of slavery in the Americas.
Learn more
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