Indentured Servitude and Slavery in the Chesapeake Region

I. Recap of last lecture

  • Importance of hierarchy and patriarchy
  • Coverture
    • Only single women (21 and above) and widows could exercise limited legal rights
  • How the roles of mother and wife were defined
  • Mothers not charged with their children’s educated
  • Two other points: colonial women were poorly educated
  • Higher rates of illiteracy than men
    • Illiteracy especially in southern colonies
    • Women not generally taught how to write

II. Indentured servitude

  • Between voluntary and forced labor
  • Contracts of 4-7 years
  • Mostly young—teens or early 20s
  • Quite powerless
  • Not treated as part of the extended family

III. Female indentured servants

  • Women generally came in search of marriage
  • Vulnerable to abusive masters
  • High rates of out-of-wedlock pregnancy
    • Nearly 20% of all female indentured servants became pregnant during their period of contract
    • Harsh penalties: Whipping, fines, additional time placed on her contract
    • Child bound out to another family; proceeds went to the master
    • If the master was the father
      • She (and eventually the child) were bound out to another master; profits went to the parish
    • New England: Lower rates of single pregnancy
      • Most (2/3rds) married the father of the child
      • Otherwise, they were unlikely to marry–stigmatized for life

IV. Family life in the Chesapeake

  • Most wives were married to farmers and lived on small plantations
    • Former indentured servants married later and had fewer children than wives in NE
      • On average, 5-6
    •  Many women experienced significant upward mobility
  • Impossible to realize the patriarchal ideal in this region
    • Most marriages short-lived
    • Family membership changed rapidly
  • Impact on women
    • Greater power in regard to inheritance than New England women
      • Usually inherited more than the “widow’s third”

IV. Slavery

  • Relatively few African slaves in North America prior to 1700s
    • Ideas about “race” were very different
    • Main division b/n Christians and heathens
    • Skin color seen as mutable—a product of climate and environment
  • Initially, many blacks treated as indentured servants
    • By 1640s, the institution of slavery began to coalesce
    • 1660s: Slave codes (VA and MD)
      • The mother’s status determines the child’s status
      • Contradicted patriarchy
        • Undercut power of black men who married slave women
  • Interracial marriages banned
  • 1664 Maryland law:
    • White women who married slaves became slaves until their husband’s death
  • Because marriage is a contract, slaves could not legally marry

V. Slave women in the colonies

  • Imbalanced sex ratio 2:1
  • Considered fit for field work
  • Not punished for unwed pregnancy
  • Childbearing rates remained very low