When did slavery begin in the Americas?

The first slaves in the American colonies arrived on a Dutch ship in Jamestown, Virginia in 1619. 

Over the next 200 years, around 600,000 more slaves were brought to the American colonies, most of them to work the tobacco and cotton fields. 

Where did slaves come from?

Slaves were brought over from Africa. 

Most of them came from the west coast of Africa where the main ports for the slave trade existed. 

The conditions on the slave ships were terrible. 

Often slaves were "packed" tightly on the ship where they were chained up and unable to move. 

Many slaves died during the trip due to disease and starvation. 

How did slavery begin?

The roots of slavery in America began with “indentured servants”. 

These were people brought over from Britain as laborers.

Many of these people agreed to work for seven years in return for their passage to the Americas. 

As the need for manual labor grew in the colonies, indentured servants became harder to get and more expensive. 

The first slaves were African indentured servants who were forced to be indentured servants for the rest of their lives. 

By the late 1600s, slavery of Africans became common in the colonies. 

What jobs did slaves have?

Slaves worked all sorts of jobs. 

Many slaves were field hands who worked the tobacco fields in the southern colonies.

These slaves worked extremely hard and were often treated poorly. 

Other slaves were house servants. 

These slaves did chores around the house or helped out in the master's trade shop. 

Slave Codes

The colonies established laws regarding slaves called slave codes. 

Some of these laws detailed the punishment for slaves who tried to escape. 

Other slave codes made it illegal to teach a slave to read, to help a slave to hide, and to pay for a slave to work. 

Slaves were not allowed to have weapons, leave their owner's plantation, or lift their hand against a white person. 

How were slaves treated?

Slaves had no rights and were under the orders of their masters 24 hours a day, seven days a week. 

They could be bought or sold at any time and were seldom able to live together for long as a family. 

They were sometimes beaten and whipped.

Children of slaves were owned by the slave owner: they were often sold as soon as they could work, never to see their parents again and the parents had no say. 

Abolitionism

After the American Revolution, many northern states outlawed slavery. 

Many people in the north felt that slavery should be illegal in all the United States. 

These people were called abolitionists because they wanted to "abolish" slavery. 

The United States became divided between slave states in the south and free states to the north. 

When new states were added, one of the major issues was whether the new state would legalize slavery or not. 

Underground Railroad

Slaves escaped from the South to the North by using the Underground Railroad. 

The Underground Railroad was a network of homes, people, and hideouts that helped slaves to make their way in secret to the North. 

Around 100,000 slaves were able to escape this way between 1810 and 1865. 

Civil War

When Abraham Lincoln was elected president, the southern states were afraid that he would outlaw slavery. 

They seceded from the United States and made their own country called the Confederacy. 

This started the Civil War. Eventually the North won the war and the southern states rejoined the Union. 

In 1865, the 13th Amendment outlawing slavery was added to the U.S. Constitution. 

What happened after the abolition of slavery?

About 4 million slaves were freed by the 13th Amendment. 

So many former slaves left the rural areas to live in towns and cities. 

Blacks and whites often rode the same buses together; ate in the same restaurants. 

But the white southerners couldn’t control these new communities as they controlled the slaves on plantations…

White people were frightened!

The Jim Crow laws 

The Jim Crow laws were passed in the late 1800s by the Southern states. 

They deprived African Americans of their civil rights and defined them as inferior.

In the southern states, two separate societies were created: one black, the other white. This was the beginning of Segregation!

Ironically, there was a set phrase that described segregation: ‘Separate, but equal!’ 

Blacks and whites could not sit in the same sections in buses, nor in the same waiting rooms, eat in the same restaurants... 

Black pupils weren’t allowed to attend the same schools as the whites.

Signs were put up to separate facilities saying “whites only” and “coloured” or “Negroes”. 

They appeared everywhere on parks, toilets, theaters, water fountains…

The Civil Rights Movement

In the 1950s and 1960s, leaders such as Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King Jr paved the way for non-violent protests. 

In 1955, Rosa Parks was arrested for not giving up her seat on the bus to a white passenger. 

This sparked the Montgomery Bus Boycott which lasted for over a year and brought Martin Luther King, Jr. to the forefront of the movement.

King led a number of non-violent protests including the March on Washington.

These protests led to the Civil Rights Act of 1964.This act outlawed segregation.

It also outlawed discrimination based on race, national background, and gender.