Origins of Slaves

Slavery did not always exist in its typical format of black Africans who were cruelly mistreated and who were the property of their master for life, it evolved to this state from other, more basic, forms. Indentured servitude was the predecessor to slavery, but despite its commonality of hard labor and abuse, it differed greatly. The greatest difference was that the term of service for servants had an expiration date, often 7 years from its beginning, while slavery was for life.  Induction into servitude most often resulted from a punishment for committing a crime, an alternative for homelessness and poverty, or to resolve an unpaid debt. On occasion, persons would subject themselves to servitude of their own free will, typically young men who wanted to escape or seek their fortune in America.

While indentured servitude filled the same role, and produced the same result of unpaid labor, the shortcoming when compared to slavery was that it did not last. The termination of a servant’s service not only resulted in the loss of a laborer but it also created an additional competitor in the marketplace. As pressure from the competitiveness of slave-owning farmers increased, slavery replaced indentured servitude as the labor-source of choice for plantation owners across the colonies. The initial source of many slaves was not across the sea in Africa, but rather the Native Americans that were already living on and working the land. Land-owners captured these Indians as slaves, but few were willing to endure the difficulties of maintaining them once African slaves became readily available. The knowledge that Indians held of the land was bittersweet for plantation owners, while it made Indians successful at planting and harvesting crops it also provided the Indians an enormous advantage should they be inclined to escape, which was often the case. Also part of the Indians home-field advantage was the support network they could tap into once on the lamb, a benefit that African slaves did not share.

Once African slaves were deemed the most desirable choice for unpaid labor and Americans’ desire for independence peaked, the demand for more slaves created an entirely new industry, the trading of slaves all along the Atlantic coast. As European and American ships arrived in Africa in search of “black gold” they found that the industry already existed there. For many years Europeans merely became new participants in the existing slave economy before they eventually influenced its mechanics in their favor.  Slaves in Africa consisted primarily of captives taken during war. War prisoners would be sold by their captors to neighboring tribes or to North Africans or Islamic Nations.  (Rediker, 75-77) Similar to European and American indentured servitude, Africans used slavery as a punishment for criminals they no longer wanted in their midst.

The continual arrival of European and American ships on Africa’s coast would eventually have great influence on the local slave market. With only limited numbers of criminals and war captives, European and American demand for slaves led larger African states to adopt a more involved role in the slave trade. As slaves primarily resulted from war, those involved in the trade began changing the definition of war and even promoted acts of war as a means for obtaining slaves. It eventually got to the point where “War was a euphemism for the organized theft of human beings.” (Rediker, 99)