Timeline of Slavery (link)
- 1501 — Spanish settlers bring first African slaves to the New World (Santo Domingo).
- 1562 — The British join the slave trade.
- 1581 — African slaves are brought to Florida by Spanish settlers in St. Augustine.
- 1619 — African slaves are brought to Jamestown.
- 1638 — New England slave trade begins.
- 1662 — Virginia law establishes that children of black mothers are slaves if their mothers are slaves, free if their mothers are free.
- 1712 — Slaves in New York City revolt; the revolt is put down by the militia.
- 1739 — Slaves in South Carolina revolt. Again, the revolt is put down by the militia.
- 1775 — First abolitionist society founded in Philadelphia.
- 1775-1783 — American Revolution.
- 1787 — Constitution is written.
- 1793 — First Fugitive Slave Act makes it a crime to interfere with efforts to capture runaway slaves.
- 1808 — United States bans the slave trade; smuggling continues.
- 1820 — Missouri Compromise forbids slavery in new territories north of latitude 36° 30’.
- 1822 — Denmark Vesey leads a slave revolt in Charleston.
- 1831 — Nat Turner leads a slave revolt in Virginia.
- 1850 — Compromise of 1850 establishes a Fugitive Slave Law giving greater power to federal authorities in exchange for admission of California to the union as a free state.
- 1854 — Kansas-Nebraska Act sets aside the Missouri Compromise and lets these two new territories decide whether they will allow slavery.
- 1857 — In the Dred Scott decision, the Supreme Court says that blacks cannot be citizens and that Congress has no power to outlaw slavery in any territory.
- 1861-1865 — Civil War.
- 1863 — President Lincoln issues the Emancipation Proclamation, freeing slaves in the Confederate States.
- 1865 — The 13th amendment to the Constitution abolishes slavery in the United States.
Capture
![Picture](/uploads/5/6/3/1/56319929/4675602.png?1437417563)
Most of the Africans who were enslaved were captured in battle or kidnapped, though some were sold into slavery for debt or as punishment for another offense. Most European and African dealers had a sophisticated network of trading alliances for gathering captives and marching them to the coast.
Gate of No ReturnThe passageway of a slave fort was often the point of no return for captured Africans. Ottobah Cugoano wrote in 1787, "I was soon conducted to a prison, for three days...when a vessel arrived to conduct us away to the ship, ... there was nothing heard but the rattling of chains, smacking of whips, and the groans and cries of our fellow men. Some would not stir from the ground, when they were lashed and beat... I have forgotten the name of this infernal fort."
Gene Peters, photographer Courtesy of the Gene Peters Collection Shackles Used to Transport SlavesCourtesy of The Mariners' Museum, Newport News, VA
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1526 San Miguel de Gualdape
(Sapelo Island, Georgia, Victorious) c. 1570 Gaspar Yanga's Revolt (Veracruz, Victorious) 1712 New York Slave Revolt (New York City, Suppressed) 1733 St. John Slave Revolt (Saint John, Suppressed) 1739 Stono Rebellion (South Carolina, Suppressed) 1741 New York Conspiracy (New York City, Suppressed) 1760 Tacky's War (Jamaica, Suppressed) 1791–1804 Haitian Revolution (Saint-Domingue, Victorious) 1800 Gabriel Prosser (Virginia, Suppressed) 1803 Igbo Landing (St. Simons Island, Georgia, Suppressed) 1805 Chatham Manor (Virginia, Suppressed) 1811 German Coast Uprising (Territory of Orleans, Suppressed) 1815 George Boxley (Virginia, Suppressed) 1816 Bussa's Rebellion (Barbados, Suppressed) 1822 Denmark Vesey (South Carolina, Suppressed) 1831 Nat Turner's rebellion (Virginia, Suppressed) 1831–1832 Baptist War (Jamaica, Suppressed) 1839 Amistad, ship rebellion (Off the Cuban coast, Victorious) 1841 Creole case, ship rebellion (Off the Southern U.S. coast, Victorious) 1842 Slave Revolt in the Cherokee Nation (Southern U.S., Suppressed) 1859 John Brown's Raid (Virginia, Suppressed) Courtesy of Wikipedia |
Conditions Aboard a Slave Ship
Food for Thought
Why did some Americans see that slavery was wrong while others did not?
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