From: crdunlea@rodan.acs.syr.edu (Christopher R. Dunlea)
Subject: Re: The story of the Scottish flag
Organization: Syracuse University, Syracuse, NY
Date: Tue, 29 Dec 92 01:57:34 EST

In article <1ho30cINNddm@network.ucsd.edu> fledgist@weber.ucsd.edu (Fragano Ledgister) writes:
>Indentures were only significant from the 1620s to the 1640s.
>Thereafter in the 
>West Indies and the southern mainland colonies slave labour provided
>the bulk of the workforce.
>

Okay Let's get into numbers here.

Date                  White Immigrants/Population          African Imm./Pop
1630                    138,000         10,000              27,000      1,000
1650                    166,000         97,000             111,000     17,000
1680                     73,000        185,000             210,000     87,000
1700                     92,000        266,000             295,000    146,000 

Source: Henry A. Gemery, Emigration from the British isles to the New World, 
1630-1700: Inference from Colonial Populations," Research in Economic History,
1980. 

First, understand that these numbers came from quoted historican sources using
the best sources available. Second, it becomes obvious that, given that 2/3 
of the colonists in southern British America were indentured at some point, 
they clearly made up the labor pool, not Africans, until close to the
turn of the century. So you are corect in sheer numbers, but not in 
scope of time.

>Indentured servants had legal rights. These might have been ignored,
>but they were there. Furthermore, those who skipped their indentures
>could blend into the general white population in a way not available
>to black slaves. In the British empire slaves were granted no legal
>protections until 1823.
>

"Might have been ignored"?! They were! Otherwise, how many of them 
might have gained land? The vast tobacco estates that made the gentry of
Viginia and the West Indies possible would not have been had the indentures
been fulfilled. Besides, the law was twisted against the servants. And 
finally, if you consider the actual size of the frontier in the 1600's
(and most of present Virgina was frontiers), with such miniscule populations
shown above, how likely was it that anyone could have blended in with the
population? With a population of only 97,000 whites between Maine and Jamaica,
do you really think anyone could "blend in" if they couldn't get
passage to somewhere else? I went to school with 30,000 people and 
every day I bumped into several people I knew (in an area of a couple square    miles).

>>Seiously, about 2/3 of the population south of New England in Colonial
>>times started out as servants. Of this number, about 40% died in
>>servetude. Of THAT remaining number (we're talking smaller now) about 30%
>>actually got tenancy. Of THAT even smaller number about 10% even got to own 
>>land and were called Mister. 
>
>What proportion of slaves attained that?
>

I'd say about the same that became freedmen. So one white guy out of a
hundred got their freedom. This is an improvement?! What sort of 
contract is that? Sounds like serfdom at best, slavery at worst. Would
you like to live under an indenture in that society?

>I repeat, indentured service was of little significance in Jamaica.
>A decade after the conquest was completed it relied on slave labour,
>rather than contract labour. Privateers, by the way, are not pirates
>(their actions are commerce raiding in time of war -- under license
>-- rather than simple thievery).
>

Privateers in the service of the empire, pirates in peace. I understand
the difference well enough. However, after 1671 Jamaican piracy, and the
Pirates of the Caribbean as well, were wiped out. After Henry Morgan's 
attack on Panama after the signing of the Treaty of Madrid a naval 
squadron was sent to Jamaica, where the pirates were destroyed, and
Morgan was sent to the Tower in chains. 

>
>Not in the West Indies. Slavery was of considerable importance there
>by the 1690s. The first major slave revolt in Jamaica occurred in
>1690, and the guerrilla war between runaway slaves and the English
>which followed that revolt was to last nearly half a century.
>

See my previous posts. I said 1690 was when slavery replaced indentures in
the backbone of the labor force in America. However, slave rebellions 
ocurred even earlier (the staunchest soldiers in Bacon's Rebellion were
the servants and slaves--people who had nothing to lose and everything to
gain). 



Xref: sparky soc.culture.celtic:8344 soc.culture.british:17879