West - Enslaved women in America: from colonial times to Emancipation

Enslaved Women in America

The African American History Series

Series Editors:

Jacqueline M. Moore, Austin College

Nina Mjagkij, Ball State University

Traditionally, history books tend to fall into two categories: books academics write for each other, and books written for popular audiences. Historians often claim that many of the popular authors do not have the proper training to interpret and evaluate the historical evidence. Yet, popular audiences complain that most historical monographs are inaccessible because they are too narrow in scope or lack an engaging style. This series, which will take both chronological and thematic approaches to topics and individuals crucial to an understanding of the African American experience, is an attempt to address that problem. The books in this series, written in lively prose by established scholars, are aimed primarily at nonspecialists. They focus on topics in African American history that have broad significance and place them in their historical context. While presenting sophisticated interpretations based on primary sources and the latest scholarship, the authors tell their stories in a succinct manner, avoiding jargon and obscure language. They include selected documents that allow readers to judge the evidence for themselves and to evaluate the authors conclusions. Bridging the gap between popular and academic history, these books bring the African American story to life.

Volumes Published

Booker T. Washington, W.E.B. Du Bois, and the Struggle for Racial Uplift

Jacqueline M. Moore (2003)

Slavery in Colonial America, 16191776

Betty Wood (2005)

African Americans in the Jazz Age: A Decade of Struggle and Promise

Mark Robert Schneider (2006)

A. Philip Randolph: A Life in the Vanguard

Andrew E. Kersten (2006)

The African American Experience in Vietnam: Brothers in Arms

James Westheider (2007)

Bayard Rustin: American Dreamer

Jerald Podair (2008)

African Americans Confront Lynching: Strategies of Resistance from the Civil War to the Civil Rights Era

Christopher Waldrep (2009)

Lift Every Voice: The History of African American Music

Burton W. Peretti (2008)

To Ask for an Equal Chance: African Americans in the Great Depression

Cheryl Lynn Greenberg (2009)

The African American Experience During World War II

Neil A. Wynn (2010)

Through the Storm, Through the Night: A History of African American Christianity

Paul Harvey (2011)

Enjoy the Same Liberty: Black Americans in the Revolutionary Era

Edward Countryman (2011)

A Working People: A History of African American Workers Since Emancipation

Steven A. Reich (2013)

Between Slavery and Freedom: Free People of Color in America from Settlement to the Civil War

Julie Winch (2014)

Enslaved Women in America: From Colonial Times to Emancipation

Emily West (2014)

Enslaved Women in America

From Colonial Times to Emancipation

Emily West

Rowman & Littlefield

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978-1-4422-0871-1 (cloth : alk paper)

978-1-4422-0873-5 (electronic)

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Printed in the United States of America

Chronology

1619: The first African slaves arrive in Virginia.

1641: Massachusetts recognizes slavery in its legal codes through The Body of Liberties.

1643: Virginia lawmakers levy a tax (tithe) upon the labor of African slave women. Amended to include free black women in 1668.

1656: Elizabeth Key sues for and gains her freedom in Virginia.

1662: Virginia law decrees that enslaved children should follow the status of their mother.

1667: Virginia defines negro people as separate from Christians, closing off baptism and formalized Christianity as a possible route to freedom.

1676: Bacons Rebellion in Virginia.

1691: Virginia forbids interracial marriage and all interracial sexual acts.

1708 and 1712: Slave riots in New York City.

1724: Louisianas Code Noir forbids the barbarous and inhumane treatment of the enslaved.

1739: Stono Rebellion in South Carolina.

1753: Phillis Wheatley born in Boston.

1770: Pennsylvania legislates for the gradual emancipation of slaves.

1773: Phillis Wheatley becomes the first enslaved person to publish a book of poems.

1775: The thirteen colonies begin armed conflict with the British.

1775: Dunmore Proclamation offers freedom to slaves who support the Crown.

1776: Members of the Continental Congress sign the Declaration of Independence.

1776: Jenny Slew uses the courts to gain her freedom in Massachusetts.

1779: Clinton Proclamation offers enslaved women, as well as men, the chance to serve the British.

1779: New York State legislates for the gradual emancipation of slaves.

1781: Elizabeth, or Mum Bett, gains her freedom in Massachusetts on the grounds that the state constitution of 1780 declared all men are born free and equal.

1783: Treaty of Paris recognizes American sovereignty.

1789: Adoption of the U.S. Constitution.

1789: George Washington signs the Northwest Ordinance into law.

1791: Revolt begins in French Saint-Domingue.

1793: Eli Whitney patents the cotton gin.

1800: Gabriel Prosser attempts to lead a slave rebellion in Virginia.

1803: The Louisiana Purchase opens up new markets for the westward slave trade.

1804: Haiti declares independence.

1804: New Jersey legislates for the gradual emancipation of slaves.

1808: The international trade in slaves is outlawed.

1819: Slaves freed by their owners in Virginia have to leave the state.

1819: Acquisition of Florida from Spain.

1831: Mary Prince publishes her autobiography, The History of Mary Prince, a West Indian Slave .

1843: Isabella Baumfree changes her name to Sojourner Truth and begins campaigning for womens rights and emancipation.

1845: J. Marion Sims begins medical experimentation on enslaved women.

1848: William and Ellen Craft escape slavery in Georgia.

1849: Harriet Tubman escapes slavery and becomes involved in the Underground Railroad.

1850: Fugitive Slave Act.

1855: Celia murders her master, Robert Newsom, and is later hanged in Fulton, Missouri.

1860: William and Ellen Craft publish Running a Thousand Miles for Freedom .

1861: Outbreak of the Civil War.

1861: Union forces gain control of South Carolinas Port Royal Sound.

1861: Harriet Jacobs publishes Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl .

1863: Lincolns Emancipation Proclamation frees slaves in areas of rebellion.