| 1526 |
A group of Africans is brought to South Carolina by a Spanish explorer to
erect a settlement. They escape and settle with Native Americans.
|
|
| 1565 |
African slaves are brought to Spanish colony of St. Augustine.
|
|
| 1607 |
Jamestown is settled. It is the first permanent settlement in the colony of Virginia. The Virginia
Company of London finances the settlement with the expectation of seeing profits from harvesting
Virginia's raw resources.
|
|
| 1612 |
John Rolfe plants Caribbean tobacco seeds in the rich Virginia soil. Tobacco becomes the exported
product that makes Virginia a wealthy colony.
|
|
| 1619 |
The first recorded Africans in the colony of Virginia arrive at Jamestown
on a Dutch ship. Colonial Williamsburg historians believe these Africans were indentured servants.
|
|
| 1639 |
Blacks in Virginia are not required to bear arms although white settlers must. |
|
| 1640 |
An African servant, John Punch, and two servants of European descent are captured while attempting
to run away. The European servants are required to serve additional time as part of their punishment.
John Punch is sentenced to lifetime servitude. This is the first recorded case of slavery prescribed
by law in the colony of Virginia.
|
|
| 1641 |
Massachusetts Bay Colony legalizes slavery. |
|
| 1642 |
Black women are counted as tithables-taxable property. Virginia passes a law making
it illegal to help runaway slaves, punishable by 20 pounds of tobacco for each night of assistance.
|
|
| 1660 |
Virginia legalizes slavery.
|
|
| 1661 |
Children born to enslaved mothers are considered slaves as well, regardless of their fathers'
status. Children of enslaved fathers and free mothers are not considered slaves.
|
|
| 1667 |
By law, slaves baptized into the church are still considered to be slaves. |
|
| 1669 |
Accidentally killing a slave during correction is not considered a crime. |
|
| 1670 |
Blacks and Native Americans are not permitted to own servants of another race. All non-Christians
arriving in the colony by water are hereafter considered slaves.
|
|
| 1671 |
Black slaves are considered property in real estate appraisals. |
|
| 1672 |
Runaway slaves resisting capture may be killed. Virginia passes a law putting
a bounty on the heads of escaped Africans who formed communities in and around the
Great Dismal Swamp bordering Virginia and North Carolina. |
|
| 1680 |
The ages of imported black children are to be determined and documented within three months of
arrival in the colony.
Blacks are forbidden to possess any type of weapon.
Slaves must have permission before leaving their plantation of residence.
Slaves are forbidden to raise a hand against any Christian. An act punishing slave insurrection
is in force.
|
|
| 1682 |
All non-Christians coming into Virginia by any means are considered slaves, whether or not they
convert to Christianity.
A court of oyer and terminer (a Latin term meaning "hear and decide") is established to try
all slaves accused of crimes. No jury hears the cases and there is no right to appeal the court's
decision.
Blacks are required to give up ownership of cattle, horses, and sheep.
|
|
| 1688 |
Mennonite Quakers in Pennsylvania sign an anti-slavery resolution.
|
|
| 1705 |
"An Act Concerning Servants and Slaves" revises and strengthens most of the laws
regarding slavery.
|
|
| 1710 |
Slaves who turn in other slaves planning insurrections or revolts are to be set free by law. |
|
| 1739 |
Stono Rebellion takes place 20 miles southeast of Charleston, South Carolina
after the governor tells slaves they can go to St. Augustine, Florida and be free.
A group of fugitives escape, killing 21 whites along the way. After their capture,
43 slaves are executed. |
|
| 1740 |
North Carolina passes a law to prosecute people helping slaves to escape. |
|
| 1769 |
Matthew Ashby, a free black man living in Williamsburg, Virginia, obtains the freedom (via petition
and purchase) of his wife, Ann, and his two children, John and Mary. Ashby may have been one of a
group that successfully petitioned the court to eliminate the tax on free black women.
In the Somerset Case, an English court rules in favor of a slave brought into England from British
colony who claims he is a free man.
|
|
| 1773 |
George Lile and Andres Bryan organize the first African American Baptist
Church at Savannah, Georgia. Members of this church helped escaping slaves.
|
|
|
1775 |
Governor Dunmore of Virginia issues an emancipation proclamation that imposes martial law in
Virginia and offers freedom to indentured servants and slaves willing to fight for the King of England.
Slave insurrection occurs in the western part of Virginia.
First abolitionist society formed in Philadelphia.
|
|
|
1776 |
Delegates to the Continental Congress in Philadelphia adopt the Declaration of
Independence on July 4, which begins, "We hold these truths to be self-evident,
that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain
inalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."
|
|
| 1787 |
U.S. Congress passes the Northwest Ordinance, which provides for territorial government and
eventual statehood for the area north of the Ohio River and east of the Mississippi River. Slavery
is prohibited in any of this new territory.
The Free African society is organized in Philadelphia by Richard Allen and Absalom Jones.
The form the African Methodist Episcopal Church, which assisted escaped slaves.
|
|
|
1792 |
Eli Whitney invents the cotton gin. |
|
|
1793
|
U.S. Congress passes the Fugitive Slave Act to protect the rights of slave
owners to retrieve runaway slaves from free states and territories. |
|
|
1801 |
The Gabriel Plot for rebellion in Henrico, County, Virginia is suppressed. |
|
|
1803
|
Haitians win independence from France and abolish slavery. |
|
|
1804
|
Nearly all Northern states have abolished slavery by this time. |
|
|
1808
|
U.S. Congress passes a law to end the importation of African slaves. |
|
|
1816
|
Federal troops engage in war against Seminoles and escaped slaves in Florida. |
|
|
1817
|
The first free Africans are repatriated to Sierra Leone. |
|
|
1820
|
The Missouri Compromise admits Missouri as a slave state and Maine as a free
state to maintain the balance of 12 free and 12 slave states in the United States.
All territory north of latitude 36-30' is declared free, all territory south of the
line is slaveholding. |
|
|
1822
|
A slave revolt led by Denmark Vesey is suppressed in Charleston, South Carolina,
36 collaborators are hanged. |
|
|
1830
|
Formation of the American Anti-Slavery Society by Lewis Tappan. Vigilance commitees
are formed in northern cities to prevent return of slaves to the south. |
|
|
1831
|
William Lloyd Garrison publishes The Liberator.
Nat Turner, a slave who believed God had chosen him to lead slaves out of bondage,
leads an insurrection killing 51 whites in Southampton County, Virginia. He and
his followers were caught. Turner was convicted of treason at his trial; hanged,
skinned and boiled. More stringent slave laws were enacted following his rebellion.
|
|
|
1833
|
Oberlin College in Ohio is founded as an integrated institution and becomes a
center of abolitionist and underground railroad activity.
All slavery is abolished in the British Empire, including Canada. |
|
|
1832
|
New England Anti-Slavery Society is formed. |
|
|
1837
|
Abolitionist editor Elijah P. Lovejoy killed in Alton, Illinois. |
|
|
1840
|
New York, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Vermont and Ohio pass a series of
"personal liberty laws."
Enslaved African revolt on the Spanish ship Amistad off the coast of Cuba. |
|
|
1843
|
Prigg vs. Pennysylvania challenging the constitutionality of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1793. |
|
|
1847
|
Frederick Douglass, an escaped slave and tremendous abolitionist orator, begins
publication of the newspaper, The North Star. |
|
|
1848
|
First Women's Rights Convention held in Seneca Falls, New York. |
|
|
1849
|
Harriet Tubman escapes from slavery, begins helping others to escape. |
|
|
1850
|
The Fugitive Slave Law is passed by Congress strengthening the 1793 Act.
Federal officers are now offered a fee for returning runaway slaves. |
|
|
1852
|
Dew, James H. Hammond and others issue strong proslavery arguments adopted
by southern states.
Harriet Beecher Stowe publishes Uncle Tom's Cabin.
|
|
|
1857
|
U.S. Supreme Court decides in the Dred Scott decision that slaves do not
become free when taken into free territory. |
|
|
1859
|
John Brown and others attack the federal arsenal at Harper's Ferry, West Virginia
to prepare to free slaves. Ten of his men were killed, he and seven others
were hanged after trial. |
|
|
1860
|
Abraham Lincoln is elected president. South Carolina is the first state to secede from the Union. |
|
|
1861
|
March
First Conscription Act for Union troops made all men 20-45, liable to military service, but
service could be avoided by payment of $300 or procuring a substitute to enlist for three years.
State quotas were fixed (proportionate to total population) and states given credit for previous
enlistments. The draft was regarded as inequitable to the poor.
The first drawings provoked serious riots in working-class
quarters in New York City, culminating (13-16 July) in the New York City Draft Riots,
four days of pillaging and lynching of African Americans, chiefly participated
in by Irish-Americans, required the dis-patch to New York of regiments de-tached
from Meade's army.
April
The Confederacy first relied on enlistments; then, drafted into military service every white
man (18-35) for three years. The lower classes denounced the long list of exempted occupations
as well as the privilege of sending substitutes; many Southern leaders questioned
the constitutionality of conscription.
May
General. B. F. Butler, in command of Fortress Monroe, Va., ruled that slaves escaping to his
lines were "contraband of war" which he would not return to their masters.
August
General Johm C. Fremont issued a proclamation declaring that slaves of
Missourians taking up arms against the U.S. were free. Lincoln modified this order
(2 Sept.) to conform to existing federal law.
Kansas admitted to the Union as a free state. Eleven states secede from the Union.
The Civil War begins.
|
|
|
1863
|
The Emancipation Proclamation, issued by President Lincoln, frees slaves in the seceding States. |
|
|
1865
|
Congress passes the Thirteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution making slavery illegal and
extending civil rights to former slaves. The Civil War ends with Union victory.
|
|
|
1866
|
U.S. Congress passes the Fourteenth Amendment extending civil rights to former slaves. |
|
|
1869
|
U.S. Congress passes the Fifteenth Amendment permitting men to vote without
regard to race, color, or previous condition of servitude. |
