Talk:Indian slavery
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 To-do list for Indian slavery: |
edit · history · watch · refresh | ||
|---|---|---|---|
|
|||
I've asked for a citation for this sentence: "Enslaved Native Americans generally died after a short time in the conditions of plantation slavery." I've heard that idea here and there, but I'm unconvinced that Indian slaves died in significantly greater numbers than African or European slaves under the same conditions. My impression is that Indian slavery was generally given up by Europeans after African slaves became readily available at affordable prices -- Indian slaves were apt to run away and much more able to find safe haven than Africans were. For this reason, northern colonies like New York and New England bought Indian slaves from South Carolina, so they would not be able to run away to their own people and would stand out as foreign Indians due to speech, mannerism, tattoos, etc. The final reason Indian slavery was given up, at least north of the Caribbean and Mexico, was not because Indians died too easily, but because the early colonies realized the degree to which they depended on Indian alliances. By the early 1700s, the English were very actively seeking alliances with nearly every major Indian tribe in eastern America. Indian slavery operated by setting one tribe against another and encouraging war, so that the war captives could be sold to the English. The system required that some tribes be enemies of the English, to justify their enslavement. By the early 1700s, this was working against the larger need for strong alliances with the Indians (such as the Iroquois, Cherokee, Creek, Chickasaw, and Choctaw; all of which had been sources of slaves or slave-raiders at one point or another). This, coupled with the growing availability of African slaves effectively ended the Indian slave system, rather than something about Indians making "bad slaves", as is sometimes claimed. I've gotten this perspective from Alan Gallay's book "The Indian Slave Trade", Meinig's "Shaping of America" books, and others.
That's why I put in the "citation needed". I'm sure there are plenty of sources that make this claim, but I'd like to see one that really stands up against the well researched work of Gallay, because I suspect the idea is a kind of "American myth" -- often claimed without much to back it up. Thanks! Pfly 19:25, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
