Geography, Environment, and Peopling 1755–1800 - AP U.S. History

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Five of our number in the passage dy'd,
Who were cast into the ocean wide,
And, after sailing seven weeks and more,
We at Virginia all were put on shore. ...

Our faces shav'd, comb'd our wigs and hair,
That we in decent order might appear,
Against the Planters did come us to view,
How well they lik'd this fresh transported crew ...

At length a grim old man unto me came,
He ask'd my trade, likewise my name,
I told him I a tin-man was by trade,
And not eighteen years of age I said ...

At last to my new master's house I came,
To the town of Wicowoco call'd by name,
Here my European cloaths were took from me,
Which never after I could ever see.

Passage adapted from "The Poor Unhappy Transported Felon's Sorrowful Account" by James Revell (1767)

Who is the most likely author of this passage?

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Answer

Many Europeans who arrived in North America during the 17th and 18th centuries came under contract as indentured servants; however, an improving economy in England in the late 17th and early 18th centuries meant that fewer workers chose to go to the colonies. The transformation from indentured servitude to slavery was a gradual process in Virginia. The major clues that the author of this piece was a European servant rather than an African slave are the fact that he was wearing a wig, the fact that he had learned a trade, and the fact that he came to his master's house in European clothes.

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