Chronology of the History of Slavery

I selected this media because I wanted to find another perspective of slavery other then the materials in class. I wanted to see if this perspective included similar history and events as discussed in class.

This is an excellent web site that gives a chronology of slavery and important events that influenced the institution of slavery. I found it on the internet as I was researching.

This is an extremely lengthy website so I focused on the year 1662. The information on this site was very similar to the information in class. I like the timeline view of information because you can see how quickly events transpired to form slavery. It is hard to believe that blacks who were viewed as indentured servants along with whites, soon found themselves as life long slaves within fifty years.

This information correlates to the information in class as it focuses on the courts decisions and outcomes in the history of slavery. In the 1662 section you can see all the decisions discussed in class, including rulings against interracial marriage, rebelling against slavery, and information on how the slaves were treated. I found the last paragraph in this section interesting. It explained how slaves in Virginia who had committed crimes were tried in special non-jury courts that were fast and did not provide due process.

The website can be found at http://www.innercity.org/holt/slavechron.html

The courts could resort to hideous punishments to reassert white authority. Offending slaves were hung, burned at the stake, dismembered, castrated and branded in addition to the usual whippings. White fear of black rebellion was a constant undercurrent. (How the Cradle of Liberty Became a Slave-Owning Nation. By Susan DeFord, Special to The Washington Post Wednesday, December 10, 1997; Page H01 http://www.washingtonpost.com)