Page 102 - American Stories, A History of the United States

3.1

3.2

3.3

3.4

3.5

Wedding in The slave QuarTers Old Plantation, a watercolor by an unknown artist (c. 1800), shows that
African wedding customs survived plantation slavery.

It was African American. The slaves accepted Christianity but did so on their own
terms—terms their masters seldom fully understood. Blacks transformed Christianity
into an expression of religious feeling in which an African element remained vibrant.
In music and folk art, they gave voice to a cultural identity that even the most degrading
conditions could not eradicate.
A major turning point in the history of African Americans occurred during the
early eighteenth century. The number of live births exceeded deaths, and from this time
on, the expansion of the African American population owed more to natural increase
than to the importation of new slaves. Thousands of new Africans arrived each year,
but the creole population was always much larger than that of the immigrant blacks.
This demographic shift did not occur in the Caribbean or South American colonies
until much later. Historians believe that North American blacks enjoyed a healthier
climate and better diet than did other New World slaves.
Although mainland blacks lived longer than those of Jamaica or Barbados, they
were still slaves. They protested their debasement in many ways, some in individual
acts of violence, others in organized revolt. The most serious slave rebellion of the Quick Check
colonial period was the Stono Uprising, when 150 South Carolina blacks seized guns How did living conditions for
and ammunition and murdered white planters in September 1739. “With Colours dis- enslaved African-Americans in the
played, and two Drums beating,” they marched toward Spanish Florida, where they mainland colonies differ from
had been promised freedom. The militia overtook the rebellious slaves and killed most conditions in the Caribbean and
of them. Although the uprising was short-lived, such incidents helped persuade whites what impact did these differing
everywhere that their own blacks might secretly be planning bloody revolt. conditions have on slave families?

blueprint For an empire

3.4 Why did england discourage free and open trade in colonial America?
u ntil the mid-seventeenth century, English political leaders largely ignored

the American colonists. Private companies and aristocratic proprietors had
created these societies, some for profit, others for religious sanctuary, but
in no case did the crown provide financial or military assistance. After the
Restoration of Charles II in 1660, Englishmen of various sorts—courtiers, merchants,
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