Transcripts For CSPAN3 Slavery In Colonial New England 20240

Welcome. The Hingham Heritage Museum. My name is deirdre anderson. I have the pleasure of serving as the executive director of the hingham Historical Society. Whose home is here at the Hingham Heritage Museum and welcome to this soldout program. On behalf of our board of directors and our small staff, i would like to thank you all for making us a part of your week. Excuse me. I would like to thank cspan for filming us so that others who cannot be with us tonight can see it at a later date. And thank you to the Abigail Adams Historical Society and their board of directors, who offered us this wonderful opportunity to partner with them as we did last year with their gillis. Their speaker, edith gillis. Abigails rich history in this region inspires us every day. Thank you. The hingham Historical Society is focused like never before on its history, to understand all voices. We currently are in the midst of a campaign for the Benjamin Lincoln house, which is our effort to purchase the home of hinghams American Revolutionary war hero at 181 north street. Benjamin lincoln received the british sort of surrender at yorktown, or as we like to tell schoolchildren, that is Benjamin Lincoln on the whiteboard. He is featured so prominently in trumbulls painting at the u. S. Capitol. Benjamin lincoln served hingham as a clerk, constable, and selectman. He also came from a family that owned slaves. And two blocks from here, theres a slave quarter in the attic of the Benjamin Lincoln home. Our next major exhibit here at the museum generates out of the archaeological finds from the greenbush excavation. The artifacts of colonial bustle weight, and others tell many stories. But the amazing story of the tribe for which the commonwealth gets its name, the massachusetts. We are privileged to work with the massachusett tribe, a member of whom is here with us tonight, to work on this exhibit, to be sure, for the first time in the hingham Historical Societys history we present the voices correctly. But how do we do this . How do we tell the story of slavery . How do we tell the story of our native people well and correctly . And we do it together. And it is a joy to be here tonight with all of you. All voices at the table. And thank you for coming to tonights program. I would like to introduce michele coughlan, head of the board at the Abigail Adams Historical Society, who will introduce our speaker. Thanks for coming tonight. [applause] michelle im going to echo dutra in saying welcome and thank you so much for coming this evening. I want to thank deirdre and michael sincerely and the rest of the hingham Historical Society for again partnering with us on a program. We are so happy to do this. And before i get into the introduction, i want to tell you about another program you might find of interest. On saturday, march 28, from 9 00 to 1 00 in plymouth, the spire center, the backroads of the south shore, which is a consortium of local historical organizations, of which the hingham Historical Society and the Abigail Adams birthplace are a part, are hosting the symposium. We have so many exciting anniversaries this year in massachusetts that this symposium will be focusing on those anniversaries, such as the 400th arrival 400th anniversary of the arrival of the mayflower, 100th anniversary of the reaching of womens suffrage. Interestingly, locally, the 100th anniversary of the trial which will be the subject of the keynote. So more information is available on our website. Brss. Org. So i am a member of the board of the Abigail Adams Historical Society, and we oversee as stewards the Abigail Adams birthplace, which was built in 1685. It is in weymouth. It is where Abigail Smith adams was born. She lived for the first 20 years of her life there until she married john adams in 1764. She continued to be connected to this house throughout her life. She visited throughout her parents lives. This was a place where her character and ideals were formed so its very important to her. We are an all volunteer organization and we try to continue her spirit by offering Educational Programs and we also offer seasonal tours and private tours. And if you would like more information, please check out our website at abigailadamsbirthplace. Org. When i first joined the Abigail Adams birthplace board a few years ago, despite knowing how prevalent slavery was in early new england i was still shocked , to discover that there were slaves in the home where Abigail Adams grew up. Her antislavery sentiments are wellknown, but her father, reverend williams smith, had at least four slaves. Cato, tower, tom and phoebe. These individuals were important to Abigail Adamss early life. We try and commemorate them and honor their memory by researching their lives, incorporating information about their lives into our tours, and also offering a program on early new england slavery every year. And so, this year, we are very pleased to be able to have Jared Hardesty join us. I wanted jared to speak for us since his first book came out, unfreedom, slavery, independence in 18thcentury boston, and this year, the stars have aligned, so jared is an associate professor at western washington university, and he is the author of black lives, native lands, white worlds, a history of slavery in new england, and i welcome you to give jared a warm welcome. [applause] jared good evening, everyone. Thank you for coming. Thank you to the hingham Historical Society and deidra and michael and everyone here. This place is really swanky. It is really nice. And also to the board of the Abigail Adams Historical Society birthplace. I was told to say slash birthplace. It is a great honor to be here, and it is certainly thanks to the audience here tonight as well. This is now the seventh book talk i have given in new england about this particular book. And almost every one of them has been sold out. Been sold out. That is heartening as an author, but it is also as someone who cares about this subject and wants this information out there as an educator as well, so it is my great honor to be here this evening to talk about black lives, native lands, white worlds, a history of slavery in new england. This book is the first general overview of slavery in new england in nearly 80 years. The last book to do this was Lorenzo Johnston greens the england. Olonial new there have been plenty of books since then. They are usually part of larger histories of slavery in the united states, in the american north, or a focused historical study, and i am certainly guilty of doing that in my first book. This is a general overview meant for kind of the reading public. This evening, i want to discuss the purpose of writing this book. Or in other words, why i think we need this book in this moment. And then give you a brief overview of its contents. In doing so, i will talk a bit about the history of slavery in new england more generally. So why write this book at all, especially in this moment . It came out last year in 2019. In the end, i envision this book as a conversation or rather, me narrating a conversation that has been going on for about the past 25 years, and you see four different conversations going on in that time period. The first, there has been a massive outpouring of academic scholarship, books, journal articles, and things like that, by scholars on the topic of new england slavery. Much of that scholarship, and i am totally guilty here, has been hyper specialized, focusing on particular places, moments, themes, or sets of sources. These works, as excellent as they are, sometimes make it difficult to see the Bigger Picture and also sometimes, they are sometimes inaccessible, both because of the way academics write, but also because of things like pay walls that are very expensive to get access to. The second conversation is that coming into this conversation are the libraries, archives, and historical societies across new england who identify that they own collections related to slavery and made them widely accessible via online publishing, traditional print publishing, but also, something as simple as when these libraries digitize their catalogs, providing subject headings related to slavery, it makes these sources much easier to identify, and much more accessible. The third, add to that a historical reckoning with slavery by leading institutions across new england such as Brown Universitys report on slavery and justice. Now, that reckoning, which started back in 2003 with brown, has extended to Historic Sites large and small, as we hear tonight. Other universities and local and state governments have all begun to dig into their own past and relationship with slavery. The finally the final piece of this is the work of community activists, of public historians, local historians, independent researchers, who have uncovered an incredible amount of source material on slavery and publicized it in the most radically accessible ways, on blogs and things like that. And this forces us all to acknowledge the regions history of and connection to slavery, so we have all these different conversations that have been going on for the past generation. Many different people talking to each other, with each other, at each other, past each other, often times, about the history of slavery in new england, the memory of that history, and the politics of that memory. In the book, i try to bring together these conversations and use them to narrate the new, more comprehensive, yet accessible history of new england slavery. In short, i stand on the shoulders of people who have been in the trenches doing this work for the past 25 years. In that sense, i view the book not only as an end. It synthesizes 25 years of scholarship to more fully tell this history. I think it is also a beginning. It provides a set of facts, a framework, and a starting point for future conversations. So how do i narrate this conversation . This kind of four conversations we have seen come together . I discussed the lives of enslaved africans and Indigenous People in new england, how their enslavement was instrumental to the colonization of the region, and how slavery and colonization were two processes designed to transform new england into a place that best served the regions white settler population, especially the most elite settlers. All three of those are tall orders in and of themselves, but to do that in about 60,000 words the editor told me no more than 60,000 words. That is about 50 to 175 pages, if you are wondering. Not much at all. And to make it approachable to the reading public. These were no small tasks. Short length, make sure it is readable. Indeed, the hardest part of writing the book was actually not what to research and write. I had 25 years of excellent source material from academics, researchers, and activists. But rather, how. How to create a book that is short yet comprehensive, comprehensive yet readable, readable yet sensitive to the subject matter . And now, the book is published, and many of you bought copies. I really hope i pulled it off. [laughter] jared the book is both a chronological and topical narrative that opens with the colonization of new england in the 1620s and 1630s, and it early 19th century with the process of emancipation. To bring some coherence this is a big history the book uses one organizing theme, connections. I look at the connection between new england slavery and slavery and Slave Society in other slave societies in other parts of the americas. I looked at the connection of slavery in new england to the larger social, economic, and Political Development of the region. And finally, i look at how those two types of connections, connections to other slave societies, connections to the development of new england, how those two connections shape the lives of enslaved people and two types of connections,how ene connections. It is a tall order. But nevertheless the book opens , by examining the connection between slavery and colonization. Anyone who is familiar with the history of slavery in new england, there is this kind of mythical moment. Historians have narrated the beginning of slavery in new england in 1638. In that year, the ship that e desire sailed into boston higher, and John Winthrop in his diary recorded the cargo on board the desire, and there was sugar, salt, and he also listed african captives. So 1638, this is the starting date. Over about the past 15 years or so, historians have begun to challenge that as a foundational moment in history of slavery in new england, and they have done that in two ways. The first is pretty obviously there were enslaved people enslaved africans before 1638. We have direct eyewitness testimony of the presence of enslaved africans. But the more important part, and where the scholarship has really gone since, and where my book really tries to develop this is not only studying the desire when it came back to new england, but the desire when it left. The desire was based out of boston. And historians began looking into what did the desire ship to the west indies to purchase the salt and the sugar and the african captives . In the hold of the desire were a number of pequot captives. Between the year 1636 and 1638, the colonies of massachusetts, rhode island, and connecticut went to war against the pequot people. The war yielded hundreds of captives. Many of them were enslaved locally in new england towns, but we know a couple hundred at least were sold out of the colony. And so, they are sold out of new england to the west indies, where they are exchanged for african captives. We see here the direct connection between slavery and colonization in new england. Slavery served a dual purpose. First, it served the purpose of removing Indigenous People from their land to open it for english settlement. What better way to remove people from their land than to permanently tear them away, sell them away from their homeland . This allows for the rapid expansion of the new england colonies. Both large numbers of english immigrants, high reproduction rates, they quickly expand into the interior, and that creates labor shortages, especially in areas that had been settled early, especially the major port towns, boston, salem, places like that. And they need labor, so they use african slave labor to supplement the labor force as a whole. You see the process of exchanging native captives for african captives, and that is the foundation of slavery in new england beginning in the 1630s through the 1670s. Native captives are african captives. For african captives. As this cycle suggests, central to it was new englands connection to the west indies. Especially the growing plantation economies there. The english settled the west indies about the same time they settled in new england. So 16 20s. They arrived in barbados a little bit later. Very quickly, these islands are completely colonized and turned over to sugar cultivation. Almost the entire islands are. They are entirely stripped of forests and any piece of arable land is planted with sugarcane, and eventually, they used enslaved africans to work those cane plantations. These islands, because they have been completely stripped of their forest, only growing sugarcane, they need food, they need provisions for that enslaved labor force. They need supplies like timber for building and for burning. They need livestock for food and labor, and they turned to new england. As early as the 1630s, you see new englanders selling these provisions to the west indies. They, it is used to fuel the plantation complex there, and in exchange, new englanders received sugar and molasses and things like and enslaved africans. It forms a symbiotic relationship between the two regions, between new england and the west indies. First barbados but eventually the leeward islands. Eventually jamaica. This is a symbiotic relationship that extends beyond the economic. It is very much economic, but there is a considerable amount of Cultural Exchange as well, so some of the earliest graduates of harvard, for example were the sons of west indian planters. There is extensive intermarriage between elite merchant families in new england and the west indies, to further solidify those economic ties. And the new england colonies begin borrowing heavily from the slave societies in the caribbean to create their own systems of slavery here. So for example, massachusetts borrowed slave law and customs governing slavery directly from barbados. And most enslaved people who arrived in the region, enslaved africans, actually had spent time in the west indies before they arrived here. Sometimes, they were born there. Sometimes, they spent a couple months after arriving on a slave ship, but they spent a considerable amount of time in the caribbean. Using this caribbean connection as a starting point, my book then turns and explores the way in which enslaved people arrived in new england. All told, about 20,000 enslaved africans arrived between the 1630s and 1775. They came to comprise about 4 of the regions population. That is another place where you have to stop and kind of question the way in which the history of slavery in new england has been written. One of the ways in which historians have pushed back against and others have pushed back against the importance of slavery in new england is those demographic numbers. Oh, it is only 4 of the population. How important could it actually be . Theres two answers to that. The first is when you look in specific regions, the slave population is actually significantly higher. So boston in the m