From Wikipedia on Indentured Servants:
“Between one-half and two-thirds of European immigrants to the
Thirteen Colonies between the 1630s and the
American Revolution came under indentures.
[5] The practice was sufficiently common that the
Habeas Corpus Act 1679, in part, prevented imprisonments overseas; it also made provisions for those with existing transportation contracts and those "praying to be transported" in lieu of remaining in prison upon conviction.
[12] In any case, while half the European immigrants to the
Thirteen Colonies had been indentured servants, at any one time they were outnumbered by workers who had never been indentured, or whose indenture had expired. Free wage labour was more common for Europeans in the colonies.
[13]Indentured persons were numerically important mostly in the region from
Virginia north to
New Jersey. Other colonies saw far fewer of them. The total number of European immigrants to all 13 colonies before 1775 was about 500,000-550,000; of these 55,000 were
involuntary prisoners. Of the 450,000 or so European arrivals who came voluntarily, Tomlins estimates that 48% were indentured.
[14] About 75% were under the age of 25. The age of legal adulthood for men was 24 years; those over 24 generally came on contracts lasting about 3 years.
[1]Regarding the children who came, Gary Nash reports that, "many of the servants were actually nephews, nieces, cousins and children of friends of emigrating Englishmen, who paid their passage in return for their labour once in America."
[15]
Farmers, merchants, and shopkeepers in the British colonies found it very difficult to hire free workers, primarily because it was easy for potential workers to set up their own farms.
[16]Consequently, a common solution was to transport a young worker from Britain or a German state, who would work for several years to pay off the debt of their travel costs. During the indenture period the servants were not paid cash wages, but were provided with food, accommodation, clothing and training. The indenture document specified how many years the servant would be required to work, after which they would be free. Terms of indenture ranged from one to seven years with typical terms of four or five years.
[2] In southern New England, a variant form of indentured servitude, which controlled the labour of
Native Americans through an exploitative
debt-peonage system, developed in the late 17th century and continued through to the period of the American Revolution.
Not all European servants came willingly. Several instances of
kidnapping for transportation to the Americas are recorded, though these were often indentured in the same way as their willing counterparts. An illustrative example is that of
Peter Williamson (1730–1799). As historian
Richard Hofstadter pointed out, "Although efforts were made to regulate or check their activities, and they diminished in importance in the eighteenth century, it remains true that a certain small part of the white colonial population of America was brought by force, and a much larger portion came in response to deceit and misrepresentation on the part of the spirits [recruiting agents]."
[6]
Many white immigrants arrived in colonial America as indentured servants, usually as young men and women from Britain or Germany, under the age of 21. Typically, the father of a teenager would sign the legal papers, and work out an arrangement with a ship captain, who would not charge the father any money.
[17] The captain would transport the indentured servants to the American colonies, and sell their legal papers to someone who needed workers. At the end of the indenture, the young person was given a new suit of clothes and was free to leave. Many immediately set out to begin their own farms, while others used their newly acquired skills to pursue a trade.
[18][19][20] A few became sufficiently prosperous that they were eventually able to acquire indentured servants of their own.
[21]
Given the high death rate, many servants did not live to the end of their terms.
[2] In the 18th and early 19th century, numerous Europeans, mostly from outside the British Isles, traveled to the colonies as
redemptioners, a particularly harsh form of indenture.
[22]
Indentured servants were a separate category from bound
apprentices. The latter were American-born children, usually orphans or from an impoverished family who could not care for them. They were under the control of courts and were bound out to work as an apprentice until a certain age. Two famous bound apprentices were
Benjamin Franklin who illegally fled his apprenticeship to his brother, and
Andrew Johnson, who later became
President of the United States.
[23]
George Washington used indentured servants;
[24] in April 1775, he offered a reward for the return of two runaway white servants.
[25]
DevelopmentEdit
Indentured servitude in the Americas was first used by the
Virginia Company in the early seventeenth century as a method for
collateralising the debt finance for transporting people to its newfound
British colonies.
Before the rise of indentured servitude, a large
demand for
labour existed in the colonies to help build settlements, farm crops and serve as tradesmen, but many labourers in Europe could not afford the
transatlantic crossing, which could cost roughly half a worker’s annual wage.
[3]
European financial institutions could not easily lend to the workers since there was no effective way to enforce a loan from across the Atlantic, rendering
labour immobile via the Atlantic because of
capital market imperfections.
[3]
To address this imperfection, the Virginia Company would allow labourers to borrow against their future earnings at the Virginia Company for a fixed number of years in order to raise sufficient capital to pay for their voyage. Evidence shows this practice was in use by 1609, only two years after the founding of the Virginia Company's original
Jamestown settlement.
[26] However, this practice created a
financial risk for the Virginia Company. If workers died or refused to work, the investment would be lost.
[26]
By 1620, the Virginia Company switched to selling contracts of "one hundred servants to be disposed amongst the old Planters" as soon as the servants reached the colonies.
[27] This minimised risk on its investment to the 2–3 months of transatlantic voyage. As the system gained in popularity, individual farmers and tradesmen would eventually begin investing in indentured servants as well.
[28]
In the 18th century, wages in
Great Britain were low because of a surplus of labour. The average monetary wage was about 50 shillings (£2.50, equivalent to £344 in 2016)
[29] a year for a plowman, and 40 shillings (£2) a year for an ordinary unskilled worker. Ships' captains negotiated prices for transporting and feeding a passenger on the seven- or eight-week journey across the ocean, averaging about £5 to £7, the equivalent of years of work back in England.
[30][31]
Still, demand for indentured labour remained relatively low until the adoption of staple crops, such as
sugarcane in the
West Indies or
tobacco in the
American South.
[32] With economies largely based on these crops, the West Indies and American South would see the vast majority of indentured labour.
[33]
Author and historian
Richard Hofstadter has written:
Over time the market for indentured servitude developed, with length of contracts showing close correlations to indicators of health and productivity. Tall, strong, healthy, literate or skilled servants would often serve shorter terms than less productive or more sickly servants.
[35][36] Similarly, destinations with harsh working climates such as the West Indies would come to offer shorter contracts compared to the more hospitable colonies.
[32]
The majority of indentured servants ended up in the American South, where cash crops necessitated labour-intensive farming. As the Northern colonies moved toward industrialisation, they got significantly less indentured immigration.
[37] For example, 96.28% of English emigrants to
Virginia and
Maryland from 1773 to 1776 were indentured servants. During the same time period, only 1.85% of English emigrants to
New Englandwere indentured.
[38]”