To Make Our World Anew: Volume I: A History of African Americans to 1880

320 Pages·2005·24.73 MB·English

by  Robin D. G. Kelley

To Make Our World Anew
To live with and care for one's family without fear of separation—something that had been denied to
_ as a goal for blacks after the Civil War. This family was photographed in 1886.
slaves W
To Make Our
World Anew
Volume One:
A History of African
Americans to 1880
edited by
Robin D. C. Kelley
and
Earl Lewis
OXTORD
UNIVERSITY PRESS
OXFORD
UNIVERSITY PRESS
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Copyright © 2000 by Oxford University Press, Inc.
Preface © 2005 by Oxford University Press, Inc.
"The First Passage" © 1995,2000,2005 by Colin A. Palmer
"Strange New Land" © 1996, 2000,2005 by Peter H. Wood
"Revolutionary Citizens" © 1997, 2000, 2005 by Daniel C. Littlefield
"Let My People Go" © 1996,2000,2005 by Deborah Gray White
"Breaking the Chains" © 1996,2000,2005 by Noralee Frankel
"To You" is reproduced from COLLECTED POEMS by Langston Hughes
Copyright © 1994 by the Estate of Langston Hughes
Reprinted by permission of Alfred A. Knopf, a Division of Random House, Inc.
First published by Oxford University Press, Inc., 2000
198 Madison Avenue, New York, New York 10016
www.oup.com
First issued as a two-volume Oxford University Press paperback, 2005
Vol. 1 ISBN-13: 978-0-19-518134-0
Vol. 1 ISBN-10: 0-19-518134-4
Vol. 2 ISBN-13: 978-0-19-518135-7
Vol. 2 ISBN-10: 0-19-518135-2
Oxford is a registered trademark of Oxford University Press
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,
stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means,
electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise,
without the prior permission of Oxford University Press.
The Library of Congress has cataloged the one-volume cloth edition as follows:
To make our world anew: a history of African Americans / edited by Robin
D. G. Kelley and Earl Lewis.
p. cm . Include s bibliographical references (p.) and index.
ISBN-13: 978-0-19-513945-7
ISBN-10: 0-19-513945-3
I.Afro-Americans—History. I . Kelley, Robin D. G. II . Lewis, Earl.
E185.T68 2000 973'.0496073—dc2 1 00-021131
13579 1 0 8642
Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper
Contents
Preface to Volume One VII
CHAPTER 1 The First Passage: 1502-1619
Colin A. Palmer 3
CHAPTER 2 Strange New Land: 1619-1776
Peter H. Wood 53
CHAPTER 3 Revolutionary Citizens: 1776-1804
Daniel C. Littlefield 103
CHAPTER 4 Let My People Go: 1804-1860
Deborah Cray White 169
CHAPTER 5 Breaking the Chains: 1860-1880
Noralee Frankel 227
Chronology 281
Further Reading 287
Picture Credits 288
Contributors 299
Index 301
To You
To sit and dream, to sit and read,
To sit and learn about the world
Outside our world of here and now—
Our problem world—
To dream of vast horizons of the soul
Through dreams made whole,
Unfettered free—help me!
All you who are dreamers, too,
Help me make our world anew
I reach out my hands to you.
—Langston Hughes
Preface to Volume One
Robin D. C. Kelley and Earl Lewis
The history of African Americans is nothing less than the dramatic saga of a
people attempting to re-make the world. Brought to the Americas against
their will as commodities to be bought and sold, Africans and their descen-
dants struggled to change their conditions and thus turn the New World of their
European masters upside down. Even when they did not succeed, the actions,
thoughts, and dreams of Africans are responsible for some of the most profound
economic, political, and cultural developments in the modern West. Black labor
generated unprecedented wealth and helped give birth to capitalism; black resis-
tance slowly destroyed the system of slavery and prompted new methods of coer-
cion and punishment; black creativity influenced virtually all forms of Western
art—from music and dance to theater and the plastic arts; black visions of freedom
and efforts to realize them not only transformed American politics but inspired
uprisings the world over—from South Africa to Tiananmen Square. Indeed, by
invoking Langston Hughes's call to make "the world anew," we recognize that
African Americans historically understood their plight and their possibilities in
global terms. For if this book demonstrates anything, it is that African Americans
saw themselves as both Americans and part of a larger, international black diaspora.
To Make Our World Anew tells the story of the nation but places the struggles and
achievements of black people in a larger international framework.
The history of African Americans begins on the African continent, a huge and
varied land bounded by the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. It was home to people with
different languages, traditions, histories, and religions. They called themselves Twi,
Yoruba, Ethiopian, Zulu, Ashanti, and Kumba among other names. Some lived in
ancient kingdoms as old as the annals of recorded history, and others lived in small
family groupings. Some worshipped one god, and others many gods. Some lived in
societies headed by powerful men, and others by powerful women. Whether in
cities or rural areas, whether Muslim, Christian, or other, the peoples of this amaz-
ing continent had long played a central role in world affairs. Egyptian advances
in medicine, language, and architecture greatly influenced the Greek and Roman
vii
viii To Make Our World Anew
worlds. Gold from the Bure and Bambuk goldfields of West Africa made its way
into the Mediterranean world, where the accumulation of significant quantities
enabled the merchants of Genoa (Italy) to underwrite European exploration and
expansion. Likewise, notable learning centers like Timbuktu attracted visitors from
Europe and the Orient, and greatly enriched the Islamic world.
The roles of Africans in world affairs changed significantly with the rise of the
South Atlantic System. As European explorers made their way to the Americas, they
expected to find streets paved with gold. The Americas were indeed rich in natural
resources, but the bounty had to be excavated, cultivated, and processed. Labor was
needed. The Europeans had already begun exploiting African labor on plantations
in the Mediterranean and off the coast of West Africa, so the modern world's turn
to Africa as a reservoir of slaves was not surprising. What followed was the forced
migration an d enslavemen t of several million Africans o f varied ethnic back-
grounds. Although scholars debate the exact numbers, it is understood that some-
where between ten an d twenty million peopl e became part o f the syste m of
enslavement that ultimately led to the making of an African diaspora and African
Americans. Many died in the trek from the interior to the coast, others during the
wait for a slave ship, and scores of others during the harsh Middle Passage. Out of
the crucible of their suffering was forged a new people—no longer simply Twi,
Yoruba, Ashanti, or Kumba. In the Americas, they first became Africans and then
African Americans. This process of people making is central to a complete under-
standing of African-American history.
To the countless numbers of Africans who survived the trans-Atlantic journey
and were forced to disembark at one of the many ports along the coast of Britain's
North American colonies, what lay before them was indeed a "strange new land."
The seemingly infinite landscape, the cooler climate, the European settlers whose
station i n society ranged from vagabon d to plantation owner , and their new
neighbors—the Native peoples who had occupied the land for centuries—were all
unfamiliar to these new arrivals. More than the land itself, the relationships they
entered into must have seemed especially peculiar. Although forms of bondage had
existed in West and Centra l Africa long before the trans-Atlantic slave trade,
human beings were rarely the main commodity at the marketplace. Here in the
modern world, the enslaved African was inspected, assessed, auctioned, bought,
sold, bartered, and treated in any manner her or his auctioneer or owner saw fit.
By the end of the eighteenth century, African slaves came to be property, pure
and simple, and the color of their skin had everything to do with their unique sta-
tus. This had not always been the case, however. During the first half of the seven-
teenth century, the planters and colonial administrators had few hard and fas t
rules about what it meant to be a slave. Some Africans were treated like European
indentured servants and emancipated after a designated period of time. Others were
slaves for life, but their children were born free. Over time, however, owners realized
how valuable their investments were and proceeded to support laws that tightened
Preface t o Volume One i x
the bonds of racial slavery—most notably laws that made African slavery an inher-
ited condition and denied black people the most rudimentary human rights.
The slaves did not always cooperate, however. They fought the masters and
overseers, ran away, and made the business of commercial farming more difficult
by not working efficiently. Some white indentured servants supported their fellow
laborers, especially at the beginning of the seventeenth century, but as the laws
changed and blackness became the primary mark of slavery, most poor white
servants learne d tha t th e consequence s o f interracia l solidarit y ha d becom e
much more severe. Being white, even a poor white, meant immunity from absolute
slavery.
Yet, in spite of their condition, enslaved Africans were still thinking and feeling
human beings endowed with intellect, creativity, and vision. They came to these
shores from various ethnic groups and speaking many languages, but through it
all they forged a strong sense of community. Her e in this strange new land the
Africans learne d th e Englis h language and mad e i t their own . They learne d
Christianity, if they had not before arrival, and transformed it. Others held fast
to Islam or combined their own spiritual beliefs with the faith of the master .
Sometimes the masters words served as their sharpest weapons, for all around
them, especially into the late eighteenth century, they heard talk of liberty and free-
dom, of the rights of man. Not surprisingly, many enslaved Africans embraced the
idea of liberty as a fundamental right, and some even presented petitions to colo-
nial administrators insisting on their right to be free. But nobody had to read
a declaration o r a treatise t o have a yearning for freedom. Indeed, the slave s
themselves authored the earliest declarations of freedom, and they were written in
blood in the form of slave insurrections. The majority simply stole themselves to
freedom.
In the 15 0 years since their forced arrival in the seventeenth century, little
exposed the contradiction between slavery and freedom for Africans as much as
this nation's figh t for independence from Great Britain. It was a contradiction
many resolved to settle. Some, such as Crispus Attucks, joined with others colonists
in striking direct blows for liberty. Others, meanwhile, heard the pleas for loyalty
to the British crown, and with the promise o f emancipation a s their reward,
remained faithful to the old order only to see it vanish before them. But whether
in the poems of Phillis Wheatley, the legal action of Qouk Walker, or the efforts of
Paul Cuffee, Americans of African descent helped define what it meant to be revo-
lutionary citizens.
In fact, as the clamor for independence fro m Great Britain intensified, so too
did th e debat e ove r slavery . Many who participate d recognize d tha t slaver y
remained a central form of labor in both the North and the South. Although a
minority view, some American colonists favored emancipation. They ably pointed
to the few blacks who purchased their freedom and gained an economic foothold
before the 1760s . But in a land where dark skin signaled a subordinate socia l