Slavery in Canada
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Slavery in Canada was practiced prior to European contact by a minority of aboriginal nations, who routinely captured slaves from neighbouring tribes. The conditions under which such slaves lived, however, were much more humane than the conditions endured by African peoples forcibly brought as chattel by Europeans to the Americas. Chattel slavery, a form of hereditary slavery, was established by European colonization and settlement of Canada during the 17th century. Individuals were treated as cattle under chattel slavery, slaves were regarded as movable possessions and treated by their slave owners as private property. Slavery itself was a booming capitalist endeavour in the Americas from the early 1600s until the mid 1800s. As a result of the Canadian physical environment, slave labour never became an economic institution as exemplified by Southern American States and the Caribbean where cheap slave labour was needed to harvest plantations. Most of the slaves were used as domestic house servants, although some performed agricultural labour. Some were of African descent, while others were aboriginal (typically called "panis", likely a corruption of Pawnee). Although Canada has a history of slavery, it is often overshadowed by the more tumultuous kind featured in other areas in the Americas. Afua Cooper states that slavery is, "Canada's best kept secret, locked within the National closet."[1]
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[edit] Under indigenous rule
Slave-owning tribes of what became Canada were, for example, the fishing societies, such as the Yurok, that lived along the coast from what is now Alaska to California.[2] Many of the indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast, such as the Haida and Tlingit, were traditionally known as fierce warriors and slave-traders, raiding as far as California. Slavery was hereditary, the slaves being prisoners of war and their descendants. Among some Pacific Northwest tribes about a quarter of the population were slaves.[3][4] One slave narrative was composed by an Englishman, John R. Jewitt, who had been taken alive when his ship was captured in 1802; his memoir provides a detailed look at life as a slave, and asserts that a large number were held.
[edit] Under French rule
In 1628 the first recorded slave in Canada was brought by a British Convoy to New France. Olivier le Juene was the name given to the boy originally from Madagascar. His given name resonates with the Code Noir, although loosely established, the Code Noir forced baptisms and decreed the conversion of all slaves to Catholicism. [5] His name is reflective of a tradition in New France that would give slaves a name from prominent Catholic figures. By 1688 the favourability of domestic servitude and its integral part of New France society was evidenced by a group of French aristocrats who petitioned King Louis XIV to import more slaves from West Africa. [6] By the early 1700s, Africans began arriving in greater numbers in New France, mainly as slaves of French aristocracy. Slavery was further fortified by the Raudot Bill of 1709. The bill was an ordinance that recognized slavery in New France in law,"Panis and Negroes who have been purchased and who will be purchased, shall be property of those who have purchased them and will be their slaves."[7] Although slavery continued after the British conquest, the slave trade was not formally established as there was no need for a large labour force given the localized (fur and fisheries based) economies of the northern colonies. Despite the seemingly less physical work (as compared to slave labour on plantations) and as a result of their position within the domestic realms of their slave owners, Canadian slaves were always under the watchful gaze of their owners. By the time of the Conquest there were approximately 3,604 slaves in New France. Most of these were located around Montreal, where the economy was most dependent on labour. Historian Marcel Trudel has recorded 4,092 slaves throughout Canadian history, of which 2,692 were aboriginal people, owned mostly by the French, and 1,400 blacks owned mostly by the British, together owned by approximately 1,400 masters. The region of Montreal dominated with 2,077 slaves, compared to 1,059 for Quebec City overall and 114 for Trois-Rivières. Several marriages took place between French colonists and slaves: 31 unions with aboriginal slaves and 8 with black slaves.
The citizens of New France received slaves as gifts from their allies among native peoples. Many of these slaves were prisoners taken in raids against the villages of the Fox nation, a tribe that was an ancient rival of the Miami people and their Algonquian allies.[8] Native ("pani") slaves were easier to obtain and thus more numerous than African slaves in New France, but were less valued. The average native slave died at 18, and the average African slave died at 25.[9]
[edit] Under British rule
The 1763 Treaty of Paris made no reference to slavery in Canada, nor does the Quebec Act of 1774 or the Treaty of Paris of 1783 -- either to ban it or to permit it. After 1783, about 3,500 free blacks immigrated to Canada, mostly persons who had won their freedom by supporting the British by taking up arms during the U.S. War of Independence.
Many Loyalists from the United States brought their slaves with them to Canada after the American Revolution. Some slaves fled Upper and Lower Canada to free states in America such as Massachusetts, Maine, Vermont, and Pennsylvania. The Imperial Act of 1790 assured prospective immigrants that their slaves would remain their property. By 1790 the abolition movement was gaining credence in Canada and the ill intent of slavery was evidenced by an incident involving a slave woman being violently abused by her slave owner on her way to being sold in the United States. In 1793 Chloe Clooey, in an act of defiance yelled out screams of resistance. The abuse committed by her slave owner and her violent resistance was witnessed by Peter Martin and William Grisely.[10] Peter Martin, a former slave, brought the incident to the attention of Lieutenant Governor John Graves Simcoe. Under the auspices of Simcoe, 'The Slave Act of 1793," was legislated. The elected members of the executive council, many of whom were merchants or farmers who depended on slave labour, saw no need for emancipation. White later wrote that there was "much opposition but little argument" to his measure. Finally the Assembly passed the Act Against Slavery that legislated the gradual abolition of slavery: no slaves could be imported; slaves already in the province would remain enslaved until death, no new slaves could be brought into Upper Canada, and children born to female slaves would be slaves but must be freed at age 25. To discourage manumission, the Act required the master to provide security that the former slave would not become a public charge. The compromise Slave Act of 1793 stands as the only attempt by any Canadian legislature to act against slavery. [11] This legal rule ensured the eventual end of slavery in Upper Canada, although as it diminished the sale value of slaves within the province it also resulted in slaves being sold to the United States. In 1798 there was an attempt by a lobby groups to rectify the legislation and import more slaves.[12]
By 1797, courts began to rule in favour of slaves who complained of poor treatment from their owners.[9] These developments were resisted in Lower Canada until 1803, when Chief Justice William Osgoode ruled that slavery was not compatible with British law.
This historic judgment, while it did not abolish slavery, set free 300 slaves and resulted in the rapid decline of the practice of slavery. However, slavery remained in Upper and Lower Canada until 1834 when the British Parliament's Slavery Abolition Act finally abolished slavery in all parts of the British Empire.
Most of the emancipated slaves of African descent in Canada were in the 1830s sent to settle Freetown in Sierra Leone and those that remained primarily ended up in segregated communities such as Africville outside Halifax, Nova Scotia.
Today there are four remaining slave cemeteries in Canada: in St.-Armand, Quebec, Shelburne, Nova Scotia and Priceville and Dresden in Ontario.
Around the time of the Emancipation, the Underground Railroad network was established in the United States, particularly Ohio, where slaves would cross into the Northern States over the Ohio River en route to various settlements and towns in Upper Canada (known as Canada West from 1841 to 1867, now Ontario).
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ AfuaCooper, The Untold Story of Canadian Slavery and the Burning of Old Montreal,(Toronto:HarperPerennial, 2006)'
- ^ Slavery in the New World
- ^ Digital History African American Voices
- ^ Haida Warfare
- ^ Afua Cooper,The Untold Story of Canadian Slavery and the burning of Old Montreal(Toronto:HarperPerennial,2006), 74-76.
- ^ Tom Derrek,"In Bondage," The Beaver 83.1 (February-March 2003)
- ^ Robin Winks,Blacks in Canada(Montreal:McGill-Queens Press, 1966),6.
- ^ Brett Rushforth, "Slavery, the Fox Wars, and the Limits of Alliance," William and Mary Quarterly 63 (January 2005), No.1, para. 32. Rushforth confuses the two Vincennes explorers. François-Marie was 12 years old during the First Fox War.
- ^ a b Cooper, Afua (2006). The Hanging of Angélique. Harper Collins. ISBN 0002005530.
- ^ Archives of Ontario,"Enslaved Africans in Upper Canada,"http://www.archives.gov.on.ca/english/on-line-exhibits/slavery/index.aspx
- ^ Patrick Bode, "Upper Canada, 1793: Simcoe and the Slaves." Beaver 1993 73(3): 17-19
- ^ Patrick Bode, "Simcoe and the Slaves," The Beaver 73.3 (June-July 1993)
[edit] External links
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