Indentured servant
An indentured servant is an unfree labourer under contract to work (for a specified amount of time) for another person, often without any pay, but in exchange for accommodation, food, other essentials and/or free passage to a new country.
Most of the European settlers who came to the Caribbean islands during the 16th and 17th centuries did so as indentured servants. Commoners, most of whom were young men, with dreams of owning their land or striking it rich quick would essentially sell years of their freedom in exchange for passage to the islands. The landowners on the islands would pay for a servant?s passage and then provide them with food and shelter during the term of their service. The servant would then be required to work in the landowner?s (master) field for a term of bondage (usually five to seven years). During this term of bondage the servant was considered the property of the master. He could be sold or given away by his master and he was not allowed to marry without the master?s permission. An indentured servant was normally not allowed to buy or sell goods although, unlike an African slave, he could own personal property. He could also go to a local magistrate if he was mistreated badly by his master. After the servant?s term of bondage was complete he was freed and paid ?freedom dues?. These payments could take the form of land or sugar, which would give the servant the opportunity to become an independent farmer or a free laborer.
Indentured servitude was a normal part of the landscape in England during the 1600?s. During the 1640?s and 1650?s some indentured servants were kidnapped and taken to Barbados. The term ?Barbadosed? was coined for these actions. Other indentured servants were English captives from Cromwell?s expeditions to Ireland and Scotland, who were forced into being brought over between 1649 and 1655.
After 1660 the Caribbean?s saw fewer indentured servants coming over from Europe. On most of the Islands African slaves now did all the hard fieldwork. Newly freed servant farmers that were given a few acres of land would not be able to make a living because sugar plantations had to be spread over hundreds of acres in order to be profitable. The landowner?s reputation as cruel masters in dealing with the large slave populations became a deterrence to the potential indentured servant. Even the islands themselves had become deadly disease death traps for the white servants. Yellow fever, malaria and the diseases that the African slaves had brought over contributed to the fact that during the 17th century between 33 to 50 percent of the indentured servants died before they were freed. Source: A Brief History of the Caribbean, Jan Rogozinski, Plume, New York, NY, 2000.
--North American history, employers usually paid for European workers' passage across the Atlantic Ocean, in return for the servants agreeing to work for a specified number of years. The agreement could also be in exchange for professional training; after being the indentured servant to a blacksmith for several years, you would expect to work as a blacksmith after the period was over. During the 17th century most of the white laborers in Maryland and Virginia came from England this way.
In the United States, indentured servitude was abolished along with slavery when the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution passed in 1865.
In some modern employment contracts, an employer pays for employee training, and the employee agrees to stay for a year or repay the cost of the training. A related circumstance is called a signing bonus.
- Indentured servitude was a form of contract labor, usually of a forced nature. One had to give up one's personal freedom for a specified period of time. In some cases it was called "white servitude," but contract labor was not limited just to white European immigrants. People of every race and ethnicity have some history with this form of labor. Many economic historians have written about the incentive compatibility structure, including David Galenson, Farley Grubb, and Abbot Smith.
- In North America, it was a method of increasing the number of residents/emigrants, especially in the British colonies. Convict labor only provided so many people, and since the journey across the Atlantic was dangerous and disease-stricken resulting in death on every journey, other means of encouraging settlement were necessary. In fact contract-laborers were so important group of people and so numerous that they were mentioned in the Constitution: "Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons".
