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85 2. Black Markets for Black Labor PIRATES, PRIVATEERS, AND INTERLOPERS IN THE ORIGINS OF THE INTERCOLONIAL SLAVE TRADE, CA. 1619–1720 The 3d of June [1722], they met with a small New-England Ship, bound home from Barbadoes, which . . . yielded herself a Prey to the Booters: The Pyrates took out of her fourteen Hogsheads of Rum, six Barrels of Sugar, a large Box of English Goods . . . , [and] six Negroes, besides a Sum of Money and Plate, and then let her go on her Voyage. —Capt. Charles Johnson, General History of the Pyrates1 By the mid-eighteenth century, networks of intercolonial trade would link the many European colonies of the Americas, facilitating a dispersal trade in the enslaved African people arriving from across the Atlantic. But during the early decades of English colonization in the Americas, such regular intercolonial trade circuits lay in the distant future. Instead, in the foundational decades of slavery in English America (ca. 1619–1700), the dispersal of Africans was more haphazard, often taking place, not on merchant ships, but rather on the vessels of pirates and privateers. Even where pillaging was not involved, 1. Captain Charles Johnson [Daniel Defoe], A General History of the Pyrates, ed. Manuel Schonhorn (Mineola, N.Y., 1999), 314. The current consensus among literary scholars is that Defoe was not actually the author of the General History, but this edition (which attributes authorship to Defoe) is still the best scholarly edition in many regards, including its tracing of primary sources the author used to compile the accounts. Most scholars now accept the interpretation of P. N. Furbank and W. R. Owens that Defoe did not write the book under the pseudonym of Captain Charles Johnson (Furbank and Owens, The Canonisation of Daniel Defoe [New Haven, Conn., 1988], 100–109; see also C. R. Pennell, “Introduction: Brought to Book; Reading about Pirates,” in Pennell, ed., Bandits at Sea: A Pirates Reader [New York, 2001], 4, 20 n. 3). Either Captain Johnson actually existed or was the pseudonym of some other well-informed author. In any case, the General History is a tricky source for historians because, at times, it presents excellent research from newspapers, published trial accounts, and correspondence with seamen, whereas at other times, it presents outright fictions. I have relied upon it below only where it presents information on pirates known to have been real historical figures and where other sources corroborate the general outline of the story. The quotation presented here is from Johnson’s recounting of the career of George Lowther, which is historical. 86 / Black Markets for Black Labor dispersals by merchants often violated trade laws protecting monopolies. As a result, many Africans arriving in the Americas found themselves distributed by illicit traders. ■ Given that early English forays to the New World aimed more at raiding Spanish America than establishing agricultural settlements, it comes as little surprise that the early English slave trade was entangled with privateering and piracy. Theft offered a way for other European powers to catch up with the Spanish and Portuguese, who were many decades ahead in both colonization and the enslavement of Africans. The English established their first American colonies in the context of privateering campaigns against Spain, and that predatory, parasitical character colored the early English slave trade. The primary hope of English (and Dutch and French) privateers was always to snare a Spanish treasure ship ferrying Peruvian silver to Europe, but the corsairs and buccaneers rarely hesitated to prey upon the Spanish American economy in other ways as opportunities presented themselves. Of these secondary opportunities , slavery and the slave trade were among the most profitable. Because enslaved people sold for high prices relative to the amount of space they required aboard a ship, a vessel full of them carried two or three times the cash value as that same vessel transporting colonial produce or other vendible commodities , excepting only gold or silver. In the labor-starved Americas, exploitable workers were the next best thing to coin. In the resulting illicit commerce, the captives were twice stolen—enslaved in Africa for sale to Atlantic traders and then seized in American waters by pirates who viewed African people as loot. Such appropriation could be perilous and terrifying for those treated as property if their traders resisted pirates at sea or if marauders attacked settlements. Once taken, the enslaved could face extended journeys. Pirates and privateers delivered enslaved people to a range of colonies, often seeking developing markets that were eager enough for...

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