NHC+1690+Economies

NHC 1690 (3) ECONOMIES

http://nationalhumanitiescenter.org/pds/becomingamer/economies/economies.htm

The items on this wiki page are taken from the following website and are only intended for the use of my students:

http://nationalhumanitiescenter.org/pds/becomingamer/economies/text5/text5read.htm
 * Economies (5)**

Planters - Diary of William Byrd II of Virginia, selections, 1709-1712 - Diary of Landon Carter of Virginia, selections, 1758

When one lists the iconic images of Colonial America, top items include the "first Thanksgiving," a backwoods farmer's cabin, Benjamin Franklin with his spectacles—and a Virginia gentleman-planter posing in full regalia, his wealth and self-assurance on display. William Byrd and Landon Carter, whose portraits are at right, lived almost identical lives as Virginia gentry—born into wealth, educated in England, influential in colonial affairs, and manager of multiple plantations and enslaved workers. Yet their diaries are as different as night and day.

Byrd's routinized diary lists each day's events, including arguments with his wife, games with his friends, and whether he said his evening prayers or not. He almost never discusses plantation business, the planting and harvesting of crops, or experimenting with new seeds and tools.

For that, one reads Carter's diary, as he struggles to save his tobacco, corn and wheat during the severe droughts of the 1750s. About all the men's diaries share is their descriptions of herbal treatments for ill slaves and family members, and whether they worked or not.

Diary of William Byrd II. Born in 1674, Byrd ranks as the most well-known gentleman-planter of pre-Revolutionary America, partly for his achievements and status, and partly for his witty and irreverent "secret diary" of the years 1709-1712. Written in shorthand, the diary was not translated and published until the 1940s. Byrd's day-to-day entries seem formulaic, yet in commenting on the day's events he reveals much about himself, his times, and the perspective of the landed gentry. Occasionally he engages in self-reflection: "Bless God for granting me so many years," he writes on his 36th birthday. "I wish I had spent them better."

Diary of Landon Carter. Born in 1710—soon after Byrd began his secret diary—Landon Carter forged a life very similar to Byrd's. When he was twenty-two his father died, leaving him eight plantations, and he married the first of his three wives (all of whom died before 1758). Like Byrd, he kept a diary. The selections included here span five months in 1758 when Carter was forty-seven years old. They present a close look at his life as a wealthy planter, herbalist doctor to his family and slaves, three-time widower, father mourning his daughter's death—and hardworking distressed farmer in a season of drought.

Why is there no section titled "Farmers" in this Theme, ECONOMIES? More than three out of four colonists were farmers or worked on farms as hired help or indentured servants.1 While their lives are documented in official records like a census or tax list, their personal experiences are not as accessible to us. The time to write diaries, travel journals, and letters was a luxury of the well-to-do.

http://nationalhumanitiescenter.org/pds/becomingamer/economies/text6/text6read.htm
 * Economies (6)**

Servitude - "Slaves for life, and servants for a time": the economics and legalities of servitude—five perspectives, 1705-1750

In the 1600s most "bonded" laborers in the British mainland colonies were not black Africans but white Europeans, mostly poor men and women from England who contracted to work for several years in the colonies in return for free passage to America and basic clothing and provisions. As "indentured servants," they had few freedoms while in service to their "masters"; but when their contracts were fulfilled after four to seven years, they were free. No such "contract" existed for enslaved Africans, of course, whose numbers escalated in the 1700s as British America craved more laborers.

The personal experience of those in servitude is explored in other sections of this toolbox. The institutional reality of servitude is our topic here: its economics and legalities. Sounds dry, but what gives intensity to these readings is the divergent views they reveal—from two southern planters, two European clergymen, and an English indentured servant. The southern planters insist slaves and servants are treated well and protected by the law; the servant says not so. The clergymen give detached accounts, devoid of the theological or ethical comments we might expect: why? Each man compares the two forms of servitude from a unique perspective for a unique audience. Be sure to determine the perspective and audience for each selection.