A LIVING HISTORY BLOG.

18TH CENTURY LIVING HISTORY IN AUSTRALIA.

Monday 7 February 2011

Asian Indians in Colonial America.

Asian Indians, also known as east India Indians, Mullato and Negro. Undoubtably some of these people were adopted into American Indian society.

Virginia Gazette Williamsburg
13 July, 1776
“..about 20 Years of Age, 5 feet 5 or 6 Inches high, slender made, is an Asiatic Indian by Birth, has been about twelve Months in Virginia, but lived ten Years (as he says) in England, in the Service of Sir Charles Whitworth. He wears long black Hair, which inclines to curl, tied behind, and pinned up…..
.. He left his Master on the Road from Williamsburg, between King William Courthouse and Todd’s Bridge, where he was left behind to come on slowly with a tired Horse…..
…Whoever takes up the said Servant, and secures him in Gaol, giving me information thereof, so that I may get him again, shall have eight dollars Reward; and if delivered to me at Westwood, in Prince William, further reasonable Charges, paid by William Brown."


Virginia Gazette Williamsburg ,
From April 15 to April 27, 1737.
RAN away…..an East-Indian, belonging to Mr. Heylin, Merchant, in Gloucester : He is a well-made, small young Fellow, wore his own Hair (which he may have cut off in order to disguise himself:)…. He went away on a strong well-made Grey Stallion, branded with a Dott, belonging to his Master. They ( a black slave and the East Indian Slave) went from Col. Lewis’s to Gloucester Town, where they robb’d a House, and took a Pair of Pistols, a Horse Whip, and ’tis supposed some other Things. They were seen on Monday going up King and Queen County. Whoever secures either of the fore-mentioned Servants, shall receive as a Reward, Two Pistoles ; for both of them, Four Pistoles, and for the Grey Stallion Two Pistoles; to be paid by John Lewis, and John Heylyn.


Evidence of “East Indians” in 17th-18th century Virginia



The seeds of what was to become modern America were planted on May 13, 1607, when British colonists arrived at an island that they would come to call Jamestown in what is now Virginia.
This first permanent English settlement in the New World would eventually become "the rightful birthing ground of America"; its soil sprinkled with the blood of Native Americans, European settlers, and their African slaves.
To this racial mix we must now include people from the Indian subcontinent.
That’s because, while preparations are underway for a grand commemoration of Jamestown’s 400th anniversary in May-June 2007, we have uncovered compelling evidence of the presence of people from the Indian subcontinent going as far back as 375 years in Virginia: people identified in American court documents of the time as "East Indians," "East India Indians," or "Asiatic Indians."
http://blog.shunya.net/shunyas_blog/2007/10/the-earliest-de.html

1 comment:

Gorges Smythe said...

It's not politically correct to mention it, but there were probably as many slaves of other races (including white) as there were blacks over the entire course of American history. And many of them were treated just as badly as the blacks and died from their ill treatment.