CHILDREN OF BONDAGE

Sonita Maan & Saleha Patel

Professor of African studies Head of the African Studies

Library at the University of Cape Town

Focus on slavery, Islam and HIV/AIDS

The book that the article is from, was the runner-up for the prestigious BJ Venter national book award in 1997

ROBERT CARL HEINZ SHELL

SLAVES – imported persons or those born into slavery who could be legally sold on their own

SERFS – locally born native people who were bonded to their owners for 25 years

BURGHERS – a citizen of the town usually of middle-class

KNECHTS – a contracted wage labourer

Key terms defined...

Free land and a universally free population would unlikely coexist

3 elements of the system:◦Free land◦Free peasants◦Nonworking land owners

Author’s Argument...

Europeans introduced guns and horses which likely started the development of slavery

Effective moral, religious or legal sanctions would have been needed to prevent slavery or coerced labour forms

What caused slavery?

Formal emancipation (1838) Masters and servants ordinance (1841)

◦Slavery had a recursive effect◦Cape legislation was designed to tie down ex-

slaves to their masters especially on the farms◦Contracts were forced and could not be broken

whether written or oral◦Even after the initial causes of slavery gone,

slavery was never abolished

Social Change

In 19th C, free land became scarce resulting in individuals working for others to pay rent◦ For example, the Khoi people were not forbidden to

take land rather they were told that they lost their land in war (p. 3)

In order to reserve land for the white settlement, the population of cape town was persistently denied the right to own land by law and military◦ This resulted in the culmination of the natives land act

of 1913

Do you think slavery still exists? If so, what are some conditions that lead people to

engage in such labour (slavery, bondage)?

Question:

In 1717 slavery was an accomplished fact:◦8589 enslaved or born into slavery◦2759 slaves imported into the Lodge◦582 slaves born in lodge◦3997 slaves imported◦1251 slaves born in households

Statistics:

Slavery was imposed on South Africa◦No one forced Cape households to buy slaves,

indeed the commission denied free burghers permission to send slave ships to the east coast of Africa

1717 – the colony was condemned to slave labour In 1657, the Dutch East India Company released its

employees to become free burghers◦ In order for free burghers to succeed in their

household, they needed slave labour

Dutch East India Company

The economy was in the hand of the individual householders and the local officials

Owners were ashamed of using their hands to do work so they employed slaves

Cape tenure system (p. 260) – separated those who might become an owner from each other so they do not form an union that would eventually self govern

Economy

In 17th C, many company employees completed their contracts and left the employment of the company to start farming ◦They were given the same faculties as free

immigrants, such as: Grant of land Other assistance upon credit

The Cape Settler Diaspora

Household:◦ Male youths (13 to 17) provided temporary unpaid

labour for their parents farm enterprises◦ By 18, they left family homes in search of labour for

their own farms◦ The shortage of labour was evident in the household

first as male child would leave the home

◦ At 16 yrs, male child reaches maturity to become the head of household

Rise of unpaid family labour and decline of wage labour

There are two types of knechts:

◦Company knecht: subcontracted wage labour “on loan” from the company

◦Free knecht: one who worked without a contract

The Knechts: An Adjunct of the Household

◦Knechts and wage labourers were seen similar to the indentured servants who worked on contract for a fixed period of time (usually 3 to 7 years) in exchange for transportation, food, clothing, housing and other necessities

◦At cape, the knechts signed a renewable one-year contract with the head of household and received a cash wage of between 7 to 9 guilders a month (approximately $5.69 CAD)

Company Knechts

◦They were mostly free blacks, and enjoyed their freedom in the sense that they had no institution or contract to follow, they did not own land or property and were obviously not employed by the company

◦For example, in 1666 they were paid twice as much and in 1692 they were declared the largest labour pool in the cape population

Free Knechts

The hiring of a slave was always cheaper than hiring a knecht because the labour of slaves was cheap compared to the knechts who wanted a higher wage

According to Samuel Hudson (1806), in the 18th century the hiring of slaves became popular as slave owners inherited slaves and lived off the proceeds of their hired out slaves

The Effect of Slave Hiring on Wage Labour

“Nothing is more common than to see at all hours of the day, numbers of young men whose parents derive the whole income from the wages of two or three salves, dressed in the first style and loitering

away their time. (265)”

Do you think this still exists today? If so, can you provide some examples.

◦A generation later, free knechts were ordered to leave both the manual labour force as well as the overseeing pool and become poor whites

◦By 1731, there was an emerging poor white population, however they have not yet lost all their skills, rather they still had to offer their literacy skills to the colony

The Evolution of the Knechts Status

“no master will listen with patience to complaints (of his slaves) about ill-treatment and blows (at the hands of the overseer knecht), but would

rebuke (disapprove) the slaves and even command the knecht in their hearing, to give them a good thrashing if they refuse to obey him; but at the same time he would in private reprimand the knechts for such brutality, and point out to him that the slaves were human beings and that he

had to pay a high price for them (266)”.

The European born entered the teaching profession and so burghers (citizens of the town or village) hired these company knechts (poor whites) to give their children an education based on what the knechts remembered from their youth

The free knechts on the other hand had nothing to offer because they were born in the colony

Literacy

◦ 1658-1687: they were wage labourers and comprised as much as 50% of the entire free population

◦ 1688-1739: they were mainly overseers, but they dropped to 5% of the free population

◦ 1740-1795: they served as teachers of the children of the household, representing less than 1% of the free population

◦ 1795 onwards: they were either teachers or itinerant buyers for butchers (traveling from places), making up considerably less than 1% of the population

Four Functions of a Knecht:

Freed slaves became the first free class of renters in south Africa and their masters became patroons

In the early 17th century, European free knechts were known to work for the free blacks for a monetary wage, however this came to a decline in the colony of cape

Social and Racial Origins of the Knecht

Knechts were highly monitored by company clerks until they were safely married because they did not want them to form love bonds with their masters or be accused of fornication (sexual intercourse with a person whom they are not married to).

Marriage was recommended for all knechts because “every girl without exception prefers as her husband a man who has been born in Europe to one who is of colonial birth (Mentzel, 269)

In 1689, The native Khoisan or Xhosa, were seen as an option to hire, coerce and enslave, however cape officials claimed it to be impossible to trade them as slaves because of their outstanding love and affection towards their children

After 1731, as the colony of cape looked for cheap coercible labour, they turned to the native women of Khoi who were bought into the households of the colonists without their men because the men did not want to work the ground

Enserfment and The Decline of Native Wage

Labour

In 1795 Cape authorities were presented with 10 ‘article of demand’ by the district of Swellendam (west of Cape):

◦ Article 5 declared that any Khoi’s caught to refuse or resist any commands, would become the property of the farmer employing them and serve him for life and if they run away, their masters would be entitled to pursue them and punish them (272-273)

◦ Article 6 declared that the Khoi’s shall serve their masters up to the age of 25 and not enter another’s employ without his consent, anyone who ran away would be warned or taken into custody by the messenger

Bonded Labour

Lord Caledon (British governor) wanted to protect the Khoisan labourers and so revealed clauses to the employers:

◦ 10. The master shall not be allowed to detain or prevent from departing, the wife or children of any Khoi that has been in his service and once the contract expired of the father or husband and debt had been paid, they could leave

◦ 11. In the case of a Khoi dying, and his contract coming to an end, the wife and children are at liberty to leave

Plagium slaves (person stealing) became prevalent as well as zombie slaves who were native people that were enslaved and subsequently registered under dead slaves names.

The cape government allowed for apprenticeship (one bound by a legal agreement to work for another)

In 1833, 1/6 of all 38,257 slaves were in the eastern cape (6,376 slaves)

Plagium and Zombie Slaves

What could possibly be the reasons behind this low reportance of female

infants?

Discussion

The European settlers, attracted the native populations into a wide range of coerced forms of labour by claiming they had “available” land as well as cheap water and land resources, as well the possession of firearms attracted many native population of cape to work for these European settlers

Slaves were seen as a child, no matter what their age but referred to as boys and girls

Their first name used was important because it was socializing slaves into their statuses of unending childhood

The family as a metaphor - Frederich Engels:◦ Pointed out that the social unit of family included the

slaves belonging to the head of the household◦ Famulus – means domestic slave ◦ Familia – total number of slaves belonging to one man

Slaves as Children

Artificial families were formed as a way to promote the whole idea of a family because the family became an important institution

As slaves outnumbered the household family members, therefore the safety of the family depended on the slaves (example; some families had 105 members including masters, servants, slaves)

Cape slaves and serfs were incorporated into the family physically and involuntarily regardless of their resistance

The State and The Family

When in-house slaves were born they had a special place within the family, they were important (prized) and were not sold off to anyone instead they were kept in the family

Female slaves were part of the family because they could breed children

Slaves were seen as dependent on their master or mistress, thus bound them to childhood forever

The Slave as Perpetual Child

Clothes were used to provide a distinction between masters and slave

They were forced to go barefoot without shoes or stockings while the owners wore luxurious footwear

As a result of being forced to dress a certain way, by the 19th century they started to create their own culture with the use symbols such as turbans and handkerchiefs

Clothing the Slave as a Child

If you were a slave, you would never become free. If you were a slave, you could not become an adult. If you were free, you could be an adult (284).

What do you think about this phrase?

Discussion:

The chapter provides an economic, social and domestic explanation for the decline of all free wage labour and the subsequent introduction and maintenance of both slavery and serfdom

Slavery and serfdom:◦ Were instituted and maintained by cape households◦ Never mandated by the company◦ Most convenient labour systems at the cape because

it was cheap and more coercible than free wage labour◦ Both produced offspring that were also property as

both parent slaves and slave children could be passed on to heirs of the free owners

Conclusion

India: Little Serfs (45:00)◦Debt Bondage and Child Labour (3:29)◦ http://digital.films.com.ezproxy.library.yorku.ca/PortalVi

ewVideo.aspx?xtid=10539

Stolen Childhoods (22:00) – 4:00 to 8:49◦ http://digital.films.com.ezproxy.library.yorku.ca/PortalVi

ewVideo.aspx?xtid=35366

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