By Dawn Boren
All Native people weren’t against the Trans Atlantic Slave Trade. Many were in support because it put their tribes in a better stance with colonizers. In fact, there were more in support of enslaving African Americans than opposed. Some natives had been exiled to plantations so they had first hand experiences of its harsh conditions. To support white colonizers meant that you had protection an immunity. Being on the other side of that coin committed you to a life long sentence to war.
Native Americans adopted many ways of the colonizer. The reasons vary but it certainly include using guns instead of native weapons, changing their clothing and joining the slave trade business. Not only did they embrace the concept of slavery, they also contributed to the ideology that Africans had no feelings and were created to be chattel. Some were as racist as their white counterparts. Native American were also oppressors of African people. According to Library of Congress (2023), “Choctaw Chief Greenwood LeFlore had 15,000 acres of Mississippi land and 400 enslaved Africans under his dominion.” The chief also owed a massive plantation house and was very respected among colonizers. According to Krauthamer (2015), “From the late eighteenth century through the end of the Civil War, Choctaw and Chickasaw Indians bought, sold, and owned Africans and African Americans as slaves, a fact that persisted after the tribes’ removal from the Deep South to Indian Territory. The tribes formulated racial and gender ideologies that justified this practice and marginalized free black people in the Indian nations well after the Civil War and slavery had ended.” To give this perspective, a comparison was made to the amount of slaves owned by Native people in respect to their tribal population. In 1860…. “Southeast, Cherokee Nation citizens owned 2,511 slaves (15 percent of their total population), Choctaw citizens owned 2,349 slaves (14 percent of their total population), and Creek citizens owned 1,532 slaves (10 percent of their total population). Chickasaw citizens owned 975 slaves, which accounted for 18 percent of their total population” Brown (2018). The amount of enslaved people that Native Americans owned were comparable to European plantation owners in the area. As mentioned before, some tribes traded their own members for goods, as a way of punishment or to pay a debt. There are also historical evidence that colonizers enslaved Native people before the Trans Atlantic Slave Trade. Tribes becoming slave owners allowed colonizers to gain slaves quickly. In way, it filled a gap and Native Americans saw the trade beneficial until the Yemasee War of 1715-1717.
By this time, Natives played a significant role in the slave trade but conflicts with colonizers continued. Treaties were created to provide tribes with legal rights and although it eased some of the tension, conflicts became more frequent. The tribes began to realize that colonizers had no real intention of holding up their side of the bargain even with the law being in place. They had very little control over what laws the colonizers would uphold and ones they would fully ignore. The tribes also had a misconception that the law would assist them in being treated equal to Europeans and again they were wrong. Brown (2018) stated, “After colonists in the English colony of Carolina began defaulting on some of their trade agreements and enslaving even members of their ally tribes, the Yamasee Nation began to question its own alliance with Carolina. Along with the Lower Creeks and the Savannahs, the Yamasees declared war on Carolina, killing 400 colonists, approximately seven percent of the white population. The Carolinian colonists put together a force of black slaves, militiamen, volunteers and friendly Native American nations, which defeated the Yamasees and their allies.” The Yamasee War changed more than the temper between tribes and Europeans. It also changed the slave trade. Native Americans began to move west to escape the colonizers. The ones who owned slaves took them during the migration and others slowed trading dramatically. That left a labor deficit in projected growth on the plantations since the need for cotton, tobacco and other crops increased. More African bodies were needed to make up the difference and this caused the Trans Atlantic Slave Trade grow even more.
The Native American role in antebellum south and the Atlantic Slave Trade is often overlooked. There are multiple accounts of Native tribes taking a huge part in enslaving Africans. The only point of contention was when freed Native Americans were captured and placed in slavery. Sometimes the captures were by accident and some were intentionally. This was also one of the reasons why the Yemasee War started. The relationship between Europeans and Native people was rocky at best. Tribes demanded respect while colonizers made sure that they were stripped of their possessions including their culture. The media uses “savages” often when describing how whites viewed some Native people. Their treatment was also unfair and it would be irresponsible to compared the brutality inflicted on both Africans and tribal members. Native Americans chose to participate in slave and goods trading until they realized that colonizers were stealing from them. Instead of enacting yet another war, most tribes split and some moved West. There were still thousands of native people left on plantations. They lived along side of the enslaved people and were treated the same. This was one way how the cultures joined. Another is the fact that Native American plantation owners also raped African women. Children born into slavery were owed by the plantation owner, therefore, African and Native mixed children were treated as slaves. Natives were denied tribal membership status, lineage and assets just as the black descendants of Thomas Jefferson.
Roberts, A. (2018). How Native Americans adopted slavery from white settlers.
Smith, R. (2018). How Native American slaveholders complicate the trail of tears narrative.
