Topic: history essay (during the 1660s)

Order Description

Johanna Smith arrived in the colony of Virginia in 1660. She was 18 years old and had signed a 5-year contract to work as an indentured servant. Mr. Nicholas Pagley

purchased her indenture upon her arrival in Virginia. Pagley owned a small plantation 20 miles up the James River from Jamestown. Burial records tell us Johanna was

born outside of London in 1642 and she died in Virginia in 1676. The only other existing document of her life is the following letter she wrote in 1661.

Dear Father.
I fear you have not received my letters, as I have received none from you in reply. Mr. Pagley does not like me to write since it keeps me from work. Mrs. Pagley

cannot use the quill and ink. She takes great offense to my knowledge of letters. The household is a dreadful place, but upon that I must not dwell. The plantation

grows good tobacco for England. I also tend to the small house garden, the kitchen, and the house. My labors are many. I must always be vigilant of the others. Mr.

Pagley holds five contract servants who work in the fields. They are all a low sort of people except one, a young man named Mr. Manchester. He is entrusted with

errands off the plantation and will attempt to transfer this letter, God willing. He tells me Mr. Pagley will purchase an African at the next occasion. There are but

few of them about at the present. You may question his wisdom. I may not. I fear what will become of me, your daughter. I fear my present circumstances. I know so

little of the country surrounding this place. I fear it as well. Think of me often as I do of you and Little Susan.
Your loving daughter, Johanna.

Assignment:

In a 4-5 page essay, please use this fragmentary record of an indentured servant’s life to examine the conditions in colonial Virginia during the 1660s. You may choose

to write about such conditions as work and labor, indentured servitude, slavery, gender, class relations, Virginia’s growth as a colony, etc. You do not have to write

about everything. Instead, you should strive for a well-focused essay that places what little you know about Johanna Smith in its proper historical context. For

example, if you choose to write about the hardship of indentured work, you might compare what our readings had to say about everyday life for indentured workers with

Johanna’s own descriptions of her many chores and responsibilities. The objective of your essay is to come to your own evidence-based conclusions about life in the

seventeenth-century Virginia colony, using the readings, lecture notes, and this new primary document from the indentured worker, Johanna Smith.