Probably the best known of these was John Harrower, whose journal provides a fascinating insight into the life of a schoolmaster and indentured servant in late colonial Virginia.[…]He arrived in London virtually destitute and, unable to find work, soon contracted to work as an indentured servant in Virginia as a means of escaping unemployment and poverty.

Like the others, however, he owed the contractual time to his master, who could sell the indentured servant, along with any debts owed by the servant, to someone else.

The book detailed how the Irish, who had first come to North America as indentured servants and were reviled by the more settled populations of English and Dutch Americans, became, by the mid-19th century, accepted as white.

Indentured servant

Meaning

Noun

Synonyms