Tuesday, May 03, 2011

Judith Seraphin's New York Times Magazine letter on the origin of slavery in the United States -- it started in St. Augustine on September 8, 1565

The first slaves in the territory that we now regard as the United States were not brought to Virginia in 1619. That happened 54 years earlier, when our nation’s oldest European-founded City, St. Augustine, Fla., was founded by Spain’s Pedro Menéndez de Avilés on September 8, 1565. Menéndez’s contract with King Phillip afforded him three years to import 500 African slaves.
Judith Seraphin
St. Augustine, Fla., e-mail


April 17, 2011

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