In 1620 the first Negroes were sailed to the State of Virginia on America's east coast by some Dutch merchants. In the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries big cargoes of African Negroes, men, women and children were sent across the Atlantic Ocean. Many died because of the inhuman conditions on board the ships. The survivors were sold like cattle to the white planters at auctions where men were often separated from their wives and children.

The strongest men and women worked in the tobacco- and cotton fields in the South and at the sugar factories in the West Indies. Only a few – particularly beautiful young Negro girls – worked as domestic slaves, took care of the children, cooked and washed for the white families. The Negro families lived in small cabins and had small pieces of land where they could raise their own vegetables and keep their chickens and geese. They were the property of the planter, and he could punish them, sell them and give them in marriage.

Many Negroes attempted to flee to the North, others protested by working slowly, simulating illness, or through open revolt. Often the slave owners feared their own slaves. The planters were far apart, and there were many more slaves than whites. One of the slaves´ most dangerous weapons was arson. A whole year’s income could go up in smoke if a barn filled with grain or tobacco was set on fire, and it was difficult to find the culprits.

In the 1830s and 1840s many men and women, both white and black, worked for the abolition of slavery. More and more people felt that slavery was irreconcilable with the beautiful words in the
American Declaration of Independence from 1776, which says that all human beings are created equal and have certain rights, among those the right to freedom. Much progress was made, and in 1865, after a long and bloody civil war, President Abraham Lincoln declared that slavery was abolished and the Negroes free.