Proclamation 1625: Americas Enslavement of the Irish

When one thinks of slavery in America, the only thought that comes to mind is Africans picking cotton in the fields of America. What many Americans don't know is that the Irish preceded the Africans as slaves in the early British colonies of America and the West Indies. They toiled in the tobacco fields of Virginia and Maryland and the sugar cane fields of Barbados and Jamaica.

For over 179 years, the Irish were the primary source of slave labor in the British American colonies. Proclamation...