96 THE GREEN RISING 



usually a matter of contract and varied with the age 

 of the indentured and other conditions. As a rule, 

 persons under nineteen years of age were required 

 to serve until the age of twenty- four; for persons 

 over nineteen years of age the usual period was five 

 years. The actual benefits and effects of the system 

 of indenture service is described by James C. 

 Balleigh, with special reference to Virginia, as fol- 

 lows: "Designed not only as a labor supply, but as 

 an immigration agency, it had generally the effect of 

 industrial apprenticeship, greatly strengthened the 

 position of the capitalist employer, and developed 

 a class of industrially efficient freemen. It supplied 

 almost the entire force of skilled labor in the Colonies 

 for more than half a century and continued to be a 

 source of high-grade labor long into the eighteenth 

 century. It provided for the growth of a strong 

 yeoman class and prevented the complete absorption 

 of land into great estates; and it furnished a great 

 number of independent settlers and citizens, particu- 

 larly for the back country; it had a marked effect on 

 the political as well as the economic development of 

 the country." 3 



Too much emphasis cannot be laid on the last two 

 sentences in this quotation. Indentured service con- 

 tinued until after the Revolutionary War, but finally 

 the system gave way to the wages system in industry 

 and various forms of tenantry on the great estates. 



* White Servitude in the Colony of Virginia, Johns Hopkins 

 University Studies in History and Political Science, Vol. XIII. 



