32. For Many Slaves, the British Meant Freedom While the Patriots Meant Bondage
Nowadays, the struggle between Britain and the American colonists is usually presented as a fight for liberty between tyranny and a people yearning for freedom. Which was true – from the perspective of whites fighting the British. However, from the perspective of many colonists of African descent, it was not so straightforward. The side that actually offered them liberty and freedom from tyranny was not the Patriots, but the British.
In 1775, Samuel Johnson summed up one of the greatest contradictions of the Patriots’ fight for freedom: “How is it that we hear the loudest yelps for liberty from the drivers of Negros?” Many of the American colonists’ foremost advocates of liberty and equality owned hundreds of other humans. Some, such as Thomas Jefferson, lived lavishly off the sweat and blood of hundreds of slaves who toiled for their benefit, driven by the lash and the threat of extreme violence.
