Pathogenesis: A History of the World in Eight Plagues

by Jonathan Kennedy

It wasn’t until the end of the seventeenth century that the number of African Americans in North America took off—in both absolute and relative terms. From under 7,000 in 1680 (5 percent of the population), their number increased to almost 17,000 in 1690 (8 percent), 28,000 in 1700 (13 percent), and then kept on growing.[51] By 1750, there were almost a quarter of a million Black people living in the North American colonies, roughly 20 percent of the population. When we look at colony-level statistics, it is clear that the proportion of African Americans barely changed in the northern colonies; the increase in numbers is almost totally accounted for by the southern colonies. By 1700, African Americans represented 43 percent of the population in South Carolina and 28 percent in Virginia, for example. Fifty years later, the numbers were 61 percent and 44 percent respectively.