3. The Southern Colonies in the Seventeenth Century, 1601

Quiz for Analyzing Historical Evidence: Enslavement by Marriage

Choose the best answer to each question. Click the “submit” button for each question to turn in your work.

1. What evidence did the court rely on to prove the racial status of Irish Nell and Charles?

Court documents from the seventeenth century

Birth certificates

Witness testimony

Plantation owners’ business records

2. How did Lord Baltimore try to dissuade Irish Nell from marrying Charles?

He warned her that her children and their descendants would be enslaved.

He told her that it was illegal for a white woman to marry a slave.

He advised her that her family would disown her if she married Charles.

He told her he would fire her if she married Charles.

3. How had Irish Nell come to live in America?

She was an immigrant from the Caribbean colonies.

She was seeking religious freedom as a pacifist and abolitionist Quaker.

She was the daughter of a wealthy merchant.

She worked as an indentured servant.

4. According to one witness, what was Charles’s background as a slave?

He planned to buy his freedom someday.

He had been born in America and enslaved all his life.

He was the son of a plantation owner and a slave woman.

He had been born in Africa and then enslaved.

5. According to several of the witnesses, what was Irish Nell’s status after marrying Charles?

Charles’s owner enslaved her.

She worked as a servant but as a free woman.

The neighboring white people refused to associate with her.

She and Charles ran away to try to gain their freedom.