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In 1619, a strange ship sailed into Jamestown, Virginia. Writer J. Saunders Redding described it as mysterious and ominous, carrying a “portentous freight”: twenty Africans, traded to the English colonists. Although listed as “servants,” they were treated very differently from white indentured servants. They were isolated, stripped of rights, and forced into lifelong bondage. This moment marked the beginning of a racial system that would shape the next 350 years of American history.