John Punch

Male


Personal Information    |    Notes    |    Event Map    |    All

  • Name John Punch 
    Gender Male 
    Paternal DNA E1b1a8a 
    Reference Number 10775 
    Died USA Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Person ID I10775  Families

    Family Mary Spears,   d. USA Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Children 
     1. John Bunch, I,   b. 1632, Virginia, USA Find all individuals with events at this location,   d. USA Find all individuals with events at this location  [natural]
    Family ID F8097  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

  • Event Map
    Link to Google MapsDied - - USA Link to Google Earth
     = Link to Google Earth 

  • Notes 


    • John Punch (fl. 1630s, living 1640) was an enslaved African who lived in the Colony of Virginia. Thought to have been an indentured servant, Punch attempted to escape to Maryland and was sentenced in July 1640 by the Virginia Governor's Council to serve as a slave for the remainder of his life. Two European men who ran away with him were sentenced to longer indentures but not the permanent loss of their freedom. For this reason, historians consider John Punch the "first official slave in the English colonies, and his case as the "first legal sanctioning of lifelong slavery in the Chesapeake. Historians also consider this to be one of the first legal distinctions between Europeans and Africans made in the colony, and a key milestone in the development of the institution of slavery in the United States.