Colonial Perceptions

Abstract

Thus far, this book has examined networks created and utilized by Quakers to distribute discipline and printed materials, for trade, and to find and create new homes. To conclude, this chapter seeks to look at the impact of these networks on different peoples and how participation in the Atlantic world affected the Quaker perceptions of the American and Caribbean colonies and the perception of Quakers. Quaker entry into the Atlantic world exposed London Quakers to new peoples and asked them to adapt to a new land while remaining faithful to the tenets of their faith. For example, Chalkley, Atkinson, and Ellis, like other trav- elling ministers, met native peoples, all carrying expectations informed by experiences of Quakers before them but also passing on their own experiences for Friends throughout the Atlantic community. Further- more, the inventories of Jos iah passengers Richard Johns and Samuel Chew indicate that both men were involved in the enslavement of other peoples.¹ Conversely, Native Americans and Africans were exposed to Quakers and their emerging faith and practices. Quakers were colonizers, people who removed to ‘a new locality, forming a community subject to or connected with their parent state’.² Their attempts to create a trans- Atlantic community relied on obtaining land previously occupied by native peoples, imposing their methods of cultivation and trade, relying on forced labour, establishing their own faith though not to the exclu- sion of others, and maintaining contact with Quakers in London.