![]() These radical ideas traveled around the Atlantic world. Members of the radical group the Levellers compared impressment to the enslavement of Africans and called for the end of both. They insisted that forced military service was a form of “thralldom and bondage,” which they, as “freemen of England,” must resist. In the mid-seventeenth century, English sailors engaged in collective actions against the practice. Magra writes that rebellions against impressment were a long tradition in the British world. By one count, pressed men made up 40 percent of the 450,000 sailors who served between 17. And the navy depended on men forced into service. Military ships established the nation’s power in wars and protected its trading ships and communication networks. The navy was key to Britain’s dominance of both sides of the Atlantic in the eighteenth century. Upon which, the Master thereof gave Scent of them to a Press Gang, who, with the Assistance of some Constables, in short, seized them.”īy one count, pressed men made up 40 percent of the 450,000 sailors who served between 17. ![]() One 1740 account from England described a group of sailors who, “having refused to go the Voyage without a Rise of Wages, left their Vessel. Abusive captains could control their crews by offering those who rebelled up for impressment. “Press gangs” boarded ships, marching their crews off to the physical danger, low pay, and terrible food of the navy. Across the British empire, naval officers seized sailors and forced them into service. Magra writes that impressment was a kind of military draft that, in practice, looked more like kidnapping. In many cases, the people doing the fighting were in immediate personal danger of losing their own liberty through impressment into the British Royal Navy. Magra writes, colonists’ fights for freedom from British dominance began well before 1776. On July 4, Americans celebrate liberty and independence from Great Britain.
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