Indentured servitude, in which a person agrees to work for a specified number of years in exchange for transportation to the American colonies, was used as a way to import labor and boost the population in the English settlements of North America. Following the creation of the settlement at Jamestown, the practice of indentured servitude became increasingly popular in the Chesapeake region. Typically, indentured servants would work for about five years in exchange for their passage, lodging, board, and eventual freedom. Depending on the colony, indentured servants were protected by a series of laws, particularly in Virginia, that regulated the treatment of servants. This fascinating document, a letter from Elizabeth Sprigs to her father, tells the story of a young woman who worked as an indentured servant in the colonies. In exchange for her passage from England, Sprigs would have signed a contract to work as an indentured domestic servant. The practice is typically regarded as a seventeenth-century one, but this letter illustrates that indenture was still being utilized into the eighteenth century.