The Southern Colonies: Plantations and Slavery

Wealthy land owners produced all they needed on their plantations, and

appeared to be independent. But their independence usually depended on the labor of slaves. Planters were

only a small part of the Southern population, but the plantation

economy and slavery shaped life in the Southern Colonies of Maryland,

Virginia, the Carolinas, and Georgia.

The South had few large cities because the plantations in the

Southern Colonies were largely self-sufficient, producing large cash crops of rice and tobacco.

White indentured servants could not be kept on the

plantations permanently, so Southern farmers turned to enslaved Africans for labor.

In 1665, fewer than 500 Africans had been brought to Virginia. By 1750, there were over 235,000 enslaved Africans

in America, about 85% of which lived in the Southern

Colonies.

As slavery grew, so did the plantations, expanding into

South Carolina and Georgia.

Eliza Lucas introduced indigo, a plant that yields a deep blue

dye, to the Southern plantations.

Lump of indigo dye

FOR UNDERSTANDING

______ introduced______, a plant that yields a deep blue

dye, to the Southern plantations.

• 1) Eliza Lucas, indigo

• 2) Eliza Platt, indigo

• 3) Eliza Barcas, blue bell

• 4) Lisa Lucas, azul

The Southern plantations produced large cash crops of______.

• 1) corn and tobacco

• 2) rice and wheat

• 3) corn and sugar.

• 4) rice and tobacco

White indentured servants could not be kept on the

plantations permanently, so Southern farmers turned to

______ for labor.

• 1) Native Americans

• 2) hired help

• 3) enslaved Africans

• 4) enslaved Europeans

About ______ of enslaved Africans lived in the Southern Colonies.

• 1) 65%.

• 2) 85%

• 3) 50%

• 4) 90%

As slavery grew, so did the plantations, expanding

into______.

• 1) New York, New Hampshire, and Delaware.

• 2) South Carolina and Georgia

• 3) South Carolina and Florida.

• 4) West Virginia and Maryland

From the title page to abolitionist Anthony Benezet's book Some Historical Account of Guinea, London, 1788

A powerful planter class eventually emerged in the

South and monopolized the South’s plantation economy.

The slave-owning upper class took control of the political and economic power in the South.

Many began behaving like English aristocrats.

Although some slave owners felt responsible for the well-being of their slaves, others

were tyrants.

Slaves worked in groups of about 20 to 25, under the

supervision of overseers (men hired by planters to watch over and direct the work of slaves).

Slaves often endured brutal treatment, and meager rations. This situation eventually lead to the Stono Rebellion in 1739, in which about 20 slaves killed several plantar families, and

were themselves executed by a militia group.

On September 9, 1739, twenty African American Carolinians led by Jemmy, an Angolan slave, met near the Stono River, twenty miles

southwest of Charleston. They marched down the roadway with a banner that read "Liberty!"—they chanted the same word in unison. At the

Stono Bridge they seized weapons and ammunition from a store at the Stono River Bridge and killed the two storekeepers. They raised a flag and proceeded south towards Spanish Florida, a well know refuge for

escapees. On the way, they gathered more recruits, their number now 80. They burned the 7 plantations and killed 20 whites. South Carolina's

Lieutenant Governor, William Bull, and four of his friends ran in to the group on horseback. The Lieutenant Governor fled and warned other

slave-holders. They rallied a mob of plantation owners and slave-holders to seek out Jemmy and his freedom-seeking followers.

The next day, mounted militia caught up with the group numbering 80 slaves. Twenty white Carolinians and forty-four of the slaves were killed

before the rebellion was suppressed. The captured slaves were then decapitated and their heads were spiked on every mile post between that

spot and Charles Town.

FOR UNDERSTANDING

overseers were:

• 1) frontiersman who fought the Indians.

• 2) the people who planted and harvested the plantation’s fields.

• 3) the people who controlled the Southern economy.

• 4) men hired by planters to watch over and direct the work of slaves.

Slaves often endured brutal treatment, and meager rations. This

situation eventually lead to the ______in 1739.

• 1) Bacon’s rebellion

• 2) Stono Rebellion

• 3) Stony Rebellion

• 4) Revolutionary war

A powerful ______eventually emerged in the South and

monopolized the South’s plantation economy.

• 1) political party

• 2) anti-slavery movement

• 3) planter class

• 4) new ruler

The slave-owning upper class took control of the ______ power in the South. Many began behaving like

English______.

• 1) religious, aristocrats

• 2) political and economic, aristocrats

• 3) religious and economic, militia men.

• 4) regional, monarchs

Although some slave owners felt responsible for the well-being of their

slaves, others were ______.

• 1) tyrants

• 2) kind

• 3) benevolent

• 4) irresponsible

Olaudah Equiano was born into a wealthy West African family in 1745. His family was Ibo. They

lived far from the sea, in an area now part of Nigeria.

Olaudah Equiano's father was a village chief. He had seven children and many slaves, so Equiano grew up

in a slave society.

When he was eleven, Equiano was captured by African slave traders.

The slave traders separated Equiano from his sister and sold him several times, from one African master to

another. Equiano's first owner treated him well. But he was determined to escape. "I was strengthened by the

mortifying circumstance of not daring to eat with the free-born children."

He was soon sold again, and then again, when a wealthy widow purchased him. With her family,

Equiano discovered how slavery differed from one African society to another. Equiano soon began to think the family would adopt him. His contentment

was shattered early one morning when he was awoken and taken away yet again. Eventually he found himself

on the Africa's Atlantic coast for the first time in his life. There he saw a slave ship anchored offshore.

But he had no idea what lay ahead. No Africans had ever returned from the Americas to tell of their fate.

he journey from Africa to America was called "The

Middle Passage." It was the middle leg of the triangular slave trade which began and ended in Europe. No African

expected the misery and horror it held. Slavers packed

three or four hundred Africans into a lower deck—

the ship's cargo.

The cargo hold was tiny— a person couldn't even stand up in it. The air in the hold was hot and stale. The smell of sweaty bodies and human waste made

the air even more unpleasant. Disease and death were common. Up to 25 percent of a slave ship's Africans

died during the voyage. The captain and crew struggled to keep their valuable cargo alive. They forced the Africans to dance on deck for exercise.

Sometimes they force-fed Africans who would rather die than suffer further.

The slave ship carrying Olaudah

Equiano and hundreds of other Africans

finally reached port. Their destination was the English colony of Barbados. Soon they were put up for sale.

No one purchased Equiano, who was still just a boy of 12. So he was shipped north to a plantation in Virginia. There he was shocked to see the instruments

used to control and punishment slaves.

Equiano was soon sold again. His new owner was a lieutenant in the British navy named Michael Henry

Pascal. Pascal gave him a new name: Gustavus Vassa. Equiano refused to answer to this name at first. Pascal slapped him with each refusal, and soon he relented.

Under Pascal, Equiano learned to be a sailor. He spent much time in England, where managed to educate himself as well. He even fought for Britain in the

Seven Years' War.

After seven years, Equiano had grown comfortable with his fate. So he was shocked once again when his owner sold him. His buyer was Captain James Doran to the West Indies. But Equiano challenged the sale.

Doran was not persuaded.

Doran brought Equiano back to the Caribbean and sold him to a Quaker merchant from Philadelphia

named Robert King.

King treated Equiano well. But Equiano had tasted freedom and couldn't accept a slave's life anymore. His urge for freedom grew even greater when King put him to work aboard a Caribbean slave ship. But

Equiano refused to give up.

He began trading glasses and other objects on the side. Eventually he saved 40 pounds (equal to about $3,700 today). That was enough to purchase his freedom. As a freeman, Equiano continued working as a sailor for years. He traveled widely, but his personal struggle against racism and slavery continued. One day, a

ship's captain decided to sell Equiano. Equiano was hung from the mast all night long. In the morning, he begged to be released. Since his body was blocking

the sails, the crew brought him down. The ship's carpenter persuaded the captain to put Equiano ashore.

There he thanked God for "this unexpected deliverance" and found another ship bound for

Jamaica.

Eventually Equiano turned to the abolitionist cause. He became a public speaker in his adopted home of England. In 1789, he wrote his autobiography, The

Interesting Narrative of The Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, The African. It was an immediate best seller— the first anti-slavery book to reach a wide audience. Equiano became England's

leading spokesperson for blacks and the abolition of slavery.

Olaudah Equiano died in 1797. Ten years later, Britain and the United States abolished the slave

trade.