Captive Passage - Arrival: Life in the Americas
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Captive Passage: The Transatlantic Slave Trade and the Making of the AmericasSugar Plantations
Tobacco Plantations
Cotton Plantations
Rice Plantations

Captive Passage
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possible in part by:
National Endowment for the Humanities
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Arrival: Life in the AmericasPreference for AfricansThe Slave Markets
European RewardsSlave Populations in the AmericasThe Ships Return to EuropeEconomics
Sugar IntroductionSlavery in North AmericaReligionSilver Mines of South America

Rice Plantations:

Harvesting the Rice
Harvesting the Rice
South Carolina was in many ways similar to the Caribbean. The soil and climate of South Carolina proved ideal for the cultivation of rice. Although rice was not initially envisioned as a major crop, by 1720, it had become the colonists' most important food item. By 1750, it was South Carolina's major export, surpassed only by tobacco and wheat. Rice, like tobacco, required a fairly high level of skill and experience to grow, and the English in South Carolina were unsuccessful at first. Enslaved Africans came from rice-producing regions in Africa ensured prosperity of rice plantations in North America. Of those brought to South Carolina during the late 17thand early 18 thcenturies, 43 percent came from rice-producing regions of Africa. The colonists' dependency on knowledge and experience of rice cultivation meant that the enslaved Africans possessed a comparatively large amount of bargaining power.

The method of using the tidal flow to cultivate rice transformed the coastal Southeast between 1783 and the early 19thcentury. It was a highly productive method that was practical only on the lower stretches of a few rivers from the Cape Fear in North Carolina to the St. Johns in north Florida. The initial investment to create a tidal rice plantation was substantial and took a tremendous amount of backbreaking labor as well. Enslaved Africans cleared riverside swamps of timber and undergrowth and then surrounded them with earthen levees. Next they constructed an intricate system of dams, dikes, floodgates, ditches, and drains. The rise and fall of the tide was used to irrigate the fields several times during the growing season to encourage rice growth and to control weeds and pests.

Rice farmers in South Carolina did not use indentured servants from England to the extent that the tobacco farmers in the Chesapeake region did. This was largely due to the fact that English settlers who came to the colony in 1670 from Barbados brought enslaved Africans with them, creating a base of slave labor. The tendency and the desire to use slaves was also strengthened by the belief that they were more accustomed to the warm, semi-tropical climate than British servants and that they were, therefore, immune to many of the diseases that plagued the inhabitants of the region. As in the Chesapeake region, disease was a serious problem. Yellow fever was a particularly virulent killer in South Carolina. The warm climate combined with the necessity of growing rice near swamps and standing water, in order to allow for irrigation, created a disease-breeding environment. It was certainly true that Africans were far more accustomed to the warmer climate than were the Europeans, yet they suffered the effects of certain diseases just as the English did. Smallpox affected them just as severely and they were particularly susceptible to lung infections such as influenza, tuberculosis, and pneumonia owing to a lack of adequate food and clothing. Africans in South Carolina did have greater resistance to some of the diseases such as yellow fever and malaria, however, because both diseases were endemic in Africa and thus many slaves were immune to them.
 
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