plantation

Examples of plantation in the following topics:

• The Plantation Economy and the Planter Class

  • A plantation economy is based on agricultural mass production, usually of a few staple products grown on large plantations such as tobacco.
  • A plantation economy is based on agricultural mass production, usually of a few staple products grown on large farms called plantations.
  • Sugar also has a long history as a plantation crop.
  • Shirley Plantation.
  • The owner of a plantation was called a planter.

• Slave Labor

  • There were two primary types of labor systems seen on plantations: the gang system and the task system.
  • This was particularly the case for slaves with knowledge about rice cultivation on rice plantations.
  • The slaves used this knowledge to bargain with the plantation owners to gain more control over their work.
  • It gave the plantation owners a greater knowledge of this new and non-indigenous form of farming.
  • Slaves were forced to work on plantations often under brutal conditions.

• Social Classes in the Colonies

  • The class system of the plantation South included the plantation masters and their families and the plantation elite.
  • The southern region had very few urban places apart from Charleston, where a merchant elite maintained close connections with nearby plantation society.
  • Beyond the plantations, yeoman farmers operated small holdings, sometimes a few slaves.
  • The plantation areas of Virginia were integrated into the vestry system of the established Anglican church.
  • By the 1760s, a strong tendency to emulate British society was apparent in the plantation regions.

• Agriculture

  • Plantation economy in the Old South was based on agricultural mass production, usually of a few staple products grown on large farms called plantations.
  • In the American South, antebellum plantations were centered on a "plantation house," the residence of the owner, where important business was conducted.
  • Slavery and plantations had different characteristics in different regions of the South.
  • Crops cultivated on antebellum plantations included cotton, tobacco, indigo, and rice.
  • Early 20th-century U.S. photo: "Negroes picking cotton on a plantation in the South"

• Plantation Masters and Mistresses

  • Planters were slaveholding owners of Southern plantations who wielded great political power in both the federal and state governments.
  • The owner of a plantation was called a planter.
  • The wealthiest planters, such as the Virginia elite with plantations on the James River, had more land and slaves.
  • Only a small minority of free white Southerners owned plantations in the antebellum era.

• Slavery in the South

  • The rise of large-scale plantations in the South led to the widespread use of slavery to support the colonial economy.
  • Every colony had slaves, from the southern rice plantations in Charles Town, South Carolina, to the northern wharves of Boston.
  • However, it was in the large agricultural plantations in the South where slavery took hold the strongest.
  • Early on, enslaved people in the South worked primarily in agriculture, on farms and plantations growing indigo, rice, and tobacco; cotton did not become a major crop until after the American Revolution.
  • The rapid expansion of large-scale plantations and single-crop agriculture in the Deep South greatly increased demand for slave labor, and slavery became the backbone of the British colonies.

• White Society in the South

  • Antebellum society in the South consisted of a class of wealthy plantation-owners, a middle class of yeomans, poor whites, and slaves.
  • Based on a system of plantation slavery, the social structure of the South was far more stratified and patriarchal than that of the North.
  • The largest slaveholders, generally owners of large plantations, represented the top stratum of Southern society.
  • This plantation-owning elite, known as "slave magnates," was comparable to the millionaires of the following century .
  • Only a small minority of free white Southerners owned plantations in the antebellum era.

• African-American Culture

  • Although the treatment of slaves varied depending on plantation norms, overseers, and masters, more often than not it was characterized by brutality.
  • Some states denied slaves the right to carry firearms, drink liquor, or leave the plantation without their master's written consent.
  • When slaves were brought to American plantations, they were slowly stripped of their African religions and converted to Christianity.
  • Many white masters allowed the "kitchen garden economy" to thrive, letting some slaves leave the plantation on Sundays to sell their wares.
  • Slaves on a South Carolina plantation (The Old Plantation, c. 1790)

• Slave Culture

  • Although the treatment of slaves varied depending on the plantation, more often than not it was characterized by brutality.
  • Some states denied slaves the right to carry firearms, drink liquor, or leave the plantation without their master's written consent.
  • When slaves were brought to American plantations, they were slowly stripped of their African religions and converted to Christianity.
  • Many white masters allowed the "kitchen garden economy" to thrive, letting some slaves leave the plantation on Sundays to sell their wares.
  • Slaves who ran away were often fed and sheltered by slaves on neighboring plantations, which enabled them to evade their masters.

• Commercial Farmers

  • Following the invention of the cotton gin in the late 1790s, cotton came to dominate southern plantations and became the quintessential example of a commercialized crop.
  • The rapid growth of the textile industry in Britain created a major demand for cotton fiber, and by 1840, this plantation crop represented two-thirds of all American exports.
  • Cotton was generally produced on plantations ranging from South Carolina westward, and production relied upon slave labor, thus greatly strengthening the institution of slavery in the South.