Plantation Colonies
Brazil’s Sugar Plantation
Sugar Plantations
- Harvesting and refining on one site
- Connection to industrial revolution
Labor
- Disease kills tons of NAs
- Portuguese bring African slaves
England’s Tobacco Colonies
Jamestown settlement
- Much like Spain’s first voyage
- Virginia company
Jamestown People
- Not well adapted to the environment
- Bad relationships with the Powhatan
Tobacco
- Cash crop
- Grows well in Virginia
House of Burgesses (1619)
- Representative government
- Made taxes and laws
- Notice that this is the same year as the first enslaved Africans landing in what would become the US
Indian War of 1622
- Opechancanough was mad about the English wanting to convert NA kids, he wants the English out
- Almost kills all the British
Royal Colony
- Company colony → royal colony
- Government is controlled by the King
Lord Baltimore Settles Catholics in Maryland
- Baltimore is an aristocrat and Catholic
- Maryland becomes a refuge for Catholics
- Lots of tobacco
The Caribbean Islands
Development
- English, Dutch, French, and Spanish in the Caribbean
- St. Kitts becomes an important center
- Sugar is the cash crop of the Caribbean
Plantation Life
Freeholds
- Land owned in its entirety without taxes
- Headright system → amass tons of land by bringing slaves and indentured servants
Economic Boom
- Tobacco causes an economic boom
- Large land owners get richer
Life
- Hard for both the rich and poor
- Not a lot of women in the colonies
Indentured Servitude
- They worked for no pay for an agreed period of time
- Indentured servants were very valuable, many contracts were sold
- Many indentured servants never escaped poverty after their contracts ended
African Laborers
Gradual and instant change to slave labor based on location
Africans lose rights after tobacco boom collapse