Jack Fish Mrs. DeShambo English 8 January 13, 2017 Joshua John Ward was the biggest American slaveholder. Joshua held over 1,000 slaves, to be exact he held 1,092”.(haygenealogy.com). Joshua owned a lot of rice plantations. He served as a 44th Lieutenant Governor and also served in the National Guard. He was a democratic. After 21 years of service in the military, Joshua decided it was time to retire. He was also heavily involved in politics. He served in both of the houses of the state legislature and as a lieutenant governor from 1850-1852. Joshua John Ward was born on November 24, 1800. He was born in Georgetown County, South Carolina. Joshua died on February 27, 1853, in Georgetown County, South Carolina, at the age of 53. Joshua’s wife’s name was Joanna …show more content…
Fish 2 Joshua had 1,092 slaves that worked hard every day. Joshua’s slaves worked for all the plantations. Joshua worked a long time to get all of the rice plantations and all of the fields done and the pay the field workers of Georgetown County. Joshua Ward is mostly known for being the greatest and most experimental of the Antebellum Rice Planters. Ward was an expert at doing things with all of the rice. “He developed his world famous long grain version of Carolina Gold. It commanded the highest price of any rice on the world market in Paris and London.”( atlantablackstar.com) In 1853, when Joshua died, his son, Mayham Ward, inherited Alderly. Then when Mayham Ward died, his estate ended up in court to be divided more evenly. Joshua had it in his will to divide his plantations among all of his sons. Because of the Civil War, Joshua’s estate wasn’t settled until many years later. In later years, the price of rice started to decline. Then after a while, a series of hurricanes totally ruined the system of dikes and canals that was used for irrigation of the rice fields. By 1911, the industry collapsed and there was almost no rice being grown in South Carolina