Slavery was a big factor in the colonies. Slavery developed in the colonies in the 17th and 18th centuries, by trading because the cost of indentured servitude was very high. The African American first arrived in Jamestown in 1619 on a Dutch trading ship, not as slaves, but not also as free men. Some historians have estimated that 6 to 7 million slaves were imported to the New World during the 18th century alone. (http://www.history.com/topics/black-history/slavery). They worked mostly on the tobacco, rice and indigo plantations of the southern. They served as indentured servants (http://www.ushistory.org/us/6c.asp). Also, slavery was important because it helped build the economy of the colonies. It begins when John Hawkins, start the British …show more content…
Slavery was encouraged in there. Slaves were working as farmers, they were producing sugar, cotton, rice, and tobacco. The most crop that was produced by slavery was cotton. They provided over a half of all US goods earnings. “By 1840, the South grew 60 percent of the world's cotton and provided some 70 percent of the cotton consumed by the British textile industry.”( https://www.gilderlehrman.org/content/historical-context-was-slavery-engine-american-economic-growth). They also showed other people how to plant rice. The task system was important in South Carolina where enslaved people had a given assignment each day. People spent most of the year up their knees and mud bent over tilling away at the soil under the sun. the rice was a very demanding master. In South Carolina slaves all worked almost to death. Slavery played a big role to develop the economy in the United States. Also, they were treated very badly for the enslaved survival took many forms some pretended to be ignorant or represented by their master’s interests. Many refused to confirm they maintained their dignity by drawing strength from their spirituality and