Objective C Paper

2/15/2013 History 135 016rl
Edward Pistola

OBJECTIVE B PAPER

Slavery was a key factor in the growth of industry in the northern colonies which generated enormous amounts of weath in the new world. Slavery was important to the northern colonies for many economic reasons. The north was a huge supplier of goods and tools to the west indies. New England land owners thrived off of the trade of sugar from the Caribbean to make molasses and rum. The northern colonies supplied many ships to transport livestock and horses to the west indies for plantation owners and supplied these plantations with slaves making the northern economy completely reliant on slave trade.
What started the thriving economical relationship between the northern colonies and the west indies was a handful of weathy people and events. The enabler of this success was Henry Winthrop who his father John Winthrop who was a puritan and later was the founding governor of the Massachusetts bay colony. Henry in 1627 landed on the island of Barbados with the aspirations of being a planter but was short on indentured servants to get the plantation going . During this time many puritans were leaving England for the colonies but many other puritans were going to the Caribbean and setting up sugar plantations which was the main cash crop besides tobacco. With sugar being a huge cash crop and with the many plantations being set up around the Caribbean this started a huge surge of African slaves that were sent over to do the grueling work of working the sugar fields because of the lack of indentured servants.
In 1645 the New England colonies first started transporting slaves from Africa to Barbados and sometimes colonial ships would result to captive labor like their European counterparts. By this time the west indes was creating such an abundant amount of sugar for the New England colonies to trade and make into molasses and rum but the northern colonies profited beyond the sugar trade. The northern colonies would trade a large amount of food to the west indes making agriculture big in the north. The Northern colonies would trade fruit vegetables and livestock to the Caribbean to feed the large amount of slaves working there. Plantation owners in the west indies would not bother with trying to grow their own food on their plantations since every acre was needed for planting sugar.
Slavery was not only limited to the west indies during this time, slavery was also going on in the northern colonies as well. Since agriculture was booming in the north to supply slaves with food and other raw materials for the west indes many land owners had slaves working on large farms all over the northeast. Throughout rural areas like New Jersey, long island and Rhode Island many farmers owned slaves to work crops on these large farms to supply the plantations. Some of these farms were large up to 4000 acres with as many as 50 or more slaves on each. One of these owners was Lewis Morris who owned a farm that was about 1900 acres long which he used to grow and sell corn, wheat and to raise livestock and even supply lumber to the plantations in the west indes. Another example is a family of traders named the Van Cortlands had a huge farming operations in the Bronx which had many slaves.
Because of this large amount of income coming from the west indes the northern industry was skyrocketing. Coastal towns in Massachusetts were building a large amount of ships many of which were sold to the west indies. There were many lumber fields operating to supply the Caribbean with lumber for barrels and to provide materials to docks so ships can be built. There was a lot of iron yards and sail makers and carpenters that helped the economy of the Northern colonies grow even more. Many families and became very well off because of the slave trade, many farmers and wealthy merchants like Peter Faneuil who is from Boston and owned a 400 acre plantation in Barbados which helped him profit from the from slavery.
There are many reasons I think why most Americans rarely hear about this or were even taught this in school. The first reason why I think it is rarely talked about is that when the north won the civil war and slavery was abolished people always think and refer slavery to the south. Most people assume that slavery was only involved during the period leading up to the civil war and forget that it was a large part of this Americas history long before it. So part of the reason why I think this part of history is not mentioned is because of history being a little misconstrued. The second reason why I think its not talked about is because when people see the and think about the north they think of antislavery which is hardly the case since slavery was such a large part of the northern economy for a long time, but I doubt a lot of has been buried due to moral dilemma since people don’t have to dig very deep to find out what happened during that period of history and the countless farms that are still around today that have had slave labor in the north. Most of this I think is not heard of on a regular basis is because it is not popular history and most people are not informed about it which I think is a shame since it is a part of this nations past.