Slavery in the 13 British colonies in America grew during the 17th century, largely because the labor force served as an economic engine for colonial prosperity. In 1619, when the first captive African immigrants arrived in America, they worked alongside white indentured servants in the Jamestown tobacco fields.
The Atlantic slave trade peaked in the last two decades of the 18th century, during and following the Kongo Civil War. Wars among tiny states along the Niger River's Igbo -inhabited region and the accompanying banditry also spiked in this period.
Beyond issues of morality, another reason for the decline in the slave trade was simple economics. Slaves were an important part of the agricultural economies of many countries, especially in North America, but the onset of the industrial revolution made the manpower requirements that drove the slave trade increasingly obsolete.
Rise of Slavery in the Colonies in the 17th Century. Slavery in the 13 British colonies in America grew during the 17th century, largely because the labor force served as an economic engine for colonial prosperity.
The military and naval strengths of competing nations were important factors in slave trading success, but it was not the only factor. In the first half of the 18th century the British Atlantic community became more integrated, allowing the trade in slaves to flourish.
Military strength and control of the trade were intertwined. At this time governments restricted which ships could trade with their colonies. Each European power restricted trade within their colony to benefit their own merchants. Conquest of colonies in the Americas led to an increased share of slave trading.
As a result of increased cotton production and the required labor, the slave population in cotton-growing regions greatly increased. The economic and political impact of the cotton gin was significant.
As the demand for slaves increased with European colonial expansion in the New World, rising prices made the slave trade increasingly lucrative.
This remarkable growth was the result of two factors: (1) continued importation of new slaves from Africa and the Caribbean; and (2) natural population growth, especially among American-born slaves, who lived longer lives and bore more children than African-born slaves.
High European demand for cash crops (Tobacco, sugar, and rice), Difficulty in enslaving Natives, and lack of indentured servants were the reasons for growth of slavery.
By 1675 slavery was well established, and by 1700 slaves had almost entirely replaced indentured servants. With plentiful land and slave labor available to grow a lucrative crop, southern planters prospered, and family-based tobacco plantations became the economic and social norm.
Trade in African slaves increased dramatically in the 7th century because Arab Muslims and Europeans began trading these slaves.
As the slave trade begin in 17th century, the slaves were bought from local chieftians. After branding and shackling, the slaves were packed tightly into voyage for the three month long wire across the Atlantic to the Caribbean. At the African coast, they were sold to plantation owners.
The explosive growth of the Atlantic slave trade was due mainly to the rise of plantation agriculture in the Americas. Plantation agriculture began with sugar production in Portuguese Brazil and later expanded into Spanish, British, French, and Dutch colonies in the Caribbean.
How did a high enslaved population in the southern states threaten the people of the northern states? It meant the exported crops would primarily come from the South. It made it much harder to put an end to slavery. It pressured the free states to reconsider the issue of slavery.
It was part of the Industrial Revolution and made cotton into a profitable crop. Cotton planting expanded exponentially and with it, the demand for slaves. The South was thus wedded even more firmly to slave labor to sustain its way of life.
As northern textile factories boomed, the demand for southern cotton swelled and the institution of American slavery accelerated. Northern subsistence farmers became laborers bound to the whims of markets and bosses.