Black South Carolinians are residents of the state of South Carolina who are of African American ancestry. This article examines South Carolina's history with an emphasis on the lives, status, and contributions of African Americans. Enslaved Africans first arrived in the region in 1526, and the institution of slavery remained until the end of the Civil War in 1865. Until slavery's abolition, the free black population of South Carolina never exceeded 2%. Beginning during the Reconstruction Era, African Americans were elected to political offices in large numbers, leading to South Carolina's first majority-black government. Toward the end of the 1870s however, the Democratic Party regained power and passed laws aimed at disenfranchising African Americans, including the denial of the right to vote. Between the 1870s and 1960s, African Americans and whites lived segregated lives; people of color and whites were not allowed to attend the same schools or share public facilities. African Americans were treated as second-class citizens leading to the civil rights movement in the 1960s. In modern America, African Americans constitute 22% of the state's legislature, and in 2014, the state's first African American U.S. Senator since Reconstruction, Tim Scott, was elected. In 2015, the Confederate flag was removed from the South Carolina Statehouse after the Charleston church shooting.Activist Bree Newsome removes Confederate flag from South Carolina State House
Colonial South Carolina When Spanish and French explorers reached the region in the 16th century, they encountered numerous tribes of Native Americans, with the Cherokees and the Catawba people being the most prominent prior to the arrival of African American slaves in South Carolina. The initial European efforts to establish settlements were unsuccessful; however, in 1670, a lasting English settlement was founded along the coast close Charleston. The English then began dependent on African American slavery.
Enslaved Africans first arrived in the area that would become South Carolina in 1526 as part of a Spanish expedition from the Caribbean. In 1670 when the British Empire colonized the region, the Lords Proprietor established the Province of Carolina and created a plantation-style economy that increasingly relied on enslaved labor. By 1708, the enslaved African population in South Carolina exceeded the number of free whites. This black majority existed in the state until the Great Migration in the early twentieth century, with some temporary fluctuations.
Black people were present at the founding of the English colony in South Carolina. Europeans brought black slaves to the state after the genocide of Native Americans.
Slave Trade
Unlike her more northern colonies, South Carolina's introduction to slavery was based largely on a preexisting enslavement system from the Caribbean in the late seventeenth century. Many of the colony's first white settlers immigrated from Barbados. By 1700, South Carolina's system of slavery resulted in the development of the rice and indigo cash crop industry. Contrary to popular understanding, cotton was not a big factor until the early 1800s. By the eighteenth century, most of the slave trade in South Carolina was under the control of the Royal African Company, established by the British monarchy to facilitate trading in west Africa. Slave traders typically offered products such as iron and copper bars, brass pans and kettles, cowry shells, old guns, gunpowder, cloth, and alcohol in return for African slaves; ships typically loaded between 200 and over 600 slaves.
Charleston, South Carolina, named Charles Town in colonial times, was a major global port for trading goods and slaves. More than half of the slaves that came to British North America passed through Charles Town. By 1770, more than 3,000 African slaves were imported to the city annually. The International African American Museum, opening in 2022, is being built in Charleston, South Carolina, on the site where Gadsden's Wharf, the disembarkation point of up to 40% of all American slaves, once stood.
When slaves arrived in the city, they were often inspected and auctioned at the local market. Potential buyers inspected male slaves for characteristics of strength. If a male slave appeared weak, old, or frail, he sold for a lower price than a young, brawny male. Slaves with bruising and scaring from whippings were auctioned more cheaply because buyers were uneasy about purchasing a slave they believed to be rebellious. Women were inspected for characteristics of beauty and child reproduction. Both male and female slaves were inspected for diseases, typically being stripped of their clothing. Some potential buyers even forced open the mouths of slaves to view their teeth, another method of inspecting for disease. Slaves that were not purchased in Charles Town were forced to travel to other slave auction houses, such as in Georgetown or in other colonies.
Slave auctions also served as a form of entertainment for many white residents in Charles Town. Even people that had no intentions of bidding on a slave watched as African men and women were sold by the auctioneer. In some instances, auctioneers provided wine, drink and other forms of refreshments for slave buyers. As the slave practice grew, the prices of slaves rose. By the 1770s, slaves sold as high as $1,500, or about the price of a new car in modern times, and families were often separated through the auction.
Most of South Carolina's slaves were imported from the Angola-Congo region, Senegambia and Sierra Leone.
Stono Rebellion
The Stono Rebellion was the largest slave uprising in the British mainland colonies, resulting in the deaths of 40-50 Africans and 23 colonists. The revolt was led by a slave named Jemmy in 1739, who gathered 22 slaves near the Stono River in Charleston.Diane Mutti-Burke, "What the Stono Revolt Can Teach Us about History", review of Mark M. Smith, ed., Stono, History.net, Dec 2008, accessed 12 October 2008. They marched chanting "Liberty," and recruited more slaves along the way. The group killed two storekeepers to gather weapons and ammunition. The slaves' goal was to march to Spanish Florida, a well-known refuge for escapees. Lieutenant Governor William Bull warned slave owners that a rebellion was forming; the slave owners gathered militia to suppress the uprising. The following day, the slaves and militia met, and after the confrontation, 23 whites and 47 slaves were killed. While the slave rebellion was defeated, it encouraged many governments in British America to pass laws further restricting the freedoms of slaves and of free blacks."September 1739: Stono Rebellion in South Carolina" , History in the Heartland, Ohio Historical Society, accessed 9 September 2013.
In response to the Stono Rebellion, the South Carolina legislature passed more laws limiting the rights of African Americans and more-strictly regulating the institution of slavery. One such law was the Negro Act of 1740, which restricted slave assembly, education, and movement in addition to requiring legislative approval for each act of manumission. The act established penalties for slave owners who were too lenient in punishing their slaves. The act required slaves to travel with a pass and gave any white male the ability to scrutinize, question, and detain blacks they believed to be escaped slaves.Robert Olwell and Alan Tully, Cultures and Identities in Colonial British America, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2006, p. 37.Sutherland, Claudia E., "Stono Rebellion (1739)", Black Past, accessed 10 April 2009.
The Revolutionary War Politicians were divided on how African Americans who fought for the American cause should be rewarded. Two delegates to the Continental Congress, Edward Rutledge and Thomas Lynch, sought to bar free African Americans from enlisting in the militia, while other statesmen, such as Henry Laurens, favored exchanging military service for freedom. Under Lauren's proposal, the Continental Congress would provide slave owners $1,000 for each able-bodied slave under 35 years-old provided for military service, though this proposal was rejected. Another proposal from Thomas Sumter stated that any man who joined the militia for ten months would be gifted one free slave, though this proposal was also rejected. Ultimately, slaves who served as Patriots were returned into slavery following the war's conclusion. African Americans who served in the Continental Army were mostly laborers or cooks, and very few fought in combat situations. Slaves did not typically serve non-voluntarily; most were commanded by their slave owners to serve in their stead, and any slave who refused to serve after being instructed, risked a penalty of death. If the slave was paid the typical daily wage of seven pence, by law, that money belonged to the slave owner.
Some South Carolina African Americans fought for the British as Loyalists. Dunmore's Proclamation declared that any slave who ran away from his master and joined the royal forces would be granted his freedom. This promise was never carried out since the British lost the war. As many as 25,000 slaves, along with other British Loyalists, escaped South Carolina following the conclusion of the war. One band of three hundred Georgia and South Carolina slaves, who called themselves King of England's Soldiers, fled to the Savannah River swamps and survived until May 1786 when they were burned out by militia.
Early and Antebellum America
The Act Prohibiting Importation of Slaves was signed by President Thomas Jefferson in 1807. Anticipating the enforcement of this law, Charleston traders acquired approximately 70,000 Africans between 1804 and 1807. For most of the nineteenth century, slaves in South Carolina were born into slavery, not carried from Africa. By 1860, the slave population of South Carolina was just over 402,000, and the free black population was just over 10,000. At the same time, there were approximately 291,000 whites in the state, accounting for about 30% of the population. Compared to other states, South Carolina had a very large population of slaves, which had nearly quadrupled in the 70 years between 1790 and 1860. Much of this growth can be attributed to the rise of the cotton industry. Prior to the 1800s, South Carolina's slave-based economy dealt mostly in the harvesting of tobacco, rice, and indigo. In 1800, the Santee Canal connected the Santee and Cooper rivers, making it possible to transport goods directly from Columbia, South Carolina to Charleston by water. The creation of the Santee Canal, coupled with the invention of the cotton gin, transformed the cotton-production business into part of the global economy. The upcountry of South Carolina had fertile land that supported the growing of short-staple cotton, and many planters ruined the fertility of the land, often unknowingly, by planting season after season of cotton. But the slave-driven cotton industry catapulted South Carolina as one of the wealthiest locations on Earth by the mid-nineteenth century. Slavery soon spread throughout all of South Carolina instead of having a concentration along the coast as it had since the 1600s. The expansion of slavery throughout the state led to the full maturity of the slave society in South Carolina, and by 1860, 45.8 percent of white families in the state owned slaves, giving the state one of the highest percentages of slaveholders in the country.
Denmark Vesey