The Landscape of Tidewater Rice Cultivation

By 1750 most planters in the Low Country had shifted from the inland swamp method of rice cultivation to the tidewater plantation system.

Tidewater planting required precise conditions to be effective; it differed from inland swamp rice cultivation in that it used fresh water directly from rivers rather than water reservoirs.

It depended upon tidal power to lift the level of streams high enough for their freshwater to be diverted on to the fields.

Working from daylight to dark, slaves were ordered by their masters to re-engineer and manipulate the Low Country environment.

Rice cultivation with its apparatus of levels, floodgates, trunks, canals, banks, and ditches was compared by one planter “to a huge hydraulic machine.”

During the 1750's, the rice planters developed a second valuable staple crop for export: indigo: a plant that produced a blue dye in great demand by the clothing industry in England.

Indigo was a perfect complement to rice. It grew on land not suited to rice cultivation and it needed work at points in the season when rice did not make great demands on labor.

While indigo was relatively easy to grow, the real skill was in extracting the dyestuff.

This involved a three part process of steeping the indigo plants in vats filled with water and lime.

Once the indigo had set up it was shaped into bricks and dried in the sun.

From a little over 63,000 pounds in 1750, South Carolina's indigo exports surged to over 500,000 pounds by 1760.

Enjoying a protected market within the empire for rice and indigo, the South Carolina Low Country became the wealthiest colony on the Atlantic seaboard.