Concept
A slave plantation was an agricultural farm that used enslaved people for labour. The practice was abolished in most places during the 19th century. Slavery in the United States and Slavery in the colonial United States Planters embraced the use of slaves mainly because indentured labor became expensive. Some indentured servants were also leaving to start their own farms as land was widely available. Colonists in the Americas tried using Native Americans for labor, but they were susceptible to European diseases and died in large numbers. The plantation owners then turned to enslaved Africans for labor. In 1665, there were fewer than 500 Africans in Virginia but by 1750, 85 percent of the 235,000 slaves in the Thirteen Colonies lived in the southern colonies, Virginia included. Africans made up 40 percent of the South's population. According to the 1840 United States Census, one out of every four families in Virginia owned slaves. There were over 100 plantation-owners who owned over 100 slaves. The number of slaves in the 15 States was just shy of 4 million in a total population 12.4 million and the percentage was 32% of the population. Number of slaves in the Lower South: 2,312,352 (47% of total population) 4,919 million. Number of slaves in the Upper South: 1,208,758 (29% of total population) 4,165 million. Number of slaves in the Border States: 432,586 (13% of total population) 3,323 million. Fewer than one-third of Southern U.S. families owned slaves at the peak of slavery prior to the outbreak of the American Civil War in 1861. In Mississippi and South Carolina the figure approached one half. The total number of slave owners was 385,000 (including, in Louisiana, some free African Americans), amounting to approximately 3.8% of the Southern and Border states population. On a plantation with more than 100 slaves, the capital value of the slaves was greater than the capital value of the land and farming implements. Slave-powered latifundia featured in the economy of territories of classical Rome from the 2nd century BCE.
