Working The Revolution

The Revolution itself brought a blend of success and difficulties to America's farmers. The war halted all trade with England, the colonies' primary trading partner prior to the war (as forced upon them by the mother country). Other agricultural commerce overseas was sporadic, due to the British blockade. Another problem was the war itself; if the armies were nearby, farmers would often make a killing providing food for the bedraggled and weary troops. But if the war was distant agricultural depression often resulted, as it did in New England when the war shifted south..

The overall effects of war were mixed. South Carolina's rice production and trade - thanks in no small part to slave labor, of course - thrived as long as the blockade was sidestepped. But the tobacco farming in the Chesapeake region suffered tremendously. Though many farmers received lucrative payments for their goods from the government, the currency often depreciated before it could be used, and eventually the government would simply issue IOUs that ultimately would not be paid. Pennsylvania's farmers could no longer sell their wheat and corn stocks (no pun intended) overseas, and New England's agricultural success was limited. Overall agricultural production dropped during the war years, much due to more and more men being conscripted into military service. Most farmers had a difficult time replacing property that was lost, stolen, or destroyed (including runaway slaves), resulting in high post-war debts. An Englishman traveling through Rhode Island after the war noted that the "farmers here are miserably poor and in debt." Nash and Jeffrey summarize succinctly: "For agriculturalists everywhere, independence and the war took a heavy toll."⁸

Slaves, too, should not be forgotten (often unwilling) contributors to the American (and British) cause. By 1775 forced labor had become the rule in the American South, and was certainly more than just an exception in the North. The state of New York's slave population was over 20,000 by the 1770s, New England's states of Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island over 16,000. The majority of the northern slaves worked alongside whites in shops, on ship decks, on farms. For example, slaves comprised twenty percent of artisan labor, and more constituted a larger share of the work in the maritime trades. But it was in the South, of course, where slavery

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