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Enslaved laborers working in tobacco sheds on a colonial tobacco plantation, 1670.

The Plantation, ca. 1825, courtesy of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. This painting by an unknown artist depicts fields for cultivating cash crops, a ship for exporting goods, and a large mansion, but enslaved laborers are notably absent from this representation of plantation life. The role of slavery in producing plantation wealth is often erased or romanticized in American popular culture, from during the time of slaveryinto the present.

Tobacco field in North Carolina, image by Kevin Bercaw, 2011.

Enslaved African child in chains, wearing collar and shackles, unidentified British artist, ca. 1820-1840, courtesy of the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, United Kingdom.

Map of West Indies and Caribbean, created by Herman Moll, 1732, courtesy of Geographicus Rare Antique Maps. Map reveals relatively close proximity of Carolina colony and British West Indies. Early settlement in Carolina was strongly influenced by trade with Barbadians and other West Indian settlers, as well as emigration from the West Indies of both planters and slaves to this new North American colony.

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The Barbados Mulatto Girl, painting by Augostino Brunias, ca. 1764, courtesy of the Barbados Museum & Historical Society. This painting depicts the presence of enslaved Africans and African European "mulattos" in Barbados, as well as a sugarcane plantation in the background. Barbadian settlers brought the plantation model to the Carolina colony, and reliance on African enslaved labor.

Execution of James Scott, Duke of Monmouth, July 15, 1685. In 1685, Monmouth attempted to overthrow King James II. He was executed for his actions, and over eight hundred of his supporters from England, Ireland, and Scotland were punished by being transported to work on sugar plantations in the English West Indies, including Barbados.

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Morgan Lewis Windmill, Barbados, West Indies, image by Mary Battle, March 2012. In addition to opening access to the trans-Atlantic slave trade, Dutch traders in Barbados also introduced windmill technology for processing sugarcane. Many of these structures remain on the island today.

UNESCO Slave Route marker at Newton Plantation, Barbados, West Indies, image by Mary Battle, 2012.

"A Negro Festival drawn from Nature in the Island of St Vincent," engraving by Audinet, 1801, courtesy of the © National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, UK. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, enslaved Africans in Barbados sometimes escaped by boat to nearby islands such as St. Vincent. On this mountainous island, Amerindian Kalinagos allowed Africans to become a part of their social structure and intermarry after 1660, when Kalinago relations soured with European allies. Many of St. Vincent's current inhabitants are descendants of these escaped Africans and Amerindians.

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