Colonial period of South Carolina

The colonial period of South Carolina saw the exploration and colonization of the region by European colonists during the early modern period, eventually resulting in the establishment of the Province of Carolina by English settlers in 1663, which was then divided to create the Province of South Carolina in 1710. European settlement in the region of modern-day South Carolina began on a large scale after 1651, when frontiersmen from the English colony of Virginia began to settle in the northern half of the region, while the southern half saw the immigration of plantation owners from Barbados, who established slave plantations which cultivated cash crops such as tobacco, cotton, rice and indigo.

During the 18th century, South Carolina's capital city of Charleston became a major port in the triangular trade, and local colonists developed indigo, rice and Sea Island cotton using slave labor as export goods, transforming the colony into one of the most prosperous of the Thirteen Colonies. The colonial government of South Carolina fought several conflicts with local Indian tribes and Spanish Florida while fending off the threat of piracy. Birth rates were high and food was abundant, which offset the danger of malaria to produce rapid population growth among white South Carolinians. With the expansion of the colony's plantation economy, numerous African slaves were imported to South Carolina via the Atlantic slave trade, who comprised a majority of the population by 1708, and were integral to its development.

The colony developed a system of laws and self-government and a growing commitment to republicanism, which the Patriots feared was threatened by British policies after 1765. At the same time, men with close commercial and political ties to Great Britain tended to support the Loyalist cause when the American Revolutionary War broke out. South Carolina joined the American Revolution in 1775, but was bitterly divided between Patriots and Loyalists. British forces invaded South Carolina in 1780 and captured most of the state, but were eventually driven out.