Pastor Alexander Hewat on Rivers, Water Carriage and Trade Competition

  Hewatt, Alexander, An Historical Account of the Rise and Progress of the Colonies of South Carolina and Georgia, Volumes I and II (1779)

 

The low country being everywhere interspersed with navigable rivers and creeks, the expense of conveying his rice to the market, which otherwise would have been intolerable, was thereby rendered easy. Having provisions from his estate to support his family, and labourers, he applies his whole staple commodities for the purposes of answering the demands of the merchant and money-lender. He expects that his annual produce will not only answer those demands against him, but also bring an addition to his capital, and enable him to extend his hand still farther in the way of improvement. Hence it happened, that in proportion as the merchants extended credit to the planters, and supplied them with labourers for their lands, the profits returned to the capital yearly according to the increased number of hands employed in cultivation. 

It is no easy thing to enumerate all the advantages of water carriage to a fruitful and commercial province. The lands are rendered more valuable by being situated on navigable creeks and rivers. The planters who live fifty miles from the capital, are at little more expense in sending their provisions and produce to its market, than those who live within five miles of it. The town is supplied with plenty of provisions, and its neighbourhood prevented from enjoying a monopoly of its market. 

By this general and unlimited competition the price of provisions is kept low, and while the money arising from them circulates equally and universally through the country, it contributes, in return, to its improvement. The planters have not only water carriage to the market for their staple commodities, but on their arrival the merchant again commits them to the general tide of commerce, and receives in return what the world affords profitable to himself, and useful to the country in which he lives. Hence it happened, that no town was better supplied than Charlestown with all the necessaries, conveniencies, and luxuries of life.