BLACK SOCIAL HITORY : SLAVERY IN MARYLAND :

The institutions of Slavery in Maryland  lasted around two hundred years and initially it developed along very similar lines to neighboring Virginia. The early settlements and population centers of the province tended to cluster around the rivers and other waterways that empty into the Chesapeake Bay as in Virginia. Maryland economy quickly became centered around the farming of tobacco for sale in Europe. The need for cheap labor to help with the growth of tobacco and later with the mixed farming economy that developed when tobacco prices collapsed led to a rapid expansion of indentured servitude and later forcible immigration and enslavement of Africans.

Maryland developed into a plantation colony by the 18th century, in 1700 about 40% of Maryland population was Black. Maryland planters also made extensive use of indentured servants and penal labor. An extensive system of rivers facilitated the movement of produce from inland plantations to the Atlantic Coast for export. Baltimore was the second most important port in the 18th century south after Charleston South Carolina. Maryland remained in the   union during the American Civil War and was no included in the Emancipation Proclamation which ended slavery. Maryland State Constitution was changed in 1867.