Boom and Bust: The Rise and Fall of the Tobacco Industry in Spanish Louisiana, 1770-1790

Abstract

French royal officials, speculators such as John Law, and the French Crown itself had placed great hopes in the development of the tobacco industry in French Louisiana. Some officials even anticipated that Louisiana tobacco might someday be grown in sufficient quantities to supply all the needs of the French Tobacco Monopoly. These lofty expectations were never realized although tobacco production did reach 400,000 pounds in 1740.By the time of the transfer of the colony to Spain in 1766 the perils of war and erratic shipping had almost killed the industry. Most planters had switched to the more profitable production of indigo. Historian Jacob Price claims that the failure of the French government's efforts to develop the tobacco trade resulted from a misunderstanding about costs. In Louisiana, he writes, labor was expensive and freight dear, yet French authorities expected Louisiana tobacco to be competitive in price in the French market with Virginia tobacco, grown in an established market, with abundant labor, and much closer to Europe. Fortunately, the Spanish officials had no such illusions.