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diff --git a/28555.txt b/28555.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..0e9b362 --- /dev/null +++ b/28555.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2378 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Virginia Company Of London, 1606-1624, by +Wesley Frank Craven + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Virginia Company Of London, 1606-1624 + +Author: Wesley Frank Craven + +Release Date: April 11, 2009 [EBook #28555] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VIRGINIA COMPANY OF LONDON *** + + + + +Produced by Mark C. Orton, Diane Monico, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + + + +THE VIRGINIA COMPANY OF +LONDON, 1606-1624 + + + + +COPYRIGHT(C), 1957 BY +VIRGINIA 350TH ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATION +CORPORATION, WILLIAMSBURG, VIRGINIA + +Second Printing, 1959 + +Third Printing, 1964 + + +[Transcriber's Note: Extensive research did not uncover any evidence +that the U. S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] + + +Jamestown 350th Anniversary +Historical Booklet Number 5 + + + + +THE VIRGINIA COMPANY OF LONDON, 1606-1624 + + +This is the story of the Virginia Company and only indirectly of the +Virginia colony. Those who seek an account of the early years at +Jamestown should turn to another number in this same series. Here the +focus belongs to the adventurers in England whose hopes gave shape to +the settlement at Jamestown, and whose determination brought the colony +through the many disappointments of its first years. In terms of time, +the story is short, for it begins with the granting of the first +Virginia charter in 1606 and ends with the dissolution of the company +in 1624. It thus covers a period of only eighteen years, but during +these years England's interest in North America was so largely +expressed through the agency of the Virginia Company that its story +constitutes one of the more significant chapters in the history both of +the United States and of the British Empire. + +In the beginning there were two companies of the Virginia adventurers, +the one having its headquarters in London and the other in the western +outport of Plymouth. Englishmen at that time used the name Virginia to +designate the full sweep of the North American coast that lay above +Spanish Florida. In the original Virginia charter the adventurers were +granted rights of exploration, trade, and settlement on the "Coast of +Virginia or America" within limits that reached from 34 deg. of latitude +in the south to 45 deg. in the north, which is to say from the mouth of +the Cape Fear River in lower North Carolina to a point midway through the +modern state of Maine. The Plymouth grantees had a primary interest in +the northern area that Captain John Smith would later name New England, +and there they established a colony at Sagadahoc in August 1607, only a +few weeks after the settlement of Jamestown. But the colony barely +survived the winter, and was abandoned in the spring of 1608. +Thereafter, the Plymouth adventurers gave up. In contrast, the London +adventurers persisted, and their persistence served to tie the name of +Virginia increasingly to them and to their more southerly settlement. +As a result, the London adventurers became in common usage the Virginia +adventurers, their company the Virginia Company, and their colony +Virginia. + +The Virginia colony was especially fortunate in having the backing of +London. Indeed, it may not be too much to suggest that the chief +difference between the stories of Roanoke Island and of Jamestown was +the difference that London made. Consistently, the leadership of +Elizabethan adventures to North America, including those of Gilbert and +Raleigh, had come from the western counties and outports of England, +and with equal consistency hopeful projects had foundered on the +inadequacy of their financial support while London favored other +ventures--to Muscovy, to the Levant, and more recently to the East +Indies. It was not merely that London had the necessary capital and +credit for a sustained effort; it also had experience in the management +of large and distant ventures, such as those of the East India Company +over which Sir Thomas Smith presided, as he would preside through many +years over the Virginia Company. London had too the advantage of its +proximity to the seat of government in nearby Westminster, where King +James had his residence, where the highest courts of the realm sat +periodically, and where England's parliament customarily met. Already, +in 1606, it was possible to trace in the immediate environs of the +ancient City of London, itself still medieval in appearance and in the +organization of much of its life, the broad outlines of the great +metropolis that has been increasingly the focal point of England's +development as a modern state. + +In thus emphasizing the importance of London to the early history of +Virginia, one runs the risk of misrepresenting the true character of +the Virginia adventure. Contrary to the impression that will be gained +from many of our modern textbooks, the Virginia Company represented +much more than the commercial interests of the port of London. Its +membership included many gentlemen and noblemen of consequence in the +kingdom. Some of them, no doubt, became subscribers to a Virginia +joint-stock for the same reason that often led members of the landed +classes in England into commercial ventures. But others, quite +evidently, subscribed because of a sense of public responsibility, or +simply because skilfully managed propaganda had put pressure on them to +accept a responsibility of social or political position. For the +Virginia adventure was a public undertaking, its aim to advance the +fortunes of England no less than the fortunes of the adventurers +themselves. + +It would be helpful if we knew more about the original Virginia +adventurers than we do. The records are so incomplete as to make +impossible anything approaching a full list of the first subscribers. +However, enough is known to suggest the broad range of experience and +interest belonging to those who now joined in a common effort to build +an empire for England in America. The original charter of 1606 lists +only eight of the adventurers by name, they being the ones in whose +names the petition for the charter had been made. This list omits Sir +John Popham, Lord Chief Justice of the Kings Bench, who may well have +been the prime mover in the enterprise, and Sir Thomas Smith, who was +an active leader from an early date. Four of the eight men listed are +identified as belonging to the London group. Sir Thomas Gates was a +soldier and veteran of campaigns in the Netherlands who would later +serve as the colony's governor. Sir George Somers had led many attacks +against Spanish possessions in Queen Elizabeth's day, was a member of +parliament, and would meet his death four years later in Bermuda while +on a mission of rescue for Virginia. Edward Maria Wingfield was another +soldier who had fought in the Netherlands. He belonged to a family +which had acquired extensive estates in Ireland, and he too would go to +Virginia, where he served as first president of the colony's council. +The most interesting of the four was Richard Hakluyt, a clergyman whose +chief mission in life had been the encouragement of overseas adventures +by his fellow countrymen. To them he had literally given a national +tradition of adventure by compiling and editing one of the more +influential books in England's history--_The Principall Navigations, +Voyages, and Discoveries of the English Nation_, whose reading, in +Michael Drayton's words, inflamed "Men to seeke fame." Hakluyt had been +advisor to both Gilbert and Raleigh in their ventures, and since then +he had consistently promoted the idea that England might best find in +North America the opportunities that were needed for her prosperity and +her security. + +A significant indication of the extent to which the public interest was +considered to be involved in the Virginia project is found in the +provision that was first made for the government of the two colonies. +The powers of government, which is to say the ultimate right to decide +and to direct, were vested in a royal council, commonly known as the +Virginia Council and having its seat in London. Its membership was +probably drawn exclusively from the two groups of Virginia adventurers, +but the members were appointed by the king and were sworn to his +special service. Among the first members were Sir Thomas Smith, chief +of the London merchants; Sir William Wade, lieutenant of the London +Tower; Sir Walter Cope, member of parliament for Westminster and +adventurer in a variety of overseas enterprises; Sir Henry Montague, +recorder of the City of London; Solicitor General John Doderidge, +subsequently justice of the Kings Bench; Sir Ferdinando Gorges, who +later would lead a reviving interest in the settlement of New England +and still later would become an enemy of the Puritans who so largely +accomplished that task; Sir Francis Popham, son and heir to the Lord +Chief Justice; and John Eldred of London, Thomas James of Bristol, and +James Bagge of Plymouth, each of these three being described as a +merchant. This assignment of the powers of government proved to be +awkward, and it denied the adventurers direct control over the more +important questions affecting their adventures, as in the choice of a +plan of government for the colony or in the appointment of its key +officers. Consequently, the adventurers secured a change in the second +Virginia charter, granted in 1609. It was then specified that members +of the council thereafter should be "nominated, chosen, continued, +displaced, changed, altered and supplied, as death, or other several +occasions shall require, out of the Company of the said Adventurers, by +the voice of the greater part of the said Company and Adventurers, in +their Assembly for that purpose." In language less repetitious than +that used by the company's lawyer, this meant that the council now +became an agent primarily of the adventurers. Even so, the king +retained a veto over any choice they might make, for members of the +council were still required to take a special oath administered by one +of the high officers of state, and refusal to give the oath could mean +disqualification for the office. The company's later history would +show, whatever its legal advisor may have assumed in 1609, that this +requirement was no mere formality. + +It is not easy for the modern American to read with full assurance the +scanty record of Virginia's first years. How, for example, should he +interpret the suggestion at the beginning of the first charter that the +adventurers sought chiefly to propagate the "Christian Religion to such +people, as yet live in darkness and miserable ignorance of the true +knowledge and worship of God?" It is simple enough to point out that +the first adventurers in Jamestown showed very little of the +missionary's spirit, that they included only one minister, and that he +had enough to do in ministering to the English settlers. It is also +easy to draw an obvious contrast between the dedicated missionaries who +so frequently formed the vanguard of Spanish and French settlement in +America and the adventurous and often unruly men who first settled +Virginia. In the absence of immediate and continuing missionary +endeavors, one is naturally inclined to dismiss professions of a +purpose to convert the Indian as nothing more than a necessary gesture +toward convention in an age that was still much closer to the medieval +period than to our own. And yet, on second thought, one begins to +wonder just how sophisticated such a conclusion may be. He remembers +how deep was the rift between Protestantism and Catholicism at that +time, how fundamental to the patriotism of an Englishman was his long +defense of a Protestant church settlement against the threat of +Catholic Spain, and how largely the issues of religious life still +claimed the first thoughts of men. He then may feel inclined to observe +that the English adventurers, after all, did undertake to establish a +mission in Virginia at a relatively early date. True, ten years elapsed +before the effort to provide a school and college for the Indians had +its beginning, but these were years of a continuing struggle for the +very life of the colony itself. In the circumstances, perhaps ten years +should be viewed as a short time. + +Be that as it may, there are other questions that have been even more +bothersome, if only because they have seemed more pertinent to the +modern interest in Virginia's history. The American has been accustomed +to view the Virginia colony as the first permanent settlement in his +country, as the point at which his own history has its beginning, but +he finds in the Jamestown colony a pattern of activity somewhat +different from that he associates with the later development of the +country. What kind of a colony was it? Was it really a colony? Just +what were the adventurers trying to accomplish in Virginia? Were they +actually interested in colonization, in the proper sense of the term, +or were their objectives commercial? These and other such questions +have claimed much of the attention of those who have sought to +interpret for their fellow countrymen the early history of Virginia. +The difficulty arises partly from the American's insistence that the +later history of his country be taken as the standard for judging +every action of the first adventurers, and partly from a failure to +appreciate the extent to which the earlier ventures in Virginia were +necessarily exploratory in character. + +If one of us could ask the adventurers in 1606 what it was they hoped +to accomplish in America, he probably would be told that it depended +very much on what they might find there. Although Richard Hakluyt had +been most industrious in collecting available information from the +earlier explorations of North America, including those by Spanish and +French explorers, the specific information at hand was quite definitely +limited. By the close of the sixteenth century European explorers had +charted the broad outlines of the North American coast, and here and +there they had filled in much of the detail, as had the French in +Canada, the Spaniard and the Frenchman on the coast of Florida, and the +Englishman along the coastal regions to be later known as Carolina and +New England. But the information at the command of the adventurers in +one country was not always available to those of another; indeed, +within any one country there were shipmasters who carried in their +heads working charts of coastal waters wholly unknown to the +geographers and cartographers who sought to serve the larger interests +of the nation. Thus the London adventurers in 1606, though having at +hand a substantial body of useful information regarding the coasts, the +winds, and the currents running northward from the West Indies past St. +Augustine to Cape Hatteras, and comparable information regarding the +more northern waters explored by Frobisher, Davis, Gilbert, and others, +had only a sketchy knowledge of the intervening coastline that would +soon be explored by Captain Samuel Argall on commission from the +Virginia Company and by Henry Hudson, an Englishman temporarily in the +service of Dutch merchants. Even Chesapeake Bay, to which the London +adventurers dispatched their first expedition, was known to them +chiefly by the reports of Indians interrogated by Raleigh's agents as +they worked out from Roanoke Island. The first colonists in Virginia +gave to London detailed information regarding the lower Chesapeake and +the James River, but not until 1608 did Captain John Smith find the +time to explore the upper reaches of the bay and to identify the great +rivers emptying into it there. It hardly seems necessary to argue the +utility of such explorations, to which eloquent testimony exists in the +new bounds immediately fixed for the colony in the second charter. But +many have been the attempts to pass judgment on the success or failure +of the first settlers at Jamestown that have been written as though +their primary assignment had not been to explore. + +Exploration and fortification--these two terms are consistently linked +in the papers on which the early English adventurers jotted notes for +their guidance or for the instruction of their agents in America. The +very first objective of the explorers was to locate a suitable site for +fortification, in order that further explorations might be conducted +from a secure base. The fortifications to be raised had to meet +exacting standards, such as would be approved by the military engineers +with whom the adventurers consulted along with the geographers, the +cartographers, and the shipmasters who also possessed useful +information. For these fortifications were intended to provide security +not so much against the native Indian as against the ships and soldiers +of Spain. Over the years there had been some debate as to how the fort +might be best located, with the result that in 1607 it was decided to +locate it some distance up a river that would afford navigation for an +ocean-going vessel but would force the enemy to fight his way inland +against the disadvantage of the warning that could be given by an outer +guard at the mouth of the river. Such were the considerations that +shaped the choice of Jamestown as the site of the first permanent +English settlement in North America. To stand in the middle of the +Jamestown peninsula for contemplation of its many disadvantages for the +purposes of agricultural settlement, and even for the health of its +people, is to lose sight of the main point. One should walk over +against the river, and consider there the field of fire that was open +for well placed guns. + +And just what was the Jamestown fort supposed to guard? Was it the few +acres of the modern county of James City, or the right of Englishmen to +possess the Virginia peninsula, where so much of importance to our +national history has found its place? Not at all. It was the right of +Englishmen to be in North America, to fish the waters that lay off its +coast, to trade with its inhabitants, and to exploit such other +opportunities as an unexplored and undeveloped continent might offer. +How far these opportunities might lead no one could tell in +advance--perhaps even to China. + +A trade with China had been a major objective of English adventure +since the middle of the sixteenth century, when the Muscovy Company had +had its origins in an attempt to find a northeast passage around the +Scandinavian peninsula leading to Cathay--Marco Polo's fabulous kingdom +of northern China. The explorers found instead a profitable trade with +the territories of Ivan the Terrible, but the Muscovy merchants +continued to support a variety of ventures seeking the establishment of +an Oriental trade. Their agents looked into the possibilities of an +overland trade through Russia to Cathay, and experimented none too +profitably with a trans-Russia trade with Persia. They gave their +support to renewed attempts to find a northeast passage and claimed a +right of license for the numerous efforts that were made in Elizabeth's +reign to find a northwest passage around or through North America. +Failing in these efforts, the English merchants finally had challenged +Portugal's monopoly of trade with the East Indies by way of the Cape of +Good Hope. The East India Company, chartered by Elizabeth in 1600, had +gotten off to a good start, and was destined to become one of the great +empire builders of Britain's history. In 1606, however, the East India +merchants had had just enough experience with the new trade to begin to +appreciate some of its difficulties, as in the need to employ larger +and more expensive ships than were standard in England's maritime trade +and the great distance to China by way of the Cape of Good Hope. +Perhaps, after all, some route through America might have the advantage +over the Cape route. In the opinion of the late Sir William Foster, +through many years historiographer of the India Office, this was a +chief reason for the interest Sir Thomas Smith took in Virginia. + +Let it be noted that Sir Thomas' interest in Virginia outlasted the +hope that a successful search for a passage to China might be based on +Jamestown. Nevertheless, the point may help to explain the marked +emphasis on this hope that one finds at the beginning of the project. +Instructions to the first expedition directed the choice of a seat on +some navigable river, and added, "if you happen to discover divers +portable rivers, and mongst them any one that hath two main branches, +if the difference be not great make choice of that which bendeth most +toward the North-West, for that way you shall soonest find the other +sea." The other sea, of course, was the Pacific, or as Englishmen were +likely to say, the South Seas, whose waters also washed the shores of +China. Vain as was this hope of trade with the Orient through America, +it was destined for survival, in one form or another, through many +years. As late as the middle of the nineteenth century, it would be a +principal argument for the construction of a trans-continental railway. + +In 1606 the supposition was that the river system of North America +might be like that of Russia, where easy portages joining rivers +flowing in different directions made it possible to travel, most of the +way by boat, from the north to the south of the country and return. +"You must observe," advised the adventurers, "whether the river on +which you plant doth spring out of mountains or out of lakes; if it be +out of any lake, the passage to the other sea will be the more easy, +and [it] is like enough that out of the same lake you shall find some +spring which runs the contrary way toward the East India Sea; for the +great and famous rivers of Volga, Tanis and Dwina have three heads +near joynd, and yet the one falleth into the Caspian Sea, the other +into the Euxine Sea, and the third into the Polonian Sea." For this +information, the Virginia adventurers were indebted to the Muscovy +Company, with which Captain Christopher Newport, who commanded the +ships dispatched to Virginia, had formerly served. It was a good enough +working theory, based partly on knowledge of the geography of Russia +and partly on interrogation of the Indians in Carolina by Raleigh's +men. And the rivers of that part of North America which lies east of +the Mississippi form just such a system as the Virginia adventurers +envisaged, except for the fact that the Ohio and other westward flowing +streams do not empty into the Pacific. + +The modern American has usually looked upon such a venture as this as +something distinctly apart from an agricultural type of endeavor, but +there is good reason for believing that the London adventurers took a +different view. They understood the dependence of agriculture upon an +opportunity to market its products, and they considered the success of +their commercial ventures to be the surest and the quickest way of +providing easy access to a market. If a new and practicable route to +China could be found in America, any colony located close at hand to +the portage along which the goods of the Orient were moved for +transshipment to England would find a ready market for food and other +provisions by supplying the ships engaged in a highly profitable trade. +More than that, the plenty and the regularity of this shipping would +provide easy freightage for the encouragement of a variety of +agricultural and horticultural experiments looking to the production of +such commodities as sugar, ginger, wine, or vegetable dyes and oils. +The adventurers well understood the advantage to be gained by +duplicating the success previously won by the Portuguese and Spaniards +with such experiments in the Azores, in Madeira, in the Canaries, and +more recently in the West Indies. + +To put the point briefly, Virginia was founded upon many different +hopes for profitable undertakings--some of them commercial, some +agricultural, and some industrial. The records show an early interest +in several extractive industries, including mining, not just for gold +but for copper and iron as well. First instructions for trade with the +native Indians reveal an immediate concern for the establishment of +good relations with them and for laying in a good stock of Indian corn +as a food reserve, but they show too a concern for the policies that +would shape the development of a wider trade. Provision in the charter, +and in the instructions of the royal council, for the creation of +individual estates according to the laws and customs of England, not to +mention the guarantee of full legal rights for the inhabitants of the +colony and for their children, leave no more room for speculation as to +the intended permanence of the settlement than there is doubt as to the +expected diversity of its economic activity. But for the time being, +first things must take first place. Until it had been demonstrated that +Virginia could provide profitable freightage for the ships of England, +her future rested upon an insecure foundation. Hence, the initial +emphasis on the type of activity which promised the more immediate or +the greater return. + +Newport's fleet of the _Susan Constant_, the _Godspeed_, and the +_Discovery_ sailed for Virginia in December 1606. While the adventurers +waited for his return and report on the first discoveries, the Spanish +ambassador excitedly reported to Spain that the English intended to +send two vessels to Virginia each month until "they have 2,000 men in +that country." Actually the plan seems to have been quite different. +Lord Chancellor Egerton is reported to have declared in 1609: "We ... +thought at first we would send people there little by little." Whatever +the plan, this was the practice. Newport's total complement in the +first fleet was 160 men of whom 104 remained in the colony. He was back +at Plymouth by late July 1607, and from Plymouth he came on to London +in August. For cargo he carried clapboard, and his sailors had picked +up so much sassafras root that the leaders of the colony feared that +the market for this established staple of the American trade might be +ruined. He brought with him also ore which he hoped an assay would +prove to be gold, and he declared the country to be rich in copper. +With some exaggeration, he announced explorations "into the country +near two hundred miles" and the discovery of "a river navigable for +great shippes one hundred and fifty miles." The adventurers responded +by sending him out again, in October 1607, with 120 prospective +settlers and what would be greeted in Jamestown as the first supply. + +All told, Captain Newport would make five round trips between England +and Virginia before ending a career that included service of the +Muscovy Company by dying on the island of Java as an agent of the East +India Company. He has found no important place in the American +tradition, partly because Captain John Smith, the Virginia colony's +first historian, took care to see that Captain Newport did not have a +hero's role. But those of us who would understand the context in which +our history first developed will do well to consider the career of +Christopher Newport. + +In carrying out the second supply, which reached Jamestown in September +1608, Newport had aboard 70 new colonists, including two women and +eight Polish and German experts in the manufacture of glass, tar, +pitch, and soap ashes. He had a broad commission for completing the +exploration of the James River above the falls that much later would +fix the site of Richmond, and for determining the fate of Raleigh's +lost colony. He found no answer to that riddle, which remains to our +own day an intriguing mystery; indeed, he seems not to have found the +time for any real investigation of the problem. As a result, he brought +back only rumors of four survivors living on the Chowan River. The +instruction gains its chief interest from the suggestion it conveys of +a renewed interest on the part of the adventurers in the area +previously explored by Raleigh's men. Perhaps the adventurers +anticipated the further disappointments resulting from the additional +exploration of the James, and so thought again of the Roanoke River, +which Captain Ralph Lane had partly explored in 1585 and 1586 with the +hope that it might lead to China. Perhaps they had an eye mainly for +the publicity that could be had for any news of Raleigh's colonists. +Whatever the fact, a renewed interest in the Carolina region would find +very concrete expression in a new charter the adventurers secured +shortly after Newport's return to England in January 1609. + +The actual bounds of the Jamestown colony under the first Virginia +charter ran 100 miles along the coast and 100 miles inland from the +coast. This, at any rate, was the area to which title was promised by +the charter. The second charter gave title to an area reaching 200 +miles both northward and southward along the coast from Point Comfort, +at the mouth of the James, and "up into the Land throughout from Sea to +Sea, West and Northwest." In these greatly enlarged bounds one +immediately detects three major interests: (1) a desire to control the +entire extent of any passage that might be found to the South Seas, (2) +the hope that something might be accomplished in Carolina, and (3) the +need for a title to the whole of the Chesapeake, whose exploration had +been completed by Captain John Smith in the preceding summer. In this +exploration Captain Smith had pointed the way for the colony's later +expansion, but at the moment the adventurers seem to have viewed the +Chesapeake as having value chiefly for its fish and trade and for +further exploration. Dissatisfied with Jamestown, as a place that was +both unhealthy and exposed to attack from the sea, they advised Sir +Thomas Gates, on the eve of his departure for Virginia in the spring of +1609 as the newly appointed lieutenant governor of the colony, to move +his principal city above the falls on the James, where he would enjoy +every advantage in an attack by a European foe, or better still, that +he locate it on the Chowan River in modern North Carolina, "foure +dayes Journey from your forte Southewards." In an earlier passage of +his instructions, he had already been advised that he should be guided +by the general principle of seeking the sun, "which is under God the +first cause both of health and Riches." + +Those who bother to read Gates' instructions will notice the emphasis +they place on the choice of a _principal_ seat. There were to be other +towns, and Jamestown would be kept as the chief port of entry, though +not as the site of the main magazine and storehouse. All told, perhaps +three "habitations" would be enough for the settlers now to be +transported. Their number was nothing less than 600 persons, men, +women, and children--more than all the men who had been sent to +Virginia in the preceding two years. If the reported statement of Lord +Chancellor Egerton be accepted, the adventurers after two years of +exploratory effort had come to feel that "the proper thing is to +fortify ourselves all at once, because when they will open their eyes +in Spain they will not be able to help it, and even tho' they may hear +it, they are just now so poor that they will have no means to prevent +us from carrying out our plan." It was indeed a poor year for Spain, +which in 1609 had to agree to a truce in the long struggle with the +Dutch that ultimately brought legal recognition of the independence of +Holland. This was the year which also witnessed the exploration by +Henry Hudson of the river that has ever since borne his name, a river +on which the Dutch would soon lay the foundations of a shortlived North +American empire. Only the year before had the French built their fort +at Quebec. And now the English were determined to fortify Virginia "all +at once." A once proud monopoly of the new world, and of its +opportunities, was to be finally broken. + +The London to which Newport returned late in January, 1609, was already +astir with preparations for an adventure such as England had never seen +before. He sat in consultation with Sir Thomas Smith, as did Richard +Hakluyt, and Thomas Hariot, who as a young man just out of Oxford had +gone to Roanoke Island for Raleigh in 1585, and whose _True Report of +Virginia_, published in 1588, still remained a chief dependence of the +London adventurers. Hakluyt was preparing for publication a translation +of the Gentleman of Elva's account of De Soto's expedition through the +southeastern part of the later United States, an account published in +April as _Virginia Richly Valued_. To this he added in June a +translation from Marc Lescarbot's _Histoire de la Nouvelle-France_ for +the purpose of demonstrating that Virginia "must be far better by +reason it stands more southerly nearer to the sun." Broadsides +scattered about London announced the special opportunities awaiting +those who would join in the new venture, while clergymen in their +pulpits lent the aid of divine sanction, as in Robert Gray's _Good +Speed to Virginia_. The broad outlines of the new plan had been +presented to the public in February by Alderman Robert Johnson in a +tract entitled _Nova Britannia: Offering Most Excellent Fruites by +Planting in Virginia_. By the end of that month the adventurers had +also completed negotiations for the granting of the second charter, and +had opened their books for subscription to a new joint-stock fund. + +The device of the joint-stock fund had been increasingly relied upon by +English adventurers as they sought the means for financing more distant +and more expensive ventures. It had the advantage of pooling the +resources of more than one individual, and of distributing the risk, +and the Virginia adventure had depended upon joint-stock methods of +finance from the beginning. It is impossible to speak with exactness +regarding the financial arrangements of the first years. A provision in +the first instructions directing the settlers to live, work, and trade +together in a common stock through a period of five years suggests the +possibility of a five-year terminable stock, i.e., a fund that would be +invested and reinvested through a term of five years before it was +divided, together with the earnings thereon. But other evidence +indicates that there may have been a separate stock for each of +Newport's voyages, as was the case with each of the early voyages of +the East India Company to the Orient. The so-called joint-stock company +of that day rarely had a permanent joint-stock of the sort identified +with the modern corporation. Instead, it functioned as a governing body +representing all of the merchants engaged in a particular trade, who +traded individually or through a variety of joint-stocks invested under +the general regulation of the company. And such was the character of +the Virginia Company. + +Whatever may have been the specific terms offered earlier investors, +those offered in 1609 are clear enough. It was proposed that men +subscribe at the rate of L12 10s. per share to a common stock that +would be invested and reinvested over the term of the next seven years. +Although special good fortune might justify a dividend of some part of +the earnings at an earlier date, there would be no final dividend, +which at that time meant a division of capital as well as the earnings +thereof, until 1616. The dividend promised then would include a grant +of land in Virginia as well as a return of the capital with profit. How +much land depended, like the profit, on the degree of success that had +attended the venture meantime. + +One of the inducements for subscription was a promise that all +adventurers would have a voice in determining the policies of the +company. Again, it is impossible to say just what had been the +organization through which the adventurers had previously functioned. +They probably followed custom by meeting in assemblies or courts (both +terms were common) when some joint decision was needed, and no doubt +they relied on the designation of such committees and officers as were +necessary for the execution of decisions reached in their assembly. It +may be that the adventurers sitting on the Virginia Council functioned +also in the character of an executive committee for their fellows. In +view of the well known tendency for institutions to evolve out of +earlier practices, with such adjustments as experience may dictate, +there is reason for believing that important features of the +organization outlined in the second charter were older than the charter +itself. But the charter of 1609 offers the first unmistakable evidence +as to the organization upon which the adventurers depended. + +They were there incorporated by the name of "The Treasurer and Company +of Adventurers and Planters of the City of London, for the first Colony +in Virginia." Sir Thomas Smith was designated treasurer with power to +warn and summon the members of the council and of the company "to their +courts and meetings." The adventurers, "or the major part of them which +shall be present and assembled for that purpose" were empowered to make +grants of land according to "the proportion of the adventurer, as to +the special service, hazard, exploit, or merit of any person so to be +recompenced, advanced, or rewarded." They were to meet also as occasion +required for the election of members of the council, which was charged +with the management of the enterprise on the ground that it was not +convenient "that all the adventurers shall be so often drawn to meet +and assemble." The members of the council were listed by name, more +than fifty of them, beginning with Henry, Earl of Southampton, and +including the Lord Mayor of London, the Lord Bishop of Bath and Wells, +Thomas, Lord De la Warr, Sir William Wade, Sir Oliver Cromwell, Sir +Francis Bacon, Sir Maurice Berkeley, Sir Thomas Gates, Sir Walter Cope, +Sir Edwin Sandys, Sir Thomas Roe, Sir Dudley Digges, John Eldred, and +John Wolstenholme. These and their colleagues of the council, which +included of course Sir Thomas Smith, were the great men of the company, +not necessarily the heaviest investors but those whose experience, or +social and political position, argued that they should be on the +managing board. In short, the subscribers had a basic right to choose +the directors of the business and to determine the division of its +rewards, but the great men would run it. + +For the assurance of the adventurers, each of them was listed by name +in the charter--all told, some 650 of them. In addition to the +individuals there named, the charter listed some fifty London companies +which had subscribed in their corporate capacity in response to the +appeals of London's clergymen and the Lord Mayor. To list all these +companies would be tedious, but some of them should be named, if only +for the picture they give of London itself. Here were "the Company of +Mercers, the Company of Grocers, the Company of Drapers, the Company of +Fishmongers, the Company of Goldsmiths, the Company of Skinners, the +Company of Merchant-Taylors, the Company of Haberdashers, the Company +of Salters, the Company of Ironmongers, the Company of Vintners, the +Company of Clothworkers, the Company of Dyers, the Company of Brewers, +the Company of Leathersellers, the Company of Pewterers, the Company of +Cutlers," and others, including the companies to which belonged the +city's cordwainers, barber-surgeons, masons, plumbers, innholders, +cooks, coopers, bricklayers, fletchers, blacksmiths, joiners, weavers, +plasterers, stationers, upholsterers, musicians, turners, and glaziers. +This was a national effort, but in a special way it was London's effort +to serve the nation in response to a call from its leaders. + +There is reason to believe that the terms of the charter had been +agreed upon by the end of February, but the document remained unsealed +until May, when all who had subscribed could be listed. By that date, +too, some 600 subjects of the king had agreed to make the adventure in +person to Virginia. Some of them were smart enough to discount the +propaganda that had persuaded them, and so they settled for the wages +offered by the company. But others agreed to go on adventure, i.e. to +accept the adventurers' offer that their personal adventure to +Virginia would be counted as one share, at the minimum, in the common +joint-stock. This was to say that they would be entitled to whatever +rewards in 1616 might belong to any subscriber in England for L12 10s.; +and if the personal adventure of the settler in Virginia was considered +to be worth more, as in the case of a surgeon or one of the high +officers of the colony, then might the rights of an adventurer in +Virginia run as high as any belonging to the great adventurers in +England. The colonists who came to America in 1609 were thus encouraged +to view themselves as being in no way inferior to those who sent them. + +Sir George Somers had been selected as admiral of the great fleet which +dropped down the Thames from London on May 15 and sailed from Plymouth +on the second of June with a full complement of nine vessels. Somers +rode aboard the _Sea Adventure_, whose master was Newport and whose +passengers included Sir Thomas Gates and William Strachey, the newly +appointed secretary of the colony. Ahead of them had gone Captain +Samuel Argall, to find a new route to Virginia running north of the +Spanish West Indies, and to make a test of the Chesapeake fisheries. +Somers guided his ships along a route that had long been familiar to +him, the route discovered by Columbus for Spain and the route that +Newport and other English adventurers had consistently followed to the +more southern parts of Virginia, but he tried to stay above the +channels regularly followed by the ships of Spain. Such, at any rate, +were his instructions, and for seven weeks out of Plymouth all went +well. But then a storm struck, no doubt an early hurricane of the sort +so familiar to residents of the east coast today, a storm which +separated the _Sea Adventure_ from the other vessels and carried it to +destruction off the coast of Bermuda. Providence brought crew and +passengers, all 150 of them, safely ashore to begin an idyll that would +be celebrated in Shakespeare's _Tempest_ and would be turned to +advantage by the adventurers in their later propaganda. In Bermuda they +found food in plenty--fish, fowl, and hogs that ran wild--and a most +healthful climate. But for almost a year Virginia would struggle +without the leadership of Somers, Newport, or Gates, and without the +sure authority of instructions and commissions they had carried aboard +the _Sea Adventure_. + +After ten months the shipwrecked colonists had fashioned from the +cedars of Bermuda, which reminded them of the cedars of Lebanon, two +small vessels named the _Patience_ and the _Deliverance_. The ships +were stoutly enough built to carry the full company to Virginia in May +1610, but at Jamestown they found only want and confusion. The other +vessels in Somers' fleet had straggled into the bay the preceding +summer with their storm-tossed passengers, but the following winter had +been a nightmare. This was the winter that was destined long to be +remembered as the starving time, the time when one man was reported +even to have eaten his wife. Only a handful of the settlers, new and +old, had survived, and Somers and Gates saw no choice but to abandon +the colony. It was saved by the providential arrival early in June of +Lord De la Warr, who brought with him 150 new colonists and a +commission as the colony's governor. Somers went back to Bermuda in the +hope of laying in a stock of pork for Virginia, but there he died and +his seamen ran for England. + +The disturbing news of these tragic events reached London piecemeal. +First came the news in the fall of 1609 that the _Sea Adventure_, with +Somers, Gates, Newport, and Strachey, had been lost. This was a severe +blow to the leaders of the company, who had planned to send De la Warr +out with perhaps as many colonists as Somers had carried. Already the +enthusiasm engendered by the promotional campaign of the preceding +spring had begun to decline, as some men took second thought. +Subscriptions at that time had been enlisted on an understanding that +they might be paid in installments, and the adventurers now often found +it difficult to collect what had been promised. During the winter they +published an extraordinarily frank promotional piece, _A True and +Sincere Declaration of the Purpose and Ends of the Plantation Begun in +Virginia_. In this pamphlet, they did the best they could to stir again +the high hopes of the preceding spring, but they had to admit what all +London knew, that the news was not encouraging. And so they appealed to +the honor of the subscribers, that they remember those in Virginia who +had staked their lives on the promises made by other men. It must be +said that the adventurers did very well indeed, in the circumstances, +to get De la Warr away in the spring with three vessels and 150 +recruits for the colony. + +Had he been able to send back a favorable report on the situation in +Virginia, the adventurers probably would have found their position not +too difficult. Instead, Sir Thomas Gates returned to London in +September 1610 with a report that caused the adventurers to consider +seriously whether the whole project should not be abandoned. Gates +himself was subsequently credited with having clinched the decision in +favor of continuance by arguing that sugar, wine, silk, iron, sturgeon, +furs, timber, rice, aniseed, and other valuable commodities could be +produced in Virginia, given the necessary time and support. The +adventurers saw also the promotional possibilities of Somers' shipwreck +at Bermuda, or rather, the remarkable experience which had followed it. +Was this not an encouraging sign of God's providential care? Of His +willingness to support the English in Virginia? This was a question +London was invited to contemplate again and again during the months +that followed. + +No doubt, the courage of a few key leaders, among whom Sir Thomas Smith +was now quite definitely the chief, had a large part in the decision to +continue. Certainly, it took courage to launch the new campaign for +funds to which the adventurers committed themselves in the fall of +1610. The estimated need ran to L30,000. All former subscribers were +urged to subscribe another L37 10s. on agreement that the subscription +would be paid in at the rate of L12 10s. per year over the next three +years. Others were invited to subscribe on the same terms. The Lord +Mayor appealed once more to the London companies, and plans were made +for inviting the other towns of England to contribute. In November the +Company published _A True Declaration of the Estate of the Colonie in +Virginia_ for the purpose of refuting "scandalous reports" tending to +discourage subscriptions. Richard Rich presented, probably at the +suggestion of the adventurers, his _Newes from Virginia, the Lost +Flocke Triumphant_, a poem celebrating the shipwreck of the _Sea +Adventure_ and the providential survival of its passengers. And to this +Silvanus Jourdan added his _Discovery of the Barmudas_, a pamphlet +recounting the experience of Somers and his colleagues in the islands. +It was written, declared the author, "for the love of my country; and +... the good of the plantation in Virginia." + +It is not so remarkable that the adventurers failed to achieve their +goal of L30,000 as that they actually secured the subscription of +approximately L18,000 by the spring of 1611. The records of the company +are so incomplete for any time prior to 1619, when the only surviving +court minutes have their beginning, that it is impossible to give the +comparative figures one would like to have. But there is evidence +suggesting that the fund raised in 1609 may not have been larger than +L10,000. If this be true, the success of this second campaign for funds +becomes all the more remarkable. One can hardly explain it in terms of +the ordinary calculations of a business community. Perhaps the +adventurers believed their own propaganda, were themselves responsive +to the kind of patriotic appeal that was made in the spring of 1610, +when they were trying to get Lord De la Warr's expedition ready. "The +eyes of all Europe," said the adventurers, "are looking upon our +endeavours to spread the Gospell among the heathen people of Virginia, +to plant an English nation there, and to settle a trade in those parts, +which may be peculiar to our nation, to the end we may thereby be +secured from being eaten out of all profits of trade by our more +industrious neighbors." + +With the new funds, the adventurers equipped two expeditions which +sailed for Virginia in the spring of 1611. The first to leave carried +300 men, in three ships, under the command of Sir Thomas Dale, another +veteran of the Netherlands fighting who had been commissioned as +marshal of the colony. It was impossible not to be impressed by the +evidence that a lack of discipline had contributed to the colony's +woes, and Dale, who sailed in March, undoubtedly was intended to draw +upon his experience as a soldier for the better discipline of the +colonists. Sir Thomas Gates, who followed Dale out in May, had a +broader task. He would continue to serve as the lieutenant governor +under Lord De la Warr, and, like Dale, he carried 300 passengers. But +his six ships also carried much more. One of the basic problems of +original colonization, though it has often been lost sight of, was to +stock the colony with cattle, hogs, poultry, etc. Later colonists, in +Maryland or Carolina, would buy these essentials in Virginia, but the +Virginia colonists had no established neighbor of their own nation on +which to rely, and during the starving time they had literally eaten +themselves out of stock. Nothing could better illustrate the fact that +the Virginia adventurers in 1611 had to begin all over again than the +100 cattle, the 200 swine, and the poultry in unspecified numbers Gates +had aboard his ships as they set their course westward. And if any one +wishes to estimate the value of a cow that had been transported across +the Atlantic, let him notice the penalty imposed by Dale's laws, so +called, for killing one. + +As Gates dropped down the Thames in May, the adventurers must have +relaxed with the satisfaction that comes from real achievement. Twice +now, within the span of two years, they had raised a great fund with +which they sent each time nine vessels and 600 colonists to Virginia. +Indeed, they had done even more. Counting Argall's ship, which sailed +ahead of Somers in the spring of 1609, and the three vessels going over +with De la Warr in 1610, the company had dispatched to Virginia no less +than 22 vessels and close to 1,400 colonists in a two year period. But +Gates had hardly cleared the coasts of England before Lord De la Warr, +of all persons, turned up in London, to the great consternation of his +fellow adventurers. + +A general assembly of the adventurers on June 25 listened to his +explanation, which was promptly published by order of the council. +The story briefly was this. Ever since he had reached Virginia +the preceding June he had suffered a succession of violent +sicknesses--fevers, the flux, gout, and finally scurvy, "till I was +upon the point to leave the world." In preference to this he left +Virginia in a vessel commanded by Argall, and in the hope that he might +recover his health with the aid of hot baths in the West Indies. +Contrary winds had forced him to alter his course to the Azores, where +oranges and lemons had cured him of the scurvy. He then resolved to +return to his post, but was persuaded to seek first a full recovery of +health "in the naturall ayre of my countrey." He deplored the ill +effects on the Virginia project of his return home, but argued that it +would have been far worse for Virginia had he remained there only to +die. + +A nice advertisement this for the healthfulness of Virginia's climate. +One might wonder at the council's decision to publish the report were +it not for the obvious fact that the alternative would have been worse +still. Some explanation had to be given the public, for the adventurers +had counted heavily on the presence of Lord De la Warr in Virginia to +offset the discouragement of earlier reports from Jamestown, as their +promotional literature amply demonstrates. He was a nobleman, the head +of a great family, and a member of His Majesty's Council for Virginia. +"Now know yee," reads the commission he had received in February 1610, +"that we his Majesties said Councell upon good advise and deliberation +and upon notice had of the wisedome, valour, circumspection, and of the +virtue and especiall sufficiencie of the Right Honourable Sir Thomas +West, Knight Lord la Warr to be in principall place of authoritie and +government in the said collonie, and finding in him the said Lord la +Warr propensness and willingness to further and advance the good of +the said plantation, by virtue of the said authoritie unto us given by +the said letters pattents have nominated, made, ordained and apointed +... the said Sir Thomas West, Knight Lord la Warr to be principall +Governor, Commander and Captain Generall both by land and sea over the +said colonie and all other collonies planted or to be planted in +Virginia or within the limits specified in his Majesties said letters +pattents and over all persons, Admiralls Vice-Admirals and other +officers and commanders whether by sea or land of what qualitie soever +for and during the term of his natural life, and do hereby ordaine and +declare that he the said Lord la Warr during his life shall be stiled +and called by the name and title of Lord Governor and Captain General +of Virginia." And now, after little more than a year and before the +subscribers to the new joint-stock fund had paid in their second +installment, the Lord Governor and Captain General of Virginia was back +in London to make a public confession that in Virginia he had nearly +died of the ague, flux, and scurvy. From time to time thereafter the +company publicly suggested that the Lord Governor might soon return to +his post, but he did not undertake to do so until 1618 and then he died +on the way. + +Once more the leaders of the company showed determination. Delinquent +subscribers were carried to court in a series of chancery actions +extending into 1614. How much was collected in this way cannot be said, +but the complaints entered in chancery have provided most helpful clues +to an understanding of the company's financial history. It seems +unlikely that anything collected as a result of these actions served to +do more than reduce an indebtedness incurred by the company in 1611 on +the promise of its subscribers. One thing is certain: there was no +chance of floating another subscription. By 1612 the adventurers were +complaining that only the name of God was more frequently profaned in +the streets and market places of London than was the name of Virginia. +After that year the Virginia lottery, its winning tickets entitling the +holder to an exchange for shares in the Virginia joint-stock, became +the company's chief dependence. Now and again there would also be found +some person who wanted to go to Virginia at his own cost, and was +willing to pay the cost in return for shares of stock guaranteeing an +ultimate title to land in the colony. These transactions, at a time +when Virginia's name had lost its magic, were perhaps too few to +suggest to any one of the adventurers that here was the future, not +only of the company, but of English colonization in North America. +Although the Virginia Company continued to be active for thirteen years +after 1611, the last of its great joint-stock funds was the one to +which men made their subscriptions just before Lord De la Warr came +home. + +To this statement perhaps a qualification should be added. Virginia at +first had been to Englishmen America itself, and so it had remained in +a very real sense, despite an obvious tendency since 1609 for the +adventurers to pin their hopes increasingly on what might be found +within the reach of Jamestown. The continuance of the Virginia +adventure became thus not simply a matter of keeping the Jamestown +colony alive. What mattered was that somewhere in North America the +great task to which the company had committed itself should go forward. +And where better, after 1611, could this be tried than in the Bermudas? +Divine providence had pointed the way, so clearly that it might even be +possible to raise the needed funds in London. Moreover, Sir George +Somers, by being shipwrecked there and subsequently by dying there, had +provided a name for the islands that was both English and suggestive of +a climate so healthful that even Lord De la Warr might prosper there. +Accordingly, the leading members of the Virginia Company in 1612 +undertook the colonization of the Somers Islands, a designation often +written as the Summer Islands, and for that purpose they subscribed to +a new joint-stock fund. The Bermuda joint-stock, however, seems to +have been a much more modest fund than that subscribed either in 1609 +or 1611. + +There was nothing unusual in thus creating within the framework of the +Virginia Company a special stock for investment under the direction of +its own officers and committees in the colonization of Bermuda. In the +great companies of London it was customary that each stock should be +separately administered. The only technical difficulty lay in the fact +that Bermuda was located outside the geographical limits granted the +Virginia adventurers. Under the second of their charters, rights at sea +(on both seas) had extended out from the coasts for only 100 miles, +which for the purposes of 1612 was not far enough. The adventurers, +therefore, sought and secured a third charter granting them rights +along the coast of Virginia, within the limits of 41 deg. and 30 deg. of +northerly latitude, to a distance of 300 leagues, in order to include +"divers Islands lying desolate and uninhabited, some of which are +already made known and discovered by the industry, travel, and expences +of the said Company, ... all and every of which it may import the said +Colony [of Virginia] both in safety and policy of trade to populate and +plant." + +This extension of bounds undoubtedly represents the chief reason for +seeking the third Virginia charter, but the leaders of the company, +while they had the opportunity, also included other significant +provisions. Especially significant was a decision to enlarge the +authority belonging to the general assembly of the adventurers. To its +former prerogatives, which had been chiefly to elect members of the +council and to determine the apportionment of lands, the third charter +added three fundamental rights: to elect all officers of either company +or colony, to admit new members to the fellowship of the company, and +to draft laws and ordinances for the welfare of the plantation. +Heretofore, the council had been the true governing body, though +subject to a right of election and displacement by the adventurers in +general assembly. Now the general court of the adventurers was to +govern, with the council as its executive agency. Since voting in the +Virginia courts, as in those of other companies at the time, was by +head rather than by share, this provision of the charter can be +interpreted only as an attempt by the great men of the company to +encourage a renewed interest on the part of the general body of +adventurers by enlarging their influence on the conduct of the +company's affairs. It was the third charter which also authorized the +establishment of the Virginia lottery--the first of many attempts in +American history to exploit the gambler's instinct for the support of a +worthy cause. In the charter the king also gave assurance that his +courts would view favorably the company's suits against delinquent +subscribers. + +[Illustration: Merchants of Virginia. + +The Company of Merchants, called _Merchants of Virginia_, _Bermudas_, +or _Summer-Ilands_, for (as I heare) all these additions are given +them. I know not the time of their incorporating neither by whom their +Armes, Supporters, and Crest were granted, and therefore am compelled +to leaue them abruptly. + +From John Stow, _Survey of London_, 1632 + +Photo by Virginia State Library.] + +[Illustration: Virginia Seal + +Courtesy Mrs. L. T. Jester and Mrs. P. W. Hiden] + +[Illustration: A Declaration for the certaine time of dravving the +great standing Lottery + +Heading for the Broadside issued by _The Virginia Company_, London, +1615 + +Photo by Virginia State Library. From photograph in Virginia Historical +Society.] + +[Illustration: Royal Exchange, London. As it was in the time of the +Virginia Company. + +Photo by New York Public Library] + +[Illustration: Captain John Smith + +From _The London Company of Virginia_ (New York and London, 1908) + +Photo by Virginia State Library.] + +[Illustration: THOMAS WEST, _Third Lord de la Warr_ + +From Alexander W. Weddell, _Virginia Historical Portraiture_ + +Photo by Virginia State Library.] + +[Illustration: SIR THOMAS SMITH (or SMYTHE) + +"The Right Worshipful Sir Thomas Smith, of London, Knight, one of his +Maiesties Councell for Virginia, and Treasurer for the Colonie, and +Gouernour of the Companies of the Moscovia and East India Merchants" + +From the Original Portrait by an Unknown Artist, now in the possession +of The Skinners' Company, London. + +From Alexander W. Weddell, _Virginia Historical Portraiture_ + +Photo by Virginia State Library.] + +[Illustration: Henry Wriothesley + +(Third Earl of Southampton) + +From the painting by Michiel Jansz van Miereveldt + +From _The London Company of Virginia_ (New York and London, 1908) + +Photo by Virginia State Library.] + +[Illustration: SIR EDWIN SANDYS + +From the Original Portrait by an Unknown Artist, now in the possession +of Sir Edmund Arthur Lechmere, Bart, Bramham Gardens, London, England + +From Alexander W. Weddell, _Virginia Historical Portraiture_ + +Photo by Virginia State Library.] + +[Illustration: Sir Thomas Dale + +Portrait by an unknown artist of the Anglo-Flemish School painted in +oils early in the 17th Century. The original portrait is preserved in +the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond, Virginia + +Photo by Virginia State Library.] + +[Illustration: HENRY STUART + +_Prince of Wales_ + +From Alexander Brown, _The Genesis of the United States_ + +Photo by Virginia State Library.] + +The new charter having received the final seal in March 1612, a new +colony was established in Bermuda in the following July. Its early +history has a double significance for the later history of Virginia. In +the first place, the Bermuda colony emphasizes the growing interest of +the adventurers in what might be produced in America as against what +might be found by way of America. The occupation of the Bermuda Islands +might almost be described as a retreat from the earlier search for a +passage to China. The move could be viewed also as a reassertion of an +old interest in plundering the Spaniard, for the Bermudas lay athwart +the homeward route of Spain's treasure fleets. But in any case the +primary interest was in America and its own peculiar opportunities, and +the attention given by the early settlers in Bermuda to experiments +with tobacco, sugar, wine, ginger, and other such commodities suggests +that their purpose was not so much to plunder the Spaniard as rather to +emulate his success as a planter in the West Indies. Secondly, the +adventurers showed a marked inclination to encourage each adventurer to +meet his own costs. Provision was made for an early survey and division +of the land, with the result that men put their money chiefly into the +development of their own estates. A final survey was not completed +until 1617, but at that date some of the Bermuda adventurers at least +had known who their tenants were and approximately where their land +would lie for three full years. Whether for these or for other reasons, +Bermuda grew while Virginia languished. By 1616 over 600 colonists had +reached the Somers Islands, where most of them survived. In contrast, +Virginia had that year 350 people. + +The Bermuda subscribers had been separately incorporated as the Somers +Island Company with its own royal charter in 1615. Indeed, ever since +1612, when the Bermuda adventurers helped to relieve the financial +embarrassment of the Virginia Company by paying L2,000 for its newly +acquired title to Bermuda, the Somers Island adventurers seem to have +functioned increasingly as a separate corporation. But the membership +of the two companies was much the same. It had been the more active and +interested of the Virginia adventurers who subscribed to the Bermuda +joint-stock in 1612, and for twelve years thereafter the active +membership of the Virginia Company came so close to duplicating the +membership of the Bermuda Company that the two bodies often met +virtually as one. Until 1619 Sir Thomas Smith served as governor of +both companies. + +The growing interest of the London adventurers after 1612 in the +colonization of Bermuda did not mean that Virginia was wholly +neglected. Funds secured from the lottery and from suits against +delinquent subscribers were enough to keep the project alive. In 1612 +the adventurers even sent out a stock of silkworms for a test of silk +production. Needless to say, returning ships brought back no silk; nor +did they bring sugar or wine. Lumber, including the valuable black +walnut, seems to have provided the chief cargo for return voyages. A +shipment of tobacco, Virginia's first, in 1614 gave some ground for +arguing that the agricultural experimentation to which the colonists +had been committed for several years now would pay off eventually. So +argued Sir Thomas Gates on his return home this same year after three +years of service in the colony, but the fact that he had come back +from Virginia apparently made more of an impression than did his +argument. Others also came home, their contracted term of service +ended, and rarely did they bring any news from Virginia which added +good to its name. Instead, they talked of the severe discipline under +which they had been forced to live, and made sport of the too hopeful +propaganda which had first persuaded them to become adventurers in +Virginia. The discipline, chiefly associated with Dale's office as +marshal, made his loyal decision to remain in the colony for another +two years as lieutenant governor a further contribution to the ill +repute of Virginia's name. + +Dale finally came home in 1616, the year in which the dividend on the +1609 joint-stock fell due. The contrast between the high hopes of 1609 +and the reality of 1616 was all too painfully apparent. Six hundred +men, women, and children had sailed for Virginia in the first of these +years under a plan to live and work together for a seven year period. +They would share, each according to his particular skill or aptitude, +in the common task of planting a colony, and they would live out of a +common store. By 1616, towns were to have been built, churches and +houses raised, and an increasing acreage brought under cultivation. A +variety of profitable crops would have been tested, and markets +established for them. The original stock of cattle would have increased +through care until there were enough for all. At the same time, the +trade with the Indians would have been put on a profitable basis, as +would have mining operations and perhaps even a trade to Cathay. Such +was the general prospect to which so many adventurers had responded in +1609. To the modern student all this seems so unrealistic as to be +almost unbelievable, but unless one grasps the reality of the original +dream he cannot hope to comprehend the extent of a later +disillusionment. + +There were no funds to be divided in 1616, but the company did declare +a dividend of land--not the 500 acres per share that Alderman Johnson +had suggested as a possibility in 1609 but the more modest total of 50 +acres. This 50 acres, however, was designated as a first dividend. +Others would follow, for an ultimate total of perhaps 200 acres per +share, as the area in the colony's "actual possession" was enlarged. +Plans were announced for dispatching a new governor to Virginia with +instructions for completing the necessary surveys, and the adventurers +were urged to seize the opportunity to gain a desirable priority in the +location of their shares by contributing L12 10s. toward meeting the +necessary costs. In return for this contribution, the adventurer would +be entitled to an additional 50 acres. The land now to be divided was +that lying along the James River, and only those adventurers who +submitted to the additional levy would be entitled to share in the +division, except apparently for adventurers then living in the colony. +These were the old planters, as they came to be called, whose rights +paralleled those of the old adventurers in England. It is evident that +the adventurers were in no position to claim a monopoly as the just +reward of their past sacrifices, for they also offered an immediate +dividend, on terms no different from those governing the rights of the +old adventurers, to any new adventurer who wished to join by paying L12 +10s. per share. Such was the estate to which the Virginia Company had +been reduced after ten years of effort. + +To employ a term that was destined to become common at a later period +of American history, the Virginia Company had become nothing more than +a land company. Its one asset was the land that had been bought with +the sacrifices of the first ten years, and after 1616 all of its plans +depended upon the hope that it might use its power to give title to +that land as an inducement for investment in the colony. In its +advertisement in 1616 adventurers, both old and new, were invited to +take up shares for occupancy by themselves or for development by +tenants sent for the purpose. Perhaps because the first response to +this appeal was disappointing, the company provided an additional +inducement in 1617 by promising 50 acres per head for every person +sent to the colony, the payment being due to the one who bore the cost. +This was the Virginia headright, as it came to be called, which was +destined to remain the chief feature of the colony's land policy +through many years after the demise of the company itself. Intended at +first to encourage the adventurers in England to send the labor that +was necessary for the development of the land, it served thereafter as +a land subsidy of the immigration on which the colony lived and grew. + +By 1618 the fortunes of Virginia were taking a turn for the better. The +adventurers, or some of them at least, found encouragement in continued +shipments of tobacco. These shipments were small and the quality of the +tobacco could not be compared with the Spanish leaf of West Indian +production which was finding a growing market in London despite King +James's known disapproval of the habit on which the market grew. But +the quality of Virginia tobacco, for which Sir Thomas Smith seems to +have found a first market in the East Indies, no doubt could be +improved as the planters learned the art of its cultivation and the +adventurers found for them a better weed. No doubt, too, this success +with tobacco, whatever the imperfections of the current product, could +be viewed as a harbinger of other successful attempts to produce +commodities the Spaniard had for so long and so profitably grown in his +West Indian plantations. + +Further encouragement came from the willingness of the handful of +planters already in Virginia to remain there, and from the decision of +Ralph Hamor and Samuel Argall, both of whom had formerly served the +company in the colony, to return there. Especially significant were the +arrangements under which Hamor and Argall planned their return early in +1617. One of the problems that had undoubtedly discouraged the +adventurers from taking up the company's offer of a land grant in 1616 +was the question of the supervision that could be provided for such +tenants as they might elect to put on the land. In Bermuda, the +adventurers had found an answer, or rather thought they had, by +dividing the land into tribes, later designated as parishes, over which +a bailif would exercise an office that was partly civil and partly +traditional on the landed estates of England. In Virginia, Hamor and +Argall pointed the way to a solution by entering into an association +with several of the adventurers in England for the development of a +jointly held plantation. Thus, in January 1617, the company awarded 16 +bills of adventure to Hamor and six associates for the 16 men they +proposed to transport to Virginia at their own charge. The following +month saw a similar transaction with Captain Argall and his associates, +five adventurers who had joined with this seasoned veteran to send out +a total of 24 men. Argall went also as lieutenant governor in +succession to George Yeardley, who had been left as deputy by Dale on +his return to England in 1616, but the cost of getting the new governor +out to his post seems to have been met entirely by his own associates. +The arrangement has an obvious pertinence to an understanding of +Argall's unhappy experience as governor, for he was later charged with +neglect of the public interest through too great concern for his own +personal interests. But here the emphasis belongs to the equally +obvious fact that some of the adventurers were responding to an +opportunity to send out tenants who would work under the management and +direction of an experienced colonist. + +In 1618 George Yeardley was back in London consulting with other +adventurers, including some of the leading members of the company, who +were interested in forming associations for the development of +"particular plantations." Late in the year he sailed for the colony as +the newly designated governor of Virginia. With him he carried +instructions which record for us further developments in the company's +land policy. All adventurers, including delinquents who would pay up +their subscription, were now promised 100 acres of land on the first +dividend for each share of stock, and another 100 acres as a second +dividend after the first had been occupied. Such of the ancient +planters as had paid their own way to Virginia, which was to say those +who had settled at their own cost before Dale's departure in 1616, were +also to receive grants in like amount. The adventurers were encouraged +to pool their rights for a common grant of land by the promise that +their estate could be developed under their own management and would be +treated as a separate administrative unit for civil and military +purposes. What the company had in mind were the larger associations +already formed or on the point of being formed, such as that for the +settlement of Southampton Hundred, which eventually embraced a nominal +area of perhaps as much as 100,000 acres and in which the associated +adventurers invested a total of some L6,000. Another example is the +association of Sir William Throckmorton, Sir George Yeardley, Richard +Berkeley, George Thorpe, and John Smyth of North Nibley which early in +1619 received a first joint grant of 4,500 acres and which founded +above Jamestown the plantation known as Berkeley Hundred. These new +associations were very much the same as the association of the Virginia +adventurers which in 1612 had undertaken the colonization of Bermuda. +For the development of their common grant they pooled the necessary +capital in their own joint-stock fund and directed its investment +through their own courts, assemblies, or committees as they saw fit. +For every tenant sent to the plantation, the associated adventurers +were entitled to an additional headright of 50 acres. They were awarded +also an additional 1,500 acres for the support of public charges in the +hundred, such as those incurred for the maintenance of a church and +minister. + +How many of the colonists who migrated to Virginia between 1618 and +1624 went by agreement with such associations as these is difficult to +say, but there can be no doubt that they were a very large part of the +total. The Virginia Company, which had served theretofore as the +immediate colonizing agent, was becoming more and more a supervisory +body for the encouragement of individual and associated adventurers in +their own colonizing efforts. For itself, the company looked forward to +a continuing revenue from quitrents to be paid, at the rate of two +shillings per hundred acres after a term of seven years from the +original grant, by all save the ancient adventurers and the planters +who had migrated before 1616 at their own costs. To this revenue from +quitrents could be added the benefit to be expected from the company's +control of the colony's trade. + +As in 1609, there seems to be no doubt that all plans looked ultimately +to the establishment of individual land titles. Where the record has +survived, the associated adventurers clearly intended that their common +grant would in time be divided. In the case of Berkeley Hundred, the +evidence suggests too that the associates used the promise of a share +in this division for the recruitment of their first tenants. Yeardley's +instructions reaffirmed the company's promise of a headright in terms +inviting the migration of individual settlers at their own cost. + +To understand the plans of 1618, the modern American needs to dismiss +any idea that the isolated farm house of later America represented the +ideal toward which men looked at this time. He should think rather of +the English village community, or of the New England town, where men +lived together with the advantages of a close social relationship and +where the land they cultivated lay close at hand to the village and its +church. If the associated adventurers continued to depend for a time on +variations of the original joint-stock plan, it was not merely because +they wanted to share the risk of a still uncertain venture or because +they were seeking some useful device for meeting the problems of +management. It was also because the plantation they hoped to establish +was to have at its heart a town, and it was thought that the town could +best be built through some common effort. + +What has been said above is not intended to suggest that the company's +role after 1618 was to be purely supervisory. Although it had an +accumulated debt of some L9,000, or possibly because of this debt, the +company agreed for the encouragement of individual adventurers to +assume heavy responsibilities of leadership. It directed Yeardley to +lay out four towns, or boroughs, along the James in which grants to +individuals or the lesser associations would fall--Kecoughtan at the +mouth of the James, Henrico at the head of its navigation, and in +between Charles City and James City. From the Bermuda adventurers the +company borrowed the idea of establishing a public estate intended to +meet as nearly as possible all costs of government. In each borough +3,000 acres were to be set aside as the company's land for cultivation +by its own tenants, who would work at half shares. Out of the company's +moiety would come the support of all superior officers, excepting the +governor, for whom an additional 3,000 acres would be set aside in +James City. The company thus committed itself to a not inconsiderable +program of colonization on its own responsibility. + +One wonders what it was that inspired this renewed, and most ambitious, +venture in Virginia--a venture that would carry to Virginia over the +next five years something like 4,500 colonists. Several possibilities +can be suggested. First of all, it should be noted that the interest of +the London adventurers in the colonization of America had never +faltered, despite repeated disappointment, since they had originally +laid their hands to the task in 1606. This, at any rate, is true of the +adventurers who led, and more especially of Sir Thomas Smith. After it +had become no longer possible to push the adventure in Virginia, they +had turned to Bermuda, where an initial success seems to have +encouraged another try in Virginia. The plans adopted for Bermuda and +later for Virginia indicate that the adventurers shrewdly capitalized +on the desire of Englishmen in many different walks of life for title +to the undeveloped lands of America. A newly stirring missionary +impulse had its part to play, if only by giving to the name of Virginia +more helpful associations. Argall had captured Pocahontas, the favored +daughter of Powhatan, and with her as hostage the colonists had forced +a peace with a heretofore implacable foe. More than that John Rolfe had +married the Princess Pocahontas, as the English liked to call her, and +Sir Thomas Dale as his last major service to the colony had brought her +to England in 1616. In London, at court, and elsewhere, she and her +entourage of Indian maidens had been a most effective advertisement of +Virginia. Even after her own death in 1617, her maiden consorts had +stayed on for many months before being finally returned to Virginia by +way of Bermuda. Since 1613 the Virginia Company had leaned heavily on +the missionary appeal in its efforts to encourage continued support of +the colony, and it may well have been the company itself which prompted +the bishops of the Church of England in the year of Pocahontas' death +to sponsor a collection of funds for an Indian mission in Virginia. In +any case, the approximately L1,500 raised for the purpose were turned +over to the company, which in 1618 ordered Yeardley to set aside 10,000 +acres at Henrico for the support of an Indian college. + +The adventurers in 1618 also decreed certain legal and political +reforms that were helpful in giving Virginia a better name than it had +enjoyed for several years past. Disgruntled colonists returning from +Jamestown had brought exaggerated stories of Dale's discipline, with +the result that Virginia had gained the reputation almost of a penal +colony. The company's renewed guarantee that the settlers would enjoy +the full common law rights of Englishmen at home was coupled with +provision for a general assembly of the colonists, a body which first +met at Jamestown in 1619. In short, the company had the benefit in +1618, as so frequently in the past, of leadership of the highest +quality. + +Sir Thomas Smith was still the governor of the company in 1618, and +without question his leadership must be considered to be a major factor +shaping the new life then being infused into the colony. But a +factional strife that would soon help to destroy the company already +had made its appearance. The sources of this factionalism were varied, +and some of them had little to do with the affairs of Virginia. Thus, +at this time Sir Thomas found a determined enemy in the Rich family, +headed by the wealthy Earl of Warwick and represented most ably by Sir +Nathaniel Rich, who for many years was an active leader in the House of +Commons. Warwick had a way of investing in voyages which bordered +closely on piracy, and as a result of one such investment had become +involved in a long and bitter conflict with Smith as the governor of +the East India Company. Unquestionably of more fundamental importance +was a growing opposition to Smith that was based upon discontent with +the former management of the Virginia project. It seems almost as +though the Virginia adventurers, before they could place full +confidence in the new program for the colony's development, had to find +some more satisfying explanation for the company's previous failures by +charging gross mismanagement of its affairs. Such, at any rate, was the +conviction to which many adventurers came, chiefly it would seem the +lesser adventurers who were easily prejudiced against the great +merchants of London, of whom Sir Thomas was the chief. In a company +where the ultimate power to decide had been vested since 1612 in a +general assembly of the adventurers voting by head rather than by +share, the discontent of the lesser adventurers could become under the +guidance of an effective leader a very potent force. + +The leader was found in Sir Edwin Sandys, one of the ablest +parliamentarians of seventeenth century England. Sandys himself was not +one of the lesser adventurers. He had been a member of the Virginia +Council since 1607, and in 1611 he had responded to the company's +appeal for a subscription of L37 10s. by subscribing double that +amount, thereby matching the subscription of Sir Thomas Smith. With the +aid of other prominent adventurers, including the Earl of Southampton, +and by making common cause for the moment with the Rich faction, Sir +Edwin won election to the governorship of the company in the spring of +1619. In the absence of anything approaching a full record, it is +impossible to say what justification there may have been for the +charges of mismanagement that were brought against Smith's +administration. It would not be surprising if over the long and +frequently discouraging years of his leadership, and especially in the +period since 1612, some irregularities, some carelessness had crept +into the conduct of the company's business. A very noticeable result of +Sandys' election was an effort to systematize the company's procedures +by adoption of new standing orders and regulations, and to bring order +out of an alleged confusion of the company's records, especially those +pertaining to the rights of the adventurers to land in Virginia. But it +is possible to speak with full assurance on only one point: no other of +the adventurers had shown more courage or more devotion to the colony, +no other of them deserves to be better remembered than Sir Thomas +Smith. + +There can be no question, however, that the reviving interest in +Virginia received an additional stimulant from the fact that the +business now had a new management. At the close of 1618, and largely as +the result of emigration during that year, the population of the colony +stood at approximately 1,000 persons. During the year after Sandys' +election, a total of 1,261 emigrants left England for Virginia, over +800 of them at the company's charge. This substantial evidence of the +company's determination to assume the lead encouraged additional +associations of adventurers to take up patents for their own +plantations, with the result that by the summer of 1622 the council +could announce that over 3,500 people had migrated to Virginia since +the spring of 1619. This was a remarkable record, testifying to the +very great gifts Sir Edwin possessed as a leader and the confidence men +placed in his leadership. + +The minutes of the company's courts have survived for the period after +the election of Sandys, and so it is possible to get a clearer picture +of the company's organization and procedures than can be had for any +earlier date. Further help comes from the "Orders and Constitutions" +drawn up after Sandys' election and published in 1620 as part of a +pamphlet skilfully written to convey the impression that Virginia's +affairs were then being managed much better than in the past. The +company depended basically upon decisions reached in four great quarter +courts, which were general assemblies of all the adventurers who wished +to attend and which were scheduled for regular meeting on next to the +last Wednesday of each of the quarterly terms in which the king's +courts sat at Westminster. Only a quarter court could elect officers, +either of the colony or of the company, enact laws and ordinances, or +determine policies governing the distribution of lands in the colony +and the conduct of its trade. On the Monday preceding each meeting of +the quarter court, a preparatory court would settle the agenda for the +following Wednesday, in order that the members might have warning of +the business to be taken up at that time. Each fortnight, except in the +"long vacations" between court terms, an ordinary court would meet, +again on Wednesday, with a quorum that required the presence of at +least five members of the council, the treasurer or his deputy, and +"fifteene of the generality." The hour of meeting for all courts was 2 +P.M., and at no court could a question be put after 6 P.M. A decision +reached by any lesser court, including the extraordinary court that +might be called in case of special emergency, could be overridden by a +quarter court. This was the governing body of the company, a popular +assembly in which Sir Edwin often demonstrated his special talent as a +parliamentary tactician. Attendance varied according to the importance +of the business at hand, but as many as 150 might attend. + +The quarter court meeting in Easter term was a court of elections, +where the members cast their votes for all principal officers by secret +ballot. Except for members of the council, all offices of the company +were held by annual election. The chief office was that of the +treasurer, as the governor of the company was still officially +designated. As frequently as not, in common usage he was known as the +governor, but the charters had fixed the title of his office and in so +doing had pointed up a primary responsibility of the office. The +governor of the Virginia Company was in fact its treasurer. After 1619 +no man could hold the position for longer than three years, and no man +was eligible for election to it if already he was serving as the +governor of another company, except that he might also serve as the +governor of the Somers Island Company. The election court might vote a +reward for services rendered, but the treasurer, like other principal +officers, served without fixed compensation. + +His chief assistant, and the second officer in rank, was the deputy. As +the title suggests, he might be deputized to perform virtually any +function of the governor, including that of presiding at courts in the +governor's absence. But he also had important functions of his own. He +is perhaps best described as the chief administrative officer of the +company. He was specifically charged with superintendence over all +lesser officers, and he had a primary responsibility for contracts and +other business arrangements relating to the dispatch of shipping, +provisions, and passengers to Virginia and to the receipt, storage, and +marketing of cargoes returned from the colony. At all times, he acted, +or was supposed to act, in accordance with instructions from the court, +council, or treasurer, but all such instructions were necessarily +general in character. Many were the opportunities to use his own +judgment, or to confer a favor, as he handled business transactions +involving hundreds or even thousands of pounds. For his assistance and +perhaps to keep a watch on him, he had a committee of sixteen men +chosen by the court under a provision requiring that a fourth of the +number should be changed each year "to the end [that] many be trained +up in the businesse." The committee may have been new, but the deputy's +office was old. It had been occupied for many years before the spring +election of 1619 by Alderman Johnson. Some of the more serious charges +brought against Smith's administration related to the management of +the magazine, as the stock of supplies periodically forwarded to the +colony was generally described. Johnson had managed the successive +magazines, each separately financed by its own joint-stock, until in +1619 he was replaced by John Ferrar. + +The council, still described as His Majesty's Council for Virginia, had +become a large and unwieldy body, with many of its members inactive. +Its influence on the conduct of Virginia's affairs was now decidedly +less important than in the earlier years. According to the Orders and +Constitutions, no one "under the degree of a Lord or principall +magistrate" was thereafter to be elected to the council except "such as +by diligent attendance at the courts and service of Virginia for one +year at least before, have approved their sufficiency and worth to the +Companie." As this statement strongly suggests, a place on the council +was for many members an honorary post through which one might lend the +prestige of a great name to a worthy undertaking without assuming much +real responsibility. Nevertheless, the legal powers of the council +under the Virginia charters made its services indispensable, and made +it desirable that at least a few of its members should be intimately +acquainted with the business. The treasurer was supposed to consult +with the council on important occasions, and especially on matters +pertaining to the government of the colony. All formal instructions to +officers in the colony had to be sent in the name of the council and +over its seal. In any case of removal from office, in London or at +Jamestown, the cause had to be considered in council before it could be +taken before the adventurers. But any seven members made a quorum +giving full power to actions taken in council, and the treasurer, who +was always a member of the council, had the custody of its seal. + +Two of the seven auditors now required for annual review of +disbursements and receipts had to be members of the council. The +auditors' office had grown out of the disputes over the accounts of Sir +Thomas Smith, and in addition to the annual auditing of the +treasurer's report, which had to be submitted to the Easter court, they +were charged with responsibility for a close review of all earlier +records of the company. The primary purpose was to establish a full and +exact list of all subscriptions, with notation especially of +delinquencies. Salaried officers of the company were a secretary, a +bookkeeper, a husband (or as we would say, an accountant), and a bedel +or messenger. The secretary served all courts held by the adventurers, +the council, and the auditors, or by standing and special committees, +of which last the adventurers appointed quite a number. In addition, +the secretary was custodian of the company's records. + +Although Sir Edwin Sandys continued to be the actual leader of the +company until its dissolution in 1624, his tenure of the treasurer's +office was limited to a single year. When the adventurers assembled for +the annual elections in the spring of 1620, they were much disturbed to +receive instruction from the king that Sir Edwin was not to be +re-elected. Instead, the king suggested the choice of some merchant of +means and wide experience--perhaps Sir Thomas Smith, Sir Thomas Roe, +Alderman Robert Johnson, or Mr. Maurice Abbott. + +Whether Sandys could have been elected in the absence of this +interference by the king, which the adventurers protested as an +unwarranted invasion of their liberty, is itself an interesting and +debatable question. By his many criticisms of the previous conduct of +the company's affairs, Sandys had won the undying enmity of Sir Thomas +Smith and his important friends. More than that, he had quarreled with +his ally of the preceding year, the Earl of Warwick, who had +connections hardly less impressive than those enjoyed by Sir Thomas. +The quarrel with Warwick was over a question of piracy, as Sir Edwin +chose to regard it. One of Warwick's ships, the _Treasurer_, had sailed +from England in April 1618 with a license to capture pirates, which was +one way of getting a ship cleared from English ports for depredations +against the Spaniard at a time when the king had set his face against +all such activity. The _Treasurer_ had called at Jamestown, where +Governor Argall, who had rendered important services to the colony but +who had special reason to understand that his position in Virginia +depended upon the good will of important members of the company, helped +to outfit the vessel for a raid on the West Indies. Recent studies, and +especially those of David Quinn, a British scholar, argue strongly that +the earlier ventures of Gilbert and Raleigh had been inspired very +largely by the desire to establish some base on the North American +coast that would be useful in attacks upon Spanish possessions and the +trade routes which joined them to Spain. But it is evident enough that +by this time the leaders of the Virginia Company were chiefly fearful +that Spain might attack their colony before it was securely fortified, +and before it had fulfilled the promise of rewards far greater than +anything freebooting ventures could offer. As a result, Governor +Yeardley, on instruction from London, denied the courtesies of +Jamestown to the _Treasurer_ on its return in 1619, and won for Sandys +thereby the bitter resentment of the Rich family. + +The king's interference in the election of 1620 has naturally become a +celebrated incident in the history of Virginia. Sir Edwin was a leader +in parliament, which before the century was out would establish its +supremacy in the government of England, and the Virginia Company in +1620 had only recently established the first representative assembly in +North America. To historians who have sought the larger meaning of the +American experiment, it has often seemed that the king must have been +guided by a fear of representative government--in other words, that his +motives were largely political. No doubt, he was more easily persuaded +to enter an objection to Sandys' re-election because of Sir Edwin's +opposition to royal policies in the house of commons, but there is no +contemporary evidence to suggest that the king had even noticed the +Assembly which met at Jamestown in 1619. Moreover, that Assembly had +been authorized before Sandys' election, at a time when Sir Thomas +Smith was still in the chair, and anyone who thinks the motion had been +carried over Smith's opposition should take note that the same kind of +representative assembly was established in 1620 for Bermuda, over whose +fortunes Sir Thomas would continue to preside until 1621. Not until the +middle of the seventeenth century, at the time of Cromwell, does it +appear that anyone even suggested that the primary reason for the +king's interference was fear of a significant development in the +history of representative government. + +What actually happened in 1620 would seem to be clear enough. Sir +Thomas Smith had connections that reached all the way into the king's +bedchamber, and there he effectively argued that Sandys did not know +his business. It was an argument that found not a little justification +in the fact that the company had to admit by a broadside published in +the very month of the election court that hundreds of the colonists +sent to Virginia in the preceding year had died within a short time of +their arrival there, and it may be that Sir Thomas apprehended the even +greater disasters soon to overtake the colony. A more likely +supposition, however, is that he seized upon this news from the colony +as an opportunity to vent his resentment against Sandys, a resentment +that must have become more bitter with each of Sir Edwin's promotional +releases advertising the great improvements now to be found in the +management of Virginia's affairs. The legal basis on which the king +acted was probably debatable. No doubt, he depended upon the provision +in the charter requiring that all members of the council, of which the +treasurer was the head, be sworn to the king's service. But membership +on the council was for life, and Sir Edwin had taken his oath as a +member of the council as early as 1607. Perhaps the king took advantage +of the company's regulations requiring an annual election and that the +treasurer be sworn following his election. Whether this was a new +requirement cannot be said. It can only be suggested that the king +intended to say that if Sir Edwin were re-elected he would not give him +a necessary oath of office. It may be, too, that he stood quite simply +on the prerogative of his office to insist that his subjects in +Virginia were entitled to royal protection. In any case, the +adventurers chose not to defy the king's wish. + +Having protested his interference as unwarranted, the quarter court in +May 1620 adjourned without electing a treasurer. Instead, the +adventurers appointed a special committee to call on the king for the +purpose of acquainting him with the true facts regarding "the managing +of their business this last year" and to ask for a free election. +Sandys himself appealed to the royal favorite, the young Duke of +Buckingham, but with no effect on the king's decision. When the +adventurers reassembled late in June, they elected the Earl of +Southampton as treasurer. Thus, in a sense both parties to the dispute +emerged victorious. Sandys was no longer treasurer, but the adventurers +had refused to elect a merchant and Southampton would preside +thereafter in behalf of Sandys. There can be no doubt that Sandys +continued to be the leader of the company. Moreover, in 1621 he +extended his power by gaining control of the Somers Island Company +through the election of Southampton to its governorship. + +A question that naturally arises is that of how, or why, Sir Edwin was +able to survive this challenge to his leadership. The news from +Virginia was by no means encouraging. Given the long record of +disappointment there, and the many men who previously had died there, +the fact that several hundred of the most recent settlers had succumbed +might have been expected to unsettle any administration. Perhaps it was +the king's interference, serving as it did to rally the adventurers in +defence of the company's liberty. Perhaps Sir Thomas was guilty of too +naked a display of his power, with the result that the lesser +adventurers, who already had been taught to view the great merchants of +the company with suspicion, rallied to the support of Sandys. Perhaps +it was because the Earl of Warwick and Sir Thomas had not learned yet +the need for effective teamwork; both men disliked Sandys, but they had +their own quarrels and they would not form a real coalition against him +for another two years. All these possibilities must be given +consideration, but there would seem to be still another reason, +possibly the most important of all. + +Sir Edwin Sandys was a man of remarkable gifts, and nowhere are these +gifts better demonstrated than in his ability to stimulate the highest +hopes for Virginia. Before him only Richard Hakluyt, a patriot now dead +four years, had managed better to depict the promise America held for +Englishmen. Sandys wrote no major work on the subject, and even the +company's promotional pamphlets, which he undoubtedly shaped in some +large part, lacked the fire that Hakluyt, or even Alderman Johnson, +could impart to that branch of literature. It must be said also that +Sandys added no new idea to those which for a generation past had +guided Englishmen in their American ventures. His program included not +a single objective that the Virginia Company had not theretofore tried +to realize; the chief contrast with former programs was the absence of +any emphasis on the prospect that a route to the South Seas might be +found, an objective the adventurers had dropped for all practical +purposes a good many years before Sandys became their treasurer. But +Sandys had confidence, a systematic and orderly mind, and a persuasive +way of talking in the quarter court or in conference with the +individual adventurer who contemplated some new risk of capital. As a +result, he managed to convey the impression that plans had now been so +well thought through that Hakluyt's objectives in America had at last +become attainable. + +Leaving aside the search for a passage to China, which may never have +been so important to Hakluyt as it was to the people whose interest in +America he sought to enlist, Sandys undertook to carry through, all at +once, the program Hakluyt had outlined for Queen Elizabeth as early as +1584 in his famous "_Discourse on Western Planting_." It was a program +that looked to the development in America of products that would free +England of dependence upon trades with other parts of the world which +were in any way disadvantageous to England, and that would guarantee to +any Englishmen who developed such products a sure profit on their +investment. It was a program that had taken its shape first from the +prospect, in Raleigh's day, of an early war with Spain, and perhaps it +should be noted that when Sandys came to office in 1619 the Thirty +Years War had only recently had its beginning with the king's own +son-in-law a central figure. The war has gone down in our history books +as the last of the great religious wars, and many were the Englishmen +who thought that England should be, or would be soon involved. + +In Virginia, Sandys promised to produce iron. It is strange that the +attempt to develop an iron industry in Virginia, on which the company +spent all told something like L5,000, should have made less impression +on modern historians than has an early and brief search for gold that +was incidental to other explorations. The iron industry in England was +suffering from the depletion of the island's wood supply, which was +still depended upon for smelting, and Virginia promised an unlimited +supply. Other industries that he hoped to develop in the colony are +suggested by a list of tradesmen the company invited to adventure to +Virginia in 1620: among them, sawyers, joiners, shipwrights, +millwrights, coopers, weavers, tanners, potters, fishermen, +fishhookmakers, netmakers, leather dressers, limeburners, and dressers +of hemp and flax. Even more important because so much depended upon +persuading the individual adventurers to invest their own money in the +development of their land, were plans for the production of sugar, +wine, indigo, silk, cotton, olive oil, rice, etc. In the development of +these products Sandys intended the public lands--those cultivated under +the direct supervision of the company and by its own tenants--to serve +more or less in the capacity of experimental farms. For their planting +he sought seeds and plants from various parts of the world. On the +college land he had some 10,000 grapevines set out, and sent for their +care foreign experts imported from the continent. To make sure that +private estates would not be devoted wholly to tobacco, as yet the +colony's only proven staple, he wrote into land patents a stipulation +that other staples would be given a trial. + +To find the money for investment in the public lands was no easy task. +No common joint-stock fund could be raised in 1619, if only because the +company's plans depended chiefly upon the hope of inducing the +adventurers to invest in their own lands. It cannot be said how +successful were the renewed attempts to collect from delinquent +subscribers, but perhaps some help came from that source. Sandys +depended also, as had Smith before him, on the Virginia lottery, +perhaps more than upon any other source, for the lottery was terminated +early in 1621 by order of the privy council on grounds that included +the complaint of parliament that the lottery had become a public +nuisance. A very substantial help to Sir Edwin was the bishops' fund +for an Indian college and additional funds raised for the support of an +Indian school in the colony. The total ran to better than L2,000. It +had been decided in 1618, well before Sandys' election, that the money +from the bishops' fund would be invested in an estate to be known as +the College Land, and the precedent thus set was followed in disposing +of funds subsequently made available to the company for an Indian +school. In practical terms, these decisions meant that all mission +funds were used to send out tenants on the promise that a half-share of +the wine and other such commodities as they might produce would in time +provide a permanent endowment for the school and the college. The +decision reflects both the extraordinary poverty of the company and the +extraordinary confidence with which its leaders approached their new +ventures in Virginia. + +By the spring of 1621, when the bulk of the college funds had been +expended and the lottery was terminated, Sir Edwin's financial +resources had become even more skimpy and uncertain. Some projects, +such as that for the settlement of Italian glass-workers who were to +manufacture pottery and beads for use in the Indian trade, could be +financed by subscriptions to a special joint-stock, but this device +offered no help in meeting general expenses. As a result, Sandys +continued to take certain shortcuts, or perhaps the blame should rest +rather on Deputy John Ferrar. In any case, the colonists complained +that shipping came out so overloaded with passengers as to invite the +epidemic disease with which they usually suffered on landing, and which +made of newcomers a useless burden on the colony for some time after +their arrival. The deathrate among the colonists continued to be high. +The time and energy required to house them, or to feed them, +unavoidably forced delay with projects on which Sandys had pinned his +chief hopes. He was especially disappointed over the slow progress of +agricultural experimentation. Accordingly, when Yeardley's three year +term was ended in 1621 and Sir Francis Wyatt was sent as his +replacement, Sir Edwin also sent his brother, George Sandys, as +appointee to a new office of treasurer. He was given special charge of +all projects looking to the development of new staple commodities and +was intrusted with the collection of rents, of which the company +claimed L1,000 were presently due. These rents, which were to be +collected largely from half-share tenants who had migrated within the +preceding three years, undoubtedly now constituted the company's main +hope for an immediate revenue. Except in a very few instances, no +quitrents would be payable until 1625, and so general had been the +disappointment experienced so far with special projects that further +time would have to be allowed before any return from them could be +expected. In short, the company had exhausted its very limited +resources in getting Wyatt and George Sandys out to Virginia, and had +nothing left but hopes for the future and the anticipation of a small +immediate revenue from the rents of its own tenants, most of which had +already been assigned to such special charges as the support of public +officers in the colony. In London, virtually the only asset left to the +company was the will and determination of Sir Edwin Sandys. + +In these circumstances, Sandys necessarily devoted his main energies +after 1621 to the problem of tobacco, the only marketable staple the +colony had as yet produced. It was an old problem, but one now filled +with new difficulties. In earlier days, when it had been hoped that +tobacco might be one of a variety of staples produced in the colony, +the Virginia Company, like the Bermuda Company, had lent encouragement +to efforts looking to its production. But hardly had early experiments +proved successful before the adventurers faced the risk that tobacco +would take over the colony entirely. There is nothing surprising in +this development, for a tobacco plant, unlike a grapevine or an olive +tree, matures within a few months of its planting, and the tobacco +habit at this time was a thing of comparably rapid growth in many parts +of the world. To settlers who had been staked by adventurers ever +insistent upon a prompt return of their capital, or who wondered how +best to procure the means to make payment for the supplies brought in +the next magazine ship, the obvious answer was to plant the land to +tobacco. After doing this, if time and energy remained, they might try +some of Sir Edwin Sandys' ideas--maybe set out a few grapevines or +mulberries, as they had been instructed to do. There was good reason +for the growing fear among the leading adventurers in London that +tobacco might put a blight on all other projects. + +More than that, the increasing shipments of tobacco, especially in view +of the still relatively poor quality of the Virginia leaf, gave the +colony a bad name just when its good name was so important to the +promotional efforts of the company. The tobacco habit did not yet have +the respectable associations it would later acquire in the eighteenth +century. Instead, it was associated with tippling or bawdy houses, +where in truth a pipe was most easily had by the contemporary resident +of London. Moral considerations were reinforced by an additional +concern for the public interest. So much of the weed consumed came from +Spain that thoughtful men were inclined to consider how much England +paid out, to the profit of the Spaniard, for a commodity which added +nothing to the well being of the country. Had it not been for the +influence of Virginia and Bermuda adventurers in the House of Commons, +Parliament in 1621 might well have prohibited all importation of +tobacco into England. And in all England there was no more vigorous +opponent of tobacco than the king himself. Indeed, the king had even +written a book on the subject. + +The attitude of King James had a most important bearing on another +angle of the problem. Under its charter, the company had been allowed a +seven year exemption from import duties on cargoes brought from +Virginia. When this exemption expired in 1619, the government +immediately imposed a duty that was fixed early in 1620 at 1s. per +pound of tobacco. Though this was only half the duty paid by Spanish +tobacco, it was nonetheless a heavy burden to be imposed upon leaf that +was declared never to have sold at more than 5s. a pound and that +brought an average of only 2s. for the better grade in 1620.[A] The +adventurers' attempted escape by shipping their tobacco to Holland won +them a sharp reprimand from the privy council, and an order to bring +all of Virginia's tobacco to England for payment of his majesty's +customs. As negotiations with the king's ministers for some relief +continued, it was proposed in 1622 that the Virginia and Bermuda +adventurers might take over the tobacco monopoly, which was a grant of +the sole right to import tobacco of any sort into the kingdom in return +for a fixed contribution to the royal revenues. The holder of such a +monopoly--a very common device at the time--was entitled to collect the +customs and to hope that what he collected, plus the advantage of a +monopolistic control of the market, might enable him to clear a profit +on the transaction. Here, in other words, was a proposal that might +provide the needed relief, even some income for the company's hard +pressed treasury. The Virginia Company by 1622 was in no position to +ignore such an opportunity and fortunately, the Sandys faction was now +in control of the Somers Island Company. A joint committee of the two +companies, headed by Sir Edwin himself, entered into negotiations for +what was known as the tobacco contract. + +The bitterest factional strife in the history of the London adventurers +soon followed. It is a complicated story, too complicated and too long +to be told fully here. Briefly, both the terms agreed upon by Sandys +and his proposals for the management of the contract, proposals which +left Sandys and his cohorts in full control, touched too closely the +vital interests of some of his bitterest enemies. In Bermuda, as in +Virginia, the hope of an early profit from the production of sugar, +silk, wine, indigo, and other such commodities had proved vain, and +like Virginia, Bermuda lived by the tobacco it grew. The Earl of +Warwick and members of his family had made especially heavy investments +in their Bermuda properties, and Sir Nathaniel Rich became the floor +leader, as it were, of an attempt to defeat the contract. Sir Thomas +Smith and his friends joined in the effort. Especially objectionable in +the view of the opposition were plans for placing the management of the +contract in the hands of salaried officials, with Sir Edwin as director +at a salary of L500. At one Virginia court, meeting early in December, +the debate got so out of hand that it required several additional +sessions to straighten out the minutes in order that appropriate +penalties might be imposed upon Mr. Samuel Wrote, a member of the +Virginia council whose unrestrained charges of graft violated the +company's rules and offended the court's sense of its own dignity. In +the end the opposition elected to make the final test in a Bermuda +court, whose consent was necessary to close the contract and where +Sandys' opponents included the more substantial investors in that +colony. The test came in February 1623, and Sandys won. But it could be +demonstrated that had the vote been by share rather than by head, as +was the rule in both companies, he would have been defeated. Sandys' +opponents in the Bermuda Company all along had complained of a plan to +distribute the charges of the contract equally between the two +companies, arguing that the Virginia tobacco had a greater value and +should therefore carry a proportionately larger charge. And now they +were in a position to argue that the Virginia Company, in whose courts +for some time they had steadfastly refused even to vote on the salary +question, sought to exploit the younger plantation, as was evidenced by +the opposition of the adventurers to whom Bermuda's tobacco chiefly +belonged. With this argument, Sandys' opponents promptly carried the +whole question before the privy council. + +This was in the spring of 1623. During the course of the preceding +debate, news had come of an Indian massacre in Virginia that had cost +the lives of over 350 colonists. The faction-ridden and bankrupt +company had stirred itself to send such aid as it could, but now came +the word that this had not been enough. By the testimony of Sandys' own +brother, though this testimony may not have been immediately available +to his enemies, another 500 colonists had died before the year was out +as a result of the dislocations occasioned by the massacre, and as a +result of the failure of the company to send enough aid. The tobacco +contract dropped into a position of secondary importance as Sandys' +opponents, with Alderman Johnson taking the lead, petitioned the king +for a full investigation of the situation in Virginia and of the recent +conduct of its affairs. + +Whatever one may think of Sir Edwin Sandys, or of the motives which +inspired his opponents, there can be no question as to the correctness +of the action taken by the government. The leaders of the two factions +were called before the privy council on April 17, where they displayed +so "much heat and bitterness" toward one another as to make it +difficult to get on with the business. In the end, the council won +agreement that a special commission should be established for an +investigation of the state of the colony's affairs, the agreement +coming finally when the council conceded the demand of Sandys' +supporters that the investigation should begin with the administration +of Sir Thomas Smith. Accordingly, on May 9, a commission was issued to +Sir William Jones, justice of the Court of Common Pleas, and six other +gentlemen "to examine the carriage of the whole business." Meantime, a +letter had been prepared by the privy council to acquaint the colonists +with the fact that their affairs had been taken into "His Majesty's +pious and princely care" and to encourage them "to go on cheerfully in +the work they have in hand." The central issues all pertained to +Virginia, but in the circumstances there was no choice but to include +both companies in the province of the Jones commission. + +The appointment of the Jones commission ended, for all practical +purposes, the control of the Virginia Company over the colony. The +company lingered on as an agency chiefly through which the Sandys +faction prepared its briefs for the attention of the commissioners, or +through which orders from the commissioners might be implemented. All +of the company's records were impounded by the commission, which also +took charge of all correspondence with the colony. The records of the +company demonstrated all too clearly the bankrupt state of its +finances. The hearings before the commissioners demonstrated with equal +clarity the hopeless division of the adventurers by bitter factional +strife. Correspondence from the colony brought evidence of a desperate +situation. Even Sandys had to admit that no more than 2,500 colonists +were still alive in the colony, which was to confess an attrition, +mainly by death, of something over 40 percent of the colonists residing +in Virginia, or sent to Virginia, since he had assumed responsibility +for the management of its affairs. Actually, the situation was much +worse than these figures suggested, for a census taken in Virginia +early in 1625 showed a total population of only 1,275. In the fall of +1623 the privy council invited the company to surrender its charter on +the promise that a new one would be issued to cover all individual +rights and grants, but with a revision of the plan of government that +would place the control of the colony under the more immediate +supervision of the king. In effect, the proposal was to return to +something close to the original plan of 1606. When the adventurers, in +a court from which Sandys' enemies largely absented themselves, +rejected this proposal, the government began quo warranto proceedings +against the company in the court of Kings Bench. On May 24, 1624, that +court gave its decision for recall of the Virginia charters. And so +ended the Virginia Company. + +The Bermuda Company had been dragged into the investigation chiefly +because of the close ties joining it to the older company. There was no +emergency in the colony, and its debts were not beyond the capacity of +Sir Thomas Smith and other leading adventurers to pay. As a result, the +Somers Island Company lasted on for another sixty years. + +One who looks back from 1624 over the brief and frequently troubled +history of the Virginia Company may debate, as historians have often +done in the past, just what should be said by way of conclusion. +Perhaps it is this: here were men who out of their disappointment +quarreled bitterly and by their quarrels helped to destroy an agency +through which in the past they had worked together, with a remarkable +devotion to the public interest, for the achievement of great +objectives. No doubt, their greatest fault had been to set their goals +too high. Certainly, their greatest virtue was persistence in the faith +that great things could be done for England in America, a faith +destined in time to be justified by the course of history. + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote A: For purposes of comparison, it may be noted that Spanish +tobacco was declared to have been sold for as much as 20s. a pound. The +"filthy weed" was not yet "the poor man's luxury."] + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Virginia Company Of London, +1606-1624, by Wesley Frank Craven + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VIRGINIA COMPANY OF LONDON *** + +***** This file should be named 28555.txt or 28555.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/2/8/5/5/28555/ + +Produced by Mark C. Orton, Diane Monico, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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