Virginia
1607-1660
England and the New World
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Despite the cultural growth and the increasing sense of national identity of the
Elizabethan Age (1558-1603), England remained a small and relatively poor
country on the fringe of Europe.
England had only a fraction of the population of its rivals, France and Spain. In
1600, France’s population stood at 20 million, Spain’s at 11 million and England at
barely 4 million.
In the 16th century, England’s stability was undermined by internal religious
conflict. After the English Reformation began in the 1530s, England oscillated
between the Anglicanism of Henry VIII, radical Protestantism under Edward VI, a
return to Roman Catholicism under Mary I and finally an uneasy Protestant
settlement under Elizabeth I.
Puritans and Catholics were the “outsiders” of English society.
England’s expansion outside the island of Britain began with the conquest of
Ireland in the late 16th century.
The ruthless brutality of the English conquest in Ireland would serve as a blueprint
for expansion into North America.
England’s Economic & Social Crisis
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As if religious divisions weren’t bad enough, England’s economic and social
problems worsened.
An economic downturn was exacerbated by the “enclosure” movement.
Hundreds of thousands of desperate and displaced “strolling poor” wandered the
countryside and eventually into the cities in search of food and work.
These “masterless men” posed a growing threat to England’s social stability.
What to do?
Thomas More’s Utopia, 1519.
Richard Hakluyt’s A Discourse Concerning Western Planting, 1584.
Hakluyt made a compelling argument: start colonizing! Colonies in North America
would provide land and work for the poor, a naval force along the east coast would
check Spanish power in the New World, profits from colonial investments would
boost England’s economy and England could spread Protestantism to counter
Spanish Catholicism. Hakluyt called his plan “The Glory of England’s Future.”
King James I (1603-1625)
King Charles I (1625-1649)
John White’s 1580s renditions of Powhatan villages. The illustration on the left is the most accurate.
The one on the right shows a center “street” and crops growing in neat rows in segregated fields. The
Powhatans had no need for wide streets. They grew corn, beans and squash all tangled together
which was more efficient and productive for these crops than the English method. For meat, they
hunted. Indians planted their crops without horses or plows and so would most of the English.
Consider the cost of transporting and feeding horses on a three-month voyage across the Atlantic
Ocean.
Powhatan’s
Virginia
The Powhatan Confederacy controlled most of
what is now the eastern half of Virginia. It was
one of the largest and most powerful Indian
nations on the East Coast.
The Powhatans subjugated and ruthlessly
exploited their neighbors, sometimes
forcibly moving “disloyal” tribes to new
areas or exterminating them altogether.
At first, the Powhatans were not intimidated by
the English. They saw them as a well-armed,
but otherwise weak and disorganized “tribe”
who could be manipulated and used to maintain
control over their conquests.
John Smith’s Map, 1612
The map shows the locations of dozens of Indian settlements and while not “exact,” it’s
surprisingly accurate. Archaeologists still use the map today to help identify and locate
pre-contact Indian sites.
The Powhatans resisted English expansion for
over four decades. There were three major AngloPowhatan wars, the first lasting from 1610 until 1614.
In 1622, a coordinated Powhatan attack killed
hundreds of English and nearly ended the Virginia
colony.
In 1632, the English constructed an earth and
wooden palisade across the entire James-York
peninsula to defend against the Indians.
Gov. Wm. Berkeley and the English crushed a final
Powhatan uprising in 1644 and forced the defeated
Indians onto reservations, America’s first.
By 1650, the Powhatans had been driven from the
entire peninsula, but a profitable English trade in
deerskins with Indians further inland continued for
decades.
The Topography of Tidewater Virginia
Promotional pamphlet and an early depiction of Jamestown
and its triangular palisade.
Jamestown, ca. 1640
Tobacco was highly labor intensive. One indentured servant could maintain 3-4 acres.
Between February and November the tobacco had to be seeded, re-planted, topped,
wormed, suckered, picked, hung, dried, cured, rolled into hands, packed, prized and
shipped.
Tobacco being dried and cured
Prizing the tobacco and transporting on a rolling road
Preparing the hogsheads for shipment to England
In 1618, the Va. Company introduced the “headright” system to encourage the
importation of labor as tobacco production spiraled upward. A planter received 50 acres
of land for each individual he paid to have transported to the colony. Most were
indentured servants. Between 1607 and 1675 as many as 3 out of 4 English emigrants
to the Chesapeake arrived as indentured servants. Some planters amassed holdings of
tens of thousands of acres.
English Virginians lived on widely dispersed farms and plantations. There were few, if
any, towns. Wealthy planters occupied the riverfront lands with middling and small
farmers settling the interior of the Virginia peninsulas.
Impermanent architecture: a 17th century Virginia house.
Tobacco cultivation exhausted Virginia’s soil rapidly. A tobacco field could only sustain crops for
three to four years. Thus, new land had to be cleared frequently and it was not uncommon for
planters to move their operations several miles each time. They saw little sense in spending large
sums on houses and barns that would be occupied for a relatively few years.
The Allen House (aka “Bacon’s Castle”) – built 1665 in Surry County, Virginia. One of
only three or four 17th-century buildings still standing in Virginia today. By comparison,
New England has hundreds of 17th-century structures.