Part 5 (2/2)
Such, in outline, was the government originated for Virginia by the liberal leaders of the London Company, and put into operation by Sir George Yeardley. It lasted, with the short intermission of the Commonwealth Period, for more than one hundred and fifty years, and under it Virginia became the most populous and wealthy of the English colonies in America.
The successful cultivation of tobacco in Virginia, as we have seen, put new life into the discouraged London Company. The shareholders, feeling that now at last the colony would grow and prosper, exerted themselves to the utmost to secure desirable settlers and to equip them properly.
Soon fleets of considerable size were leaving the English ports for America, their decks and cabins crowded with emigrants and their holds laden with clothing, arms and farming implements.[150] During the months from March 1620 to March 1621 ten s.h.i.+ps sailed, carrying no less than 1051 persons.[151] In the year ending March, 1622, seventeen s.h.i.+ps reached Virginia, bringing over fifteen hundred new settlers.[152] And this stream continued without abatement until 1624, when disasters in Virginia, quarrels among the shareholders and the hostility of the King brought discouragement to the Company. In all, there reached the colony from November, 1619, to February, 1625, nearly five thousand men, women and children.[153]
Although tobacco culture was the only enterprise of the colony which had yielded a profit, it was not the design of Sandys and his friends that that plant should monopolize the energies of the settlers. They hoped to make Virginia an industrial community, capable of furnis.h.i.+ng the mother country with various manufactured articles, then imported from foreign countries. Especially anxious were they to render England independent in their supply of pig iron. Ore having been discovered a few miles above Henrico on the James, a furnace was erected there and more than a hundred skilled workmen brought over from England to put it into operation. Before the works could be completed, however, they were utterly demolished by the savages, the machinery thrown into the river, all the workmen slaughtered,[154] and the only return the Company obtained for an outlay of thousands of pounds was a shovel, a pair of tongs and one bar of iron.[155] Efforts were made later to repair the havoc wrought by the Indians and to reestablish the works, but they came to nothing. Not until the time of Governor Spotswood were iron furnaces operated in Virginia, and even then the industry met with a scant measure of success.
The Company also made an earnest effort to promote the manufacture of gla.s.s in Virginia. This industry was threatened with extinction in England as a result of the great inroads that had been made upon the timber available for fuel, and it was thought that Virginia, with its inexhaustible forests, offered an excellent opportunity for its rehabilitation. But here too they were disappointed. The sand of Virginia proved unsuitable for the manufacture of gla.s.s. The skilled Italian artisans sent over to put the works into operation were intractable and mutinous. After trying in various ways to discourage the enterprise, so that they could return to Europe, these men brought matters to a close by cracking the furnace with a crowbar. George Sandys, in anger, declared ”that a more d.a.m.ned crew h.e.l.l never vomited”.[156]
In order to show that they were sincere in their professions of interest in the spiritual welfare of the Indians, the Company determined to erect a college at Henrico ”for the training up of the children of those Infidels in true Religion, moral virtue and civility”.[157] The clergy of England were enthusiastic in their support of this good design, and their efforts resulted in liberal contributions from various parts of the kingdom.[158] Unfortunately, however, the money thus secured was expended in sending to the college lands a number of ”tenants” the income from whose labor was to be utilized in establis.h.i.+ng and supporting the inst.i.tution.[159] As some of these settlers fell victims to disease and many others were destroyed in the ma.s.sacre of 1622, the undertaking had to be abandoned, and of course all thought of converting and civilizing the savages was given up during the long and relentless war that ensued.
Even more discouraging than these failures was the hostility of the King to the cultivation of tobacco in Virginia, and his restrictions upon its importation into England. Appeals were made to him to prohibit the sale of Spanish tobacco, in order that the Virginia planters might dispose of their product at a greater profit. This, it was argued, would be the most effective way of rendering the colony prosperous and self sustaining. But James, who was still bent upon maintaining his Spanish policy, would not offend Philip by excluding his tobacco from England.
Moreover, in 1621, he issued a proclamation restricting the importation of the leaf from Virginia and the Somers Isles to fifty-five thousand pounds annually.[160] This measure created consternation in Virginia and in the London Company. The great damage it would cause to the colony and the diminution in the royal revenue that would result were pointed out to James, but for the time he was obdurate.[161] Indeed, he caused additional distress by granting the customs upon tobacco to a small a.s.sociation of farmers of the revenue, who greatly damaged the interests of the colony. In 1622, James, realizing that his policy in regard to tobacco was injuring the exchequer, made a compromise with the Company.
The King agreed to restrict the importation of Spanish tobacco to 60,000 pounds a year, and after two years to exclude it entirely. All the Virginia leaf was to be admitted, but the Crown was to receive one third of the crop, while the other two thirds was subjected to a duty of six pence a pound.[162] This agreement proved most injurious to the Company, and it was soon abandoned, but the heavy exactions of the King continued. Undoubtedly this unwise policy was most detrimental to Virginia. Not only did it diminish the returns of the Company and make it impossible for Sandys to perfect all his wise plans for the colony, but it put a decided check upon immigration. Many that would have gone to Virginia to share in the profits of the planters, remained at home when they saw that these profits were being confiscated by the King.[163]
Yet the strenuous efforts of the London Company would surely have brought something like prosperity to the colony had not an old enemy returned to cause the destruction of hundreds of the settlers. This was the sickness. For some years the mortality had been very low, because the old planters were acclimated, and few new immigrants were coming to Virginia. But with the stream of laborers and artisans that the Sandys regime now sent over, the scourge appeared again with redoubled fury. As early as January, 1620, Governor Yeardley wrote ”of the great mortallitie which hath been in Virginia, about 300 of ye inhabitants having dyed this year”.[164] The sickness was most deadly in the newly settled parts of the colony, ”to the consumption of divers Hundreds, and almost the utter destruction of some particular Plantations”.[165] The London Company, distressed at the loss of so many men, saw in their misfortunes the hand of G.o.d, and wrote urging ”the more carefull observations of his holy laws to work a reconciliation”.[166] They also sent directions for the construction, in different parts of the colony, of four guest houses, or hospitals, for the lodging and entertaining of fifty persons each, upon their first arrival.[167] But all efforts to check the scourge proved fruitless. In the year ending March, 1621 over a thousand persons died upon the immigrant vessels and in Virginia.[168]
Despite the fact that hundreds of settlers came to the colony during this year, the population actually declined. In 1621 the percentage of mortality was not so large, but the actual number of deaths increased.
During the months from March, 1621, to March, 1622, nearly twelve hundred persons perished. It was like condemning a man to death to send him to the colony. Seventy-five or eighty per cent. of the laborers that left England in search of new homes across the Atlantic died before the expiration of their first year. The exact number of deaths in 1622 is not known, but there is reason to believe that it approximated thirteen hundred.[169] Mr. George Sandys, brother of the Secretary of the London Company, wrote, ”Such a pestilent fever rageth this winter amongst us: never knowne before in Virginia, by the infected people that came over in ye _Abigall_, who were poisoned with ... beer and all falling sick & many dying, every where dispersed the contagion, and the forerunning Summer hath been also deadly upon us.”[170] Not until 1624 did the mortality decline. Then it was that the Governor wrote, ”This summer, G.o.d be thanked, the Colony hath very well stood to health”.[171] The dread sickness had spent itself for lack of new victims, for the immigration had declined and the old planters had become ”seasoned”.
History does not record an epidemic more deadly than that which swept over Virginia during these years. It is estimated that the number of those that lost their lives from the diseases native to the colony and to those brought in from the infected s.h.i.+ps amounts to no less than four thousand.[172] When the tide of immigration was started by Sir Edwin Sandys in 1619, there were living in Virginia about nine hundred persons; when it slackened in 1624 the population was but eleven hundred. The sending of nearly five thousand settlers to Virginia had resulted in a gain of but two hundred. It is true that the tomahawk and starvation accounts for a part of this mortality, but by far the larger number of deaths was due to disease.
Yet hardly less horrible than the sickness was the Indian ma.s.sacre of 1622. This disaster, which cost the lives of several hundred persons, struck terror into the hearts of every Englishman in Virginia. The colonists had not the least intimation that the savages meditated harm to them, for peace had existed between the races ever since the marriage of Rolfe and Pocahontas. Considering the protection of their palisades no longer necessary after that event, they had spread out over the colony in search of the most fertile lands. Their plantations extended at intervals for many miles along both banks of the James, and in the case of a sudden attack by the Indians it would obviously be difficult for the settlers to defend themselves or to offer a.s.sistance to their neighbors.
The apparent friends.h.i.+p of the Indians had created such great intimacy between the two races, that the savages were received into the homes of the white men and at times were fed at their tables.[173] At the command of the London Company itself some of the Indian youths had been adopted by the settlers and were being educated in the Christian faith. So unsuspecting were the people that they loaned the savages their boats, as they pa.s.sed backward and forward, to formulate their plans for the ma.s.sacre.[174]
The plot seems to have originated in the cunning brain of Opechancanough. This chief, always hostile to the white men, must have viewed with apprehension their encroachment upon the lands of his people. He could but realize that some day the swarms of foreigners that were arriving each year would exclude the Indians from the country of their forefathers. Perceiving his opportunity in the foolish security of the English and in their exposed situation, he determined to annihilate them in one general butchery.
His plans were laid with great cunning. Although thousands of natives knew of the design, no warning reached the white men until the very eve of the ma.s.sacre. While Opechancanough was preparing this tremendous blow, he protested in the strongest terms his perpetual good will and love, declaring that the sky would fall before he would bring an end to the peace.[175] In order to lull the suspicions of the planters, ”even but two daies before the ma.s.sacre”, he guided some of them ”with much kindnesse through the woods, and one Browne that lived among them to learne the language”, he sent home to his master. The evening before the attack the Indians came as usual to the plantations with deer, turkeys, fish, fruits and other provisions to sell.[176]
That night, however, a warning was received, which although too late to save the most remote settlements, preserved many hundreds from the tomahawk. Chanco, an Indian boy who had been adopted by an Englishman named Race, revealed the entire plot to his master. The man secured his house, and rowed away before dawn in desperate haste to Jamestown, to give warning to the Governor. ”Whereby they were prevented, and at such other plantations as possibly intelligence could be given.”[177]
The a.s.sault of the savages was swift and deadly. In all parts of the colony they fell upon the settlers, and those that had received no warning were, in most cases, butchered before they could suspect that harm was intended. Sometimes the Indians sat down to breakfast with their victims, ”whom immediately with their owne tooles they slew most barbarously, not sparing either age or s.e.x, man woman or childe”.[178]
Many were slain while working in the fields; others were trapped in their houses and butchered before they could seize their weapons. The savages, ”not being content with their lives,... fell againe upon the dead bodies, making as well as they could a fresh murder, defacing, dragging, and mangling their dead carkases into many peeces”.[179]
That the plot was so successful was due to the completeness of the surprise, for where the English made the least resistance the savages were usually beaten off. A planter named Causie, when attacked and wounded and surrounded by the Indians, ”with an axe did cleave one of their heads, whereby the rest fled and he escaped; for they hurt not any that did either fight or stand upon their guard. In one place where they had warning of it, (they) defended the house against sixty or more that a.s.saulted it.”[180]
At the plantation of a Mr. Harrison, where there were gathered seven men and eighteen or nineteen women and children, the savages set fire to a tobacco house and then came in to tell the men to quench it. Six of the English, not suspecting treachery, rushed out, and were shot full of arrows. Mr. Thomas Hamor, the seventh man, ”having finished a letter he was writing, followed after to see what was the matter, but quickly they shot an arrow in his back, which caused him to returne and barricade up the dores, whereupon the Salvages set fire to the house. But a boy, seizing a gun which he found loaded, discharged it at random. At the bare report the enemy fled and Mr. Hamor with the women and children escaped.”[181] In a nearby house, a party of English under Mr. Hamor's brother, were caught by the Indians without arms, but they defended themselves successfully with spades, axes and brickbats.[182]
One of the first to fall was Reverend George Thorpe, a member of the Virginia Council, and a man of prominence in England.[183] Leaving a life of honor and ease, he had come to Virginia to work for the conversion of the Indians. He had apparently won the favor of Opechancanough, with whom he often discoursed upon the Christian religion. At the moment of his murder, his servant, perceiving the deadly intent of the savages, gave him warning, but his gentle nature would not permit him to believe harm of those whom he had always befriended, and he was cut down without resistance.[184]
The barbarous king failed in his design to destroy the English race in Virginia, but the ma.s.sacre was a deadly blow to the colony. No less than three hundred and fifty-seven persons were slaughtered, including six Councillors. The news of the disaster brought dismay to the London Company. For a while they attempted to keep the matter a secret, but in a few weeks it was known all over England. Although the ma.s.sacre could not have been foreseen or prevented, it served as a pretext for numerous attacks upon Sandys and the party which supported him. It discouraged many shareholders and made it harder to secure settlers for the colony.
Even worse was the effect in Virginia. The system of farming in unprotected plantations, which had prevailed for some years, had now to be abandoned and many settlements that were exposed to the Indians were deserted. ”We have not,” wrote the a.s.sembly, ”the safe range of the Country for the increase of Cattle, Swyne, etc; nor for the game and fowle which the country affords in great plentye; besides our duties to watch and warde to secure ourselves and labor are as hard and chargeable as if the enemy were at all times present.”[185]
The ma.s.sacre was followed by a venomous war with the Indians, which lasted many years. The English, feeling that their families and their homes would never be safe so long as the savages shared the country with them, deliberately planned the extermination of all hostile tribes in Virginia. Their conversion was given no further consideration. ”The terms betwixt us and them,” they declared, ”are irreconcilable.”[186]
Governor Wyatt wrote, ”All trade with them must be forbidden, and without doubt either we must cleere them or they us out of the Country.”[187]
But it soon became apparent that neither people would be able to win an immediate or decisive victory. The Indians could not hope to destroy the English, now that their deeply laid plot had failed. In open battle their light arrows made no impression upon the coats of plate and of mail in which the white men were incased, while their own bodies were without protection against the superior weapons of their foes. On the other hand, it was very difficult for the colonists to strike the savages, because of the ”advantages of the wood and the nimbleness of their heels”.[188] Even though they ”chased them to and fro”, following them to their villages and burning their huts, they found it very difficult to do them serious harm.
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