CHAPTER XVI

MANUFACTURED SUPPLIES: FOREIGN—Continued

The great bulk of imported supplies consumed in the Colony after the dissolution of the Company, as previous to that event, was obtained from England, with which kingdom the course of trade differed from that carried on with the northern settlements and with the West Indies only in volume. A detailed account of its character and the agencies by which it was conducted is of general application to the commercial intercourse of Virginia, in the seventeenth century, with all the countries having transactions with its people. Among the English merchants who brought in supplies after the revocation of the letters patent in 1624, and previous to 1700, there were few who could be described as casual dealers, that is, dealers who were without representatives in the Colony, to whom their goods could be consigned to be disposed of gradually, but who instead relied upon the chance of selling their commodities as they passed in their ships from river to river. The objections to this manner of business were numerous. As early as 1635, Captain Devries declared, as the result of his own observation, that all who conveyed supplies to Virginia with the object of exchanging them for tobacco, should erect private storehouses to be placed in the care of a factor, who should be required to remain in the Colony in order to be prepared at the proper season to take possession of

the crops of the planters to whom goods had been sold on credit, not improbably twelve months beforehand.¹ The English merchants were in the habit of doing this, and in consequence enjoyed a notable advantage over their Dutch rivals. The opinion of Captain Devries was just as correct in its relation to the condition of trade fifty years later as it was at the particular period in which he wrote. In 1683, Colonel William Fitzhugh, who had a thorough knowledge of the course of business in Virginia, corresponding with certain shipowners in New England who had recently for the first time sent to the Colony a vessel loaded with merchandise, but with no one to dispose of it but the captain, who was ignorant of the country, stated that casual trading was destructive of all profit, because the owner of the goods, being in Virginia only for a short time, had to hasten his departure to reduce the cost attendant upon the navigation of his ship, and was, therefore, compelled to sell in order to secure a cargo of tobacco, whether its price was high or low. If, on the other hand, the merchandise, as soon as it was brought to the Colony, was placed in the hands of a factor, the latter could as occasion arose gradually dispose of it to advantage, being in a position to wait for an advance in rates if those prevailing were not satisfactory. When the vessel belonging to the owner of the commodities arrived, the products for which these commodities had previously from time to time been exchanged would be ready for delivery at certain places, and the expense of a long stay would be avoided. These facts were well known to the English traders and governed their action.² The English merchants who supplied the planters with manufactured articles may be roughly divided into two

classes: first, those who resided in the mother country and disposed of goods to the colonists either directly upon the receipt of the tobacco in England, or who shipped goods to Virginia to be sold there by factors; secondly, those who lived either permanently or temporarily in the Colony and exchanged the commodities which they had ordered, for the products of the country, acting either in their own persons or through local representatives in their different mercantile transactions. To the first class belonged men of such standing as Micajah Perry, Thomas Lane, John Cary, John Cooper, George Richards, Peter Paggin, and John Bland. These English merchants in many instances had brothers or near relatives in Virginia who served as their agents. This was the case with Micajah Perry. It was also the case with John Bland. The English traders who resided in the Colony were men like Francis Lee, John Chew, Thomas Burbage, Robert Vaulx, and John Greene. In some instances they returned to England. This was the case with Robert Vaulx,¹ John Greene,² and Francis Lee.³ Participation in commercial exchange with the Virginians does not appear to have been the direct means of acquiring vast fortunes on the part of the merchants who resided in the mother country, although it is known that many persons engaged in this trade were men in affluent circumstances. Of the twenty-four who, towards the close of the seventeenth century, furnished the greater portion of the supplies of various kinds imported into the Colonies of Maryland and Virginia, not one bore a name

which is identified in an illustrious degree with the subsequent history of England either in a social or political way.¹

There is reason to think that the trade with Virginia was not steadily lucrative to an uncommon degree after all the necessary charges had been met, although the nominal margin of gain appeared to be very large. This margin is easily discovered through the whole extent of the century. In the winter of 1623, which, as has been seen, was one of such extraordinary want as to raise the prices of all articles of food to a point hitherto unknown. George Harrison wrote to his brother in England that if he would secure a vessel and send her to Virginia with a cargo of wine, butter, cheese, sugar, and other provisions, he could easily obtain a profit of two hundred pounds sterling at the least, about five thousand dollars in our modern currency. The amount required for the purchase of such a cargo in England rendered this sum equivalent to a gain of not less than fifty per cent, perhaps even to a gain of a hundred.¹ In 1626, the margin, after paying three shillings a pound for tobacco, was so small, that the English merchants declared that there was no inducement to exchange their goods for that commodity. The regulation fixing this as the price was revoked, and the English traders permitted to obtain, for their goods, tobacco at the lowest rates at which they could purchase it, in order to ensure some profit after the payment of all expenses.² This profit is stated to have ranged in 1638 from six to ten pence on each pound of that product disposed of at wholesale.³ About

the middle of the century, the difference in the price of goods in England and Virginia was in the ratio of two to three. When Sir Edward Verney decided to send his son to the Colony to open a plantation, he wrote for information to an agent in London who enjoyed the fullest opportunities of learning the relative values of articles in the two countries; there was nothing, this agent replied, that costs twenty shillings in England which would not, if conveyed to Virginia, bring thirty shillings.¹ The margin of advance, thirty-three and one third per cent, was not extraordinary when it is recalled that out of it the duty on English exports as well as the duty on Virginian imports, if they happened to be liquors, had first to be paid, not to mention the heavy charge upon each ton of freight in the ocean voyage.² In 1658, a grandson of Sir Richard Newport, who lead been a resident of Virginia for several years, returned to his English home with the report that the profits of trade with the planters were so small as to be unworthy of consideration.³ At later periods, there were times in which the chance of gain fell off to such a point that the merchants no longer regarded it as advisable to transport their commodities to the colonial market. In 1690, Colonel Fitzhugh complained of the great uncertainty as to whether vessels from England would in that year make their appearance in the waters of the rivers in his part of Virginia.⁴ Scarcity of shipping in the James was not infrequently a subject of comment with Colonel

Byrd in his correspondence, the explanation being the same in both instances. The margin of gain was very high in some years, but on the average perhaps was moderate only. Colonel Fitzhugh, who was unusually familiar with all the conditions affecting it, declared that unless the tobacco obtained in exchange for goods had been purchased at a very low figure, the chief means by which the fortunes in that age were accumulated, the profit even in favorable years would be quite meagre. A variety of points had to be weighed in considering the prospect of securing even this degree of profit. These points included the length of the stay which the ship containing the cargo of merchandise would be compelled to make in Virginia before the goods could be sold, this being necessarily a source of great expense; the outlay required to cover the charges for storage and dunnage; the commission fees to be paid to the factors; the losses frequently incurred by their dishonesty, or, if they were conscientious in their dealings, by their negligence and carelessness, whether they were natives of Virginia or England; the uncertainty in relying upon an agent if he was expected to perform the duties of a shipmaster, since if he gave the greater part of his attention to the sale of his cargo, and in pursuit of that purpose absented himself from his ship, his crew would be slow in moving the vessel from place to place where tobacco was to be secured; and if, on the other hand, he showed indifference in looking for purchasers, a still greater amount of time would be lost to the merchant in whose employment he was engaged.¹

None of these considerations had application in the cases in which the planter shipped his annual crop directly to the merchant in England, with instructions to exchange it for certain commodities to be returned to Virginia. There

was probably no one who produced tobacco in very large quantities who was not in correspondence with persons engaged in business residing in London, Bristol, Plymouth, Liverpool, and other English towns on the seaboard or river coast. As early as 1628, perhaps in consequence of the exactions of the traders in Virginia, some of the colonists united in exporting their tobacco to the mother country, where it was sold for the articles they needed.¹ This course of action was continued by individual planters, especially by those who purchased the crops of their neighbors in great quantities in hope of securing a wide margin of gain; the consignments of such men were eagerly sought by the English merchant, as in the bulk they were so large as to afford a certain profit. Every shipment by the planter in Virginia to his English correspondent was accompanied by a bill of lading, giving the person to whom it was addressed the right to sell the products named in it; the English merchant thus brought into relations with the colonist was not only his commission merchant in the modern sense of the term, but also his general banker, having many hundred pounds sterling on deposit to his credit.² These balances were easily converted into such goods as the planter thought proper to direct to be sent him; if the cost of the articles specified, as a whole, should exceed the amount of money resulting from the sale of the tobacco, the merchant was

instructed to abate the order, or was requested to cover the deficiency upon the strength of a promise to make a second consignment to him.¹ Many disputes arose between the planters and their English correspondents as to fairness of dealing respecting the charges for commission and as to the quality of goods returned. The original prices

were also at times causes of much dissatisfaction, and these grounds for occasional discontent partially explain the number of English merchants with whom the Virginian dealt when he was in the habit of exporting tobacco to England on his own account. The reasons for dissatisfaction, however, were not all on the side of the planter; there were cases in which the English trader had occasion to regret that he had advanced supplies beyond the value of the consignment which he had received. In 1688, a petition was brought before the Privy Council, in which it was affirmed that Edmund Scarborough was indebted to the petitioners to an extent exceeding seven hundred pounds sterling, the consideration being large quantities of goods shipped from time to time to Scarborough’s plantation, which still remained unpaid for. This sum amounted in our modern currency perhaps to sixteen or seventeen thousand dollars.¹

The articles ordered by the planters of their English merchants represented a great variety in kind and quality. Striking instances of this fact are scattered throughout the letter books of Fitzhugh and Byrd. On one occasion Fitzhugh instructs his English merchant to send to him five dozen gallon stone jugs;² on another, a new featherbed with curtains and valance, and also an old featherbed, as he had been informed that one which had never been used was apt to be full of dust. On still another occasion he wrote for two quilts, a side-saddle, a large silver salt-cellar, a pair of woman’s gallooned shoes, a table, a case of drawers and a looking-glass, two leather carpets, several gallons of oil, and a box of glass with white lead and colors.³ Many of the orders given by Fitzhugh

related to clothing. Writing in 1681 to his merchant in London, he directed that the balance which remained undisposed of after the several commissions he had given had been filled, should be expended in the purchase of linen, including the finest holland. There should also be one piece of kenting and several pieces of dimity. The selection was left to his correspondent.¹ In a subsequent letter Fitzhugh expresses himself in less general terms, in asking to be sent to him, with bills of lading, to be delivered at his landing, a certain quantity of kerseys, cottons, and coarse canvas, thread and silk, shoes and ironware, and also a hundred-weight of Gloucester cheese.² Several years afterwards he directed Mr. Sergeant in London to devote the proceeds of the tobacco which he had just shipped to him to the purchase of kerseys, cottons, blue linen, a bale of canvas, thirty ells of holland sheeting, nails, hoes, and axes.³ His orders were not forwarded to London merchants alone. In 1681, he is found in correspondence with Stephen Watts of Bristol, who is told to return for the tobacco consigned to him two dozen pairs of shoes, among other articles,⁴ and similar instructions were given by him to merchants who resided in other towns in England. Fitzhugh, by this course of exchange, obtained goods not only for use in his own household, but also for sale to his neighbors.

Colonel William Byrd, whose home was situated on James River, which was in more direct communication with England than the Potomac and even the Rappahannock, was equally in the habit of giving to his English merchants both large and small commissions, to be filled on receipt of the tobacco and bills of exchange forwarded by him. In 1685, he is found writing for a hat and a pair

of shoes, and in the same year for a saddle and for letter paper. In 1690, he orders to be sent to him half a dozen riding neck-cloths and two or three pairs of linen stocks. While his house at Westover was in the course of erection in 1690, he instructs his English merchant to ship to him in Virginia a bedstead, bed, and curtains, a looking-glass, one small and one middling oval table, and a dozen Russian leather chairs. From time to time he procures from England through the same agency clothing of every kind and a great variety of European wines.¹

It was not uncommon for the captain of a vessel on the point of transporting the crop of a planter to England, to enter into a contract with him, by the terms of which, the shipmaster was to exchange his cargo in the mother country for goods specified in the agreement between the two parties. An instance of this nature is found in the records of Rappahannock for 1669. Thomas Butler of that county in this year bound himself to deliver to George Brown, the captain of the Elizabeth of London, three hogsheads of sweet-scented tobacco belonging to the choicest portion of his crop. Brown was to carry this tobacco to England and there was to dispose of it for money sterling. After having laid aside twenty-two pounds for his own use, the amount of a claim which he held against Butler for goods previously sold to him, Brown was to employ whatever remained in buying linen and woollen cloths, shoes, and stockings, to be conveyed to Butler in Virginia.²

The general course of the English merchant in dealing with the planters was to send out a cargo to Virginia, there to be placed in the hands of a factor who had received

formal authority to serve as his agent. The character of this cargo depended in large measure upon the special line of trade which the person who dispatched it pursued. Every branch appears to have been represented by the English merchants who had commercial intercourse with Virginia in the seventeenth century; there were tallow-chandlers, haberdashers, distillers, stationers, pewterers, fletchers, ironmongers, cordwainers, apothecaries, felt-makers, merchant tailors, weavers, goldsmiths, coopers, vintners, and woollen drapers. Only in a few cases did they, in the powers of attorney which they gave to their factors in the Colony, describe themselves as tobacconists.¹ The value of the goods sent by the English traders to the Colony was very great; those included in a single shipment made in 1681 were held at twelve thousand pounds sterling.² Instances of cargoes appraised at two thousand pounds sterling were not uncommon, a sum with a purchasing power perhaps equivalent to as much as fifty thousand dollars at present.³ A fair notion may be obtained of the size of many of these cargoes from the warrants issued in the time of the Protectorate giving permission to merchants to transport shoes to Virginia, there being a law then prohibiting the exportation of leather without a special license from the Government. In 1653, licenses of this kind were granted to the masters and owners of twelve

vessels to carry out respectively eighteen hundred pairs, making twenty-one thousand and six hundred pairs in all;¹ five years later, the masters and owners of ten ships were authorized to export to Virginia twenty-four thousand pairs.² During the forty years which elapsed between the Restoration and the close of the century, the increase in this one item of imports must have been extremely large in consequence of the growth in population.³ The same expansion, it is reasonable to infer, extended to the great variety of other goods brought in at the same time.

If the English merchant who had determined to export goods to Virginia did not possess a ship in which they might be conveyed, he entered into a contract with the owner of a vessel for their transfer, the goods themselves, however, remaining in charge of the person whom he had appointed to accompany them. Several traders who followed different branches of business often united in chartering a ship and employing a single factor to represent their several interests in the cargo. In many cases, the captain of the vessel acted for the English merchant whose property he had taken on board, such an agent receiving instructions which were generally placed on record as soon as he arrived in the Colony.⁴ The commodities transported

were stored in large cases, chests, trunks, hogsheads, barrels, and casks. At times, a heavy loss resulted to the owner not only from rough handling and the casualties of an ocean passage, but also from embezzlement by the seamen and even by the master of the ship.¹ If a war was in progress, there was always peril of capture by the enemy. In 1665, the Dutch, who were then engaged in hostilities with the English, destroyed a fleet of merchantmen in the mouth of the James. From the earliest period, the vessels employed in the Virginian trade were under the necessity of carrying guns. In 1633, the number in single instances ranged from twenty to twenty-four.² A provision

was expressly adopted that each ship plying between the mother country and the Colony should not only be furnished with mounted cannons, but should also keep on board men who had been trained in their use. At the time of the passage of this law, there was danger of pirates making an attack upon the vessels entering or leaving the mouth of the Chesapeake.¹ In 1681, a ketch was furnished by the English Government for the protection of the Virginian coast as well as for the arrest of illegal traders. Occasions arose when its assistance was very much needed; thus in 1699, the Maryland Merchant, while lying in the waters of Virginia, was seized and plundered by an unknown ship carrying thirty guns and manned by a large crew. The Governor took immediate steps to warn the people of Elizabeth City, Norfolk, Princess Anne, Accomac, and Northampton Counties of the presence of these dangerous outlaws. The commander of the militia in each of the counties named was instructed to appoint persons to keep watch along the shore, each one having a certain distance to patrol. As soon as there was reason to suspect the presence of pirates, information was to be given to the nearest commissioned officer, who in turn was at once to communicate with the commander of his district.² As late as 1692, Fitzhugh, considering the

perils to which a merchantman was exposed both on the inward and outward voyage, declared that a person engaged in the Virginian trade might be worth one thousand pounds sterling to-day and to-morrow lose the last groat.¹ The policies ordinarily secured upon a cargo by its owner did not extend to the acts of public enemies. The insurance was five guineas upon every one hundred guineas’ worth of goods.²

In the instances in which the English merchant owned the ship transporting his commodities to the Colony, the most serious charge which he had to meet was the wages of his captain and seamen, an item of importance on account of the length of the voyage, since the vessel not infrequently took a circuitous route, touching first at the Canaries, then at Barbadoes, and finally reaching an anchorage in the waters of one of the Virginian rivers.³ The remuneration of the shipmaster was probably about nine pounds sterling a month;⁴ that of a sailor in 1668 was thirty shillings for the same length of time.⁵ There is an instance recorded in Lower Norfolk in 1680 in which a common mariner was paid only eight shillings. Fifteen years later, there was a second instance in the same county,

in which a seaman received by the month two pounds and four shillings; a chief mate, four pounds; a ship physician and carpenter, three pounds and ten shillings respectively. In 1695, a suit was brought in Lower Norfolk for work performed on the vessel of Captain Phillips during the course of twenty-five days and twenty-four nights, at the rate of eighteen pence for each twelve hours.¹

If the merchant was not the owner of a vessel, his principal expense in transporting his goods to the Colony was the charge for freight. The rates did not vary materially in any part of the seventeenth century. During the administration of the Company, the cost was three pounds sterling a ton;² in one case recorded, of that period, a rate of two pounds sterling was offered and accepted.³ In 1649, the freight charge upon each ton was three pounds, and at this figure it remained.⁴

The seamen were far from being a class of men on whom reliance could be placed. As soon as Virginia acquired a very considerable population, there was a strong disposition on the part of many of the persons thus employed to desert their vessels upon their arrival in the Colony, and by 1690, the evil had grown to such proportions that a special proclamation was issued by Governor Nicholson with a view to suppressing it. In order to increase the vigilance of shipmasters, a bond with a penalty of one thousand pounds sterling was required of them that they would return all the sailors to England whom they had brought into Virginia. They were commanded to act with the utmost fairness to their seamen, who, in

case the contracts with them as to food and other necessaries were not faithfully performed, had the right to enter complaint with the nearest justice of the peace. Particular orders were published that no one should entertain a fugitive mariner, and that all ferrymen should refuse to set him over their ferries unless he could present a note from his captain showing that he had received permission to leave his ship. Any person could arrest him without warrant.¹

Every vessel arriving in the Colony was compelled to show a cocquet upon pain of confiscation. It had also to pay certain duties imposed by law. What was known as the castle duty was established in February, 1631-32, at which time a fort at Point Comfort was in the course of erection.² This tax consisted of one barrel of powder and ten iron shot.³ The fort was completed in the autumn of 1632, and the provision as to the amount of powder and shot to be delivered by every ship on its arrival was expressly renewed. In 1632, each vessel was made subject to the payment of one-quarter of a pound of powder and a proportionate quantity of shot for every ton represented in its bulk.⁴ Three years after this enactment, the number of forts in Virginia had increased to five. The duty was now placed at fifty pounds of powder for every vessel

of two hundred tons and an amount in proportion for every ship of greater or smaller burden; a proportionate quantity of shot, match, and other material used in defence was also to be delivered.¹ The merchants of all classes complained of these charges as well as of the tax imposed for administering the oath of allegiance to each passenger who arrived in the Colony and for registering each hogshead sent out.² In 1643, the law of 1633 was reënacted.³ The quantity of powder to be paid in settlement of the castle duty was in 1645 increased from one-quarter of a pound to one-half for every ton in the burden of the ship, the quantity of shot or lead being fixed at three pounds. As a means of ensuring a full collection of these articles, officers were appointed upon every river of importance in the inhabited parts of Virginia, who were to receive the duties in kind or in valuable commodities, and in case of collusion between the master of a vessel and the person in charge of a port, the recognizance of the latter was to be forfeited.⁴ The change in the material in which the castle duties were to be paid, tobacco or whatever product formed the freight of the ship being substituted for powder and shot, and delivered not when the vessel arrived but when she departed, is to be ascribed to the fact that a few years before, these duties had, under an Act of the General Assembly, been appropriated to the Governor instead of going as before to the captains of the forts.⁵ This change did not continue for many years. In the session

of 1661-62, the castle duties were again made payable in powder and shot at the rate of half a pound of powder and three pounds of leaden shot for every ton represented in the burden of each ship arriving. It was permitted, however, to a master of a vessel to settle these duties in money sterling or in bills of exchange.¹ Many owners of ships engaged in the trade with Virginia complained in the following year that it was a great hardship to require them to pay twelve pence as a castle duty upon every ton of merchandise they imported, and they petitioned that instead they should be allowed to deliver half a pound of powder and three pounds of lead towards the defence of the plantations.² This request apparently failed to receive a favorable response. In 1680, the amount which it was optional for the shipowners to substitute for powder and shot was fixed at one shilling and three pence a ton.³ A tonnage tax of fifteen pence was imposed upon every vessel arriving in the Colony towards the end of the century.⁴ A present of liquor or provisions to the Governor by the shipmaster on anchoring, which in the beginning was a mere act of courtesy,⁵ came in time to be a recognized charge, amounting to twenty shillings on each vessel above one hundred tons and thirty shillings if under. Culpeper remitted the gift in consideration of the payment of its value in tobacco or coin.⁶

A complaint was raised in 1660 by the masters of merchantmen, that on arriving at the mouth of the James, they found no one to steer their vessels up that stream, and no beacons to mark the sites of shoals in its waters. With a view to removing the ground of this complaint, Captain William Oewin was appointed the chief pilot in James River, and to encourage him in the performance of the duty thus imposed on him, he was allowed the privilege of demanding five pounds sterling from the master of every vessel above eighty tons who engaged his services, and forty shillings from the captains who declined the offer. Every ship dropping anchor in the Roads was required to pay Captain Oewin a fee of thirty shillings. This was not so much of a gratuity as it appeared, since he was expected to maintain beacons at every point between Willoughby Shoals and Jamestown where navigation was dangerous. If these beacons were removed or destroyed, it was his duty to replace them before the expiration of fifteen days.¹ The successor of Captain Oewin was Captain Chichester, who was followed by his son. The position was filled by the latter during the time of the second administration of Sir William Berkeley, and during the whole of the official terms of Culpeper and Howard. In a petition presented to Governor Nicholson in 1691, he referred to himself as for a period of many years the only pilot in James River who was serving under commission front the colonial authorities. The duties of his office occupied his whole time and was his only means of livelihood[.] In order that there might be competent men at hand to take his place when he died or became disabled by accident or old age, he declared himself ready to instruct apprentices in the art of his calling and to inform

them as to all dangerous points in the waters in which he served as pilot.¹

At an early period in the history of the Colony, strict laws were passed prohibiting the master or owner of a ship from breaking bulk before his vessel came to anchor off Jamestown Island. The object of these laws in the beginning was to put a stop to forestalling and engrossing commodities, as an evil especially injurious to Virginia because its population was so far removed from the source of manufactured supplies. In later times, the desire to promote the growth of Jamestown by making it the only port of entry was an important motive in the passage of the same class of Acts; and after the imposition of a duty on all liquors brought into the Colony, the determination to secure the full amount of the public funds arising from this tax, which could be done only by requiring all vessels arriving to hold their cargoes unbroken until the port of entry had been reached, was an additional reason for these enactments. As early as 1617, Governor Argoll instructed the masters of all ships dropping anchor at Kecoughtan to refuse permission to their sailors to go on land or to the colonists to come on board, as the mariners, when allowed to have personal intercourse with the people, obtained an opportunity of disposing of the goods consigned to persons in Virginia who happened to have died before the arrival of the ship.² It was provided in 1623, by an Act of Assembly, that as soon as a vessel reached anchorage at Point Comfort, an officer should go on board and read a proclamation directing that without the express permission of the Governor and

Council, no part of the cargo was to be sold previous to the arrival of the ship at Jamestown, and this proclamation was ordered to be nailed to the mast as a means of giving it the fullest publicity.¹ The General Court, in 1626, adopted the rule that no one among the colonists should be allowed to enter a vessel on its way to that place without special license from the authorities. This was in strict conformity with the instructions received by Yeardley in the course of this year on his appointment to office.² That the provision was enforced is shown by the fact that in 1627, Michael Wilcox, a planter, was fined because he had gone on board of the Charlie while it was lying at anchor in James River and purchased twelve pounds of sugar.³ So firmly resolved was the local government that no permission should be granted to shipmasters and owners to break the bulk of their cargoes, whether to sell in large quantities to a forestaller who might propose to take advantage of the necessities of the people, or to a person like Wilcox, who was only seeking to supply his private wants, that when the Marmaduke in 1626 ran aground below Mulberry Island, orders were given that no goods should be removed from her with a view to lightening the vessel for the purpose of floating her, unless the owners of these goods gave assurance that the merchandise, when removed, should be brought to Jamestown, without any effort being made in the interval to dispose of it by secret bargains and indirect sales.⁴ In 1632, the Act requiring that a proclamation should

be nailed to the mast of every ship arriving at Point Comfort in prohibition of all breaking of bulk before Jamestown was reached, was passed a second time, the penalty imposed for its violation being the forfeiture of the goods and the imprisonment of the captain for a period of four weeks.¹ This severity appears to have had no deterring effect upon the shipmasters and owners; they continued to make sales and contracts for the future disposition of merchandise, as their vessels pursued their way up the river. So notorious did this custom become that it was found necessary to assign an officer of the law to each ship arriving at the Point, whose duty it was to accompany the vessel placed under his supervision to Jamestown.² The instructions of Wyatt, when he was appointed to the governorship in 1638-39, and of Berkeley in 1641, when he was named for the same office, expressly directed them to prohibit the breaking of bulk before anchor was cast at that port. Berkeley was commanded to see that warehouses were erected there for the reception of goods upon their removal from the ships.³

In spite of these repeated provisions, there is reason to think that planters found their way on board of vessels in the river, for the purpose of making purchases, without any serious obstructions. In the fight which took place near Blunt Point between a Bristol frigate and two ships from London, the one being in sympathy with the cause of the King, the others with that of Parliament, the only person killed was a citizen of the Colony who had gone on board to buy merchandise.⁴ It was impossible to enforce a law which produced such serious inconvenience.

Wishing to conform to the instructions from England, and at the same time recognizing their impracticability, the Assembly in 1661 passed an Act compelling all vessels after reaching Virginia to make entry at Jamestown, but granting their masters and owners the right to obtain a license to engage in trade in any part of the Colony.¹

Previous to the appointment of collectors, the master of a ship which had just dropped anchor at Jamestown was expected to deliver to the authorities an invoice of the goods in his vessel when he reached Point Comfort.² At one time he was required to certify his arrival to the Governor.³ When the rule compelling every ship discharging its cargo in Virginia to make entry at Jamestown fell into abeyance, it became the duty of the master to report his arrival to the officer in the waters of whose jurisdiction his vessel happened to stop, and his failure to do so exposed him to its seizure.⁴ Much complaint arose at one time that the captains who were under the necessity of going to the home of this officer in order to make a legal entry, after incurring great inconvenience and serious expense in the journey, very frequently failed to find him.⁵ This evil does not appear to have been corrected as late as 1689, the performance of the duties of the collectors being left to deputies.⁶ In the session of 1692-93, it was provided by an Act of Assembly, that the officers who were empowered to enter all ships arriving in the Colony should either themselves or in the persons of their substitutes, reside in the places which had been named as

legal ports.¹ The fee for entering a vessel in one of these ports was the same as that for clearing, namely, fifteen shillings, if the vessel was twenty tons or less in burden, and thirty if it exceeded that number; this fee included the charge not only for making entry, but also for issuing a license to trade, and for taking the bonds required of all the shipmasters at this time.²

In 1671, Sir William Berkeley affirmed, in response to an inquiry made by the Commissioners for Foreign Plantations, that at this time no duty was imposed upon any article imported into the Colony.³ This had not always been the case. Ten years previously, in consequence of the numerous diseases which, it was supposed, were produced by the free use of liquors among the planters, a tax of six pence had been laid upon every gallon of rum brought into Virginia by a vessel not owned entirely by its citizens, and the same provision was adopted with reference to pavele sugar.⁴ This duty was not to become operative until 1663, and in the following year it was abolished on the ground that it raised a serious obstruction in the way of the prosperity of the general trade of the Colony.⁵ It was, however, at a later date reimposed on rum, and was subsequently extended to wine, brandy, and other spirits. At first the amount was three pence a gallon, but this was increased in 1691 by a penny in the case of all liquors imported unless they came directly from England. No spirits were to be transferred from the ship to the shore until the duty had been paid, generally in the form of either money sterling or bills of exchange, to the officers appointed to receive it .⁶

After the revocation of the charter, the master or factor in charge of a cargo, on reaching Jamestown, was required to wait until ten days had passed before he should attempt to dispose of the goods in his care, the object of this provision being that the colonists should have full opportunity to learn of the arrival of the vessel and time to make a journey to Jamestown to purchase such parts of its contents as they wanted.¹ By the Act of 1633, all the commodities landed at that place to be bartered for tobacco had to pass through the hands of the storekeeper who had charge of the general warehouse at that point, a certain percentage being granted him in the exchange.²

The most careful regulations were adopted to prevent the forestallment and engrossment of merchandise after it had been landed and offered for sale. This was one reason, as has been shown, for the passage of the series of Acts requiring all ships that arrived in the Colony to keep their cargoes intact until Jamestown had been reached. One of the first measures of the Company after the election of Southampton to the treasurership was to instruct the authorities in Virginia to exercise unceasing vigilance in suppressing every attempt to buy up the great bulk of commodities with a view to raising prices to an exorbitant extent by anticipating the market.³ In a dispatch to the Governor and Council, forwarded in the Warwick in 1621, the effort to monopolize the principal articles imported during the previous year, as a part of the supplies of the Magazine, was condemned with great severity on the ground that it not only restricted the profits of the joint stock by means of which these supplies

had been purchased, but also compelled the people to pay at high rates for goods which could have been bought at low rates if obtained directly from the Magazine itself.¹ Replying to these communications, the Governor and Council after reprobating the engrossing and forestalling of merchandise as wrong in themselves, firmly denied that they had been practised in Virginia.² When Wyatt was appointed to administer the affairs of the Colony, he came over with special instructions to put a summary stop to these forms of extortion, if they should be found to exist, and if not, to adopt measures which would prevent their arising.

The General Court passed an order in 1626, forbidding any person who had purchased goods in Virginia to dispose of them at prices higher than he had paid for them, under a penalty of five hundred pounds of tobacco; and in 1629, a second order of the same court fixed the penalty at an amount of that commodity representing three times the value of the articles sold.³ In 1630, it was enacted that no one should be allowed to buy imported merchandise, whether on board ship or ashore, unless he intended to apply it to his own use, and if he found that he had purchased a greater quantity than he really needed, he should have the right to dispose of his surplus only at the rates at which he had acquired it. Goods were to be exchanged only on the basis of six pence for every pound of tobacco.⁴ In 1622, a forestaller was legally defined as a man who had obtained, under the terms of a contract, actual possession of merchandise or right to its possession before it reached

Jamestown, whether introduced by land or by water. There were also included in the same category, all who used any subterfuge whatever for the purpose of enhancing the price of goods when offered for sale in the market or who prevented their transportation to market at all.¹ In 1633, the special articles in which it was thought advisable that there should be no forestallment by purchase from the importing merchant, were shoes, Irish stockings, and coarse woollen and coarse linen stuff designed to be converted into shirts and sheets for the use of servants.² The regulation prohibiting the acquisition of these articles for the purpose of reselling them, was held not to apply to persons who bought for the benefit of planters who resided in remote places; to such persons was granted the right to increase the amount of the purchase money by a margin of gain that would be sufficient to compensate for the risk and inconvenience attending the transportation of the goods; but they were to secure no merchandise except what had been specifically ordered by the planter.³ In the course of the same year, it was provided by law that in buying such merchandise, tobacco should be rated at nine pence a pound, an advance of three pence over the price laid down three years previously.⁴ In 1644, all the Acts for the suppression of engrossing were expressly repealed and the privileges of an absolute free trade in their business dealings with each other were allowed to all the people of the Colony.⁵

In the session of 1654-55, an Act was passed which established markets at certain points in Virginia;⁶ every shipmaster was required to transport his cargo to some one of these markets under the penalty of being considered

a forestaller according to the provisions of the laws of England. A few years later, the statute granting free trade to the colonists among themselves was reënacted, apparently indicating that the regulations for the suppression of engrossing and forestalling had again come into operation although at one time repealed.¹ In the instructions for the guidance of Culpeper when he became Governor, he was ordered to put an end to every form of these evils practised in Virginia, but he denied very emphatically that they had any existence in his jurisdiction;² notwithstanding this, the same command was repeated in the instructions given a few years later to Howard on his assuming the reins of administration. In the statement of grievances presented by the authorities of Northampton to the three commissioners from England who arrived after the collapse of the insurrection of 1676, it was declared that in this county, the engrossing of merchandise was carried on to such an extent as to prejudice the welfare of the community at large; an earnest petition was in consequence entered that no person should be suffered to purchase after the arrival of a ship a larger quantity of goods than he could pay for out of the proceeds of his annual crop.³

The importance in public estimation of the regulations as to forestalling, which involved engrossing, was shown as long as these regulations remained in the statute book by the penalties prescribed for their violation. For the first offence, the punishment was imprisonment during two months without bail; for the second offence, six

months; for the third offence, exposure in the pillory, forfeiture of goods and imprisonment for such a length of time as the Governor should decide to be proper.¹ The laws against forestalling between 1630 and 1640 were but a reflection of the same class of enactments in operation in England. As early as the session of 1631-32, the House of Burgesses ordered that the English statutes hearing on this point should be proclaimed and executed in Virginia.² There was, however, far greater need of such laws there than in the mother country, the very fountain of the manufactured supplies which were so essential to the welfare of the population of the Colony. The volume of goods imported by the English merchants could rarely in any one year have been much in excess of the requirements of the planters. A successful attempt to advance the rates of these goods by obtaining a partial monopoly in them, was an injury to the general community even in the years in which tobacco commanded the most remunerative prices. Whenever the crop was cut short, or the rates at which the planters were compelled to sell were too low to ensure a profit, the hardships resulting from engrossing and forestalling under the most favorable circumstances were greatly increased.

It was not, however, to the interest of the merchant that the laws against engrossing and forestalling should be strictly enforced. His object was to sell the goods which he had on board of his ship or which he had transferred to land under care of himself or factor, to the first person who offered tobacco of fine quality for them, and to him it was a matter of indifference at what prices the buyer subsequently disposed of them among the inhabitants of the Colony. The need of the people for merchandise might have been great enough to constrain them to

pass a law prohibiting the exportation from Virginia of articles once imported, in case the exporter and importer were different persons,—such a law was actually passed,¹—and yet it would have been still to the advantage of the trader bringing in a cargo of commodities to sell them to the first person who was speculating upon the wants of the community. To be required to discriminate as to the individual purchaser was to impose upon the newly arrived merchant a burden of trouble and annoyance which was certain to render the law unpopular with himself and all the members of the class to which he belonged. What he desired was a free market, and the right to break the bulk of his cargo whenever a buyer appeared. All the restrictions upon the market and the buyer alike were finally abolished, not only because the quantity of goods imported increased enormously with the progress of the century, but also in consequence of the powerful influence exercised by the English merchants at home. Such an influence these men never failed to bring to bear when it was the question of removing some obstacle that diminished their profits by increasing their expenses, or which exposed them, in exchanging their commodities for tobacco, to grave inconvenience. When it was sought to establish a number of ports in Virginia by compelling traders to adopt certain places as their exclusive markets in the Colony, upon the penalty of punishment as forestallers if they disregarded the law to that effect, the undertaking resulted in failure, because it was opposed to the interests of this class. In claiming the right to land their cargoes at any point where purchasers offered, its members were simply adapting themselves to local conditions not to be disregarded without serious damage to all. The gain derived from a venture was moderate, even when they

were at liberty to follow the course that was suggested by the topography of the country and the system of plantations. Restrictive laws merely added to the drawbacks inherent in the physical character of Virginia. Owing to the dispersion of the plantations along the rivers, merchants were already forced to seek their markets at private landings, often several hundred miles apart, by the water highway.

The person in Virginia to whom goods from England were consigned was not infrequently a merchant who owned a share in them, and who, therefore, in selling, acted rather as a partner than as a factor; the profits of a venture were often for this reason divided among several trailers, only one of whom had either visited or resided in the Colony. As a rule, however, the factor, who, by the terms of the Navigation Act, must be a native or a naturalized subject of England, had no pecuniary interest in the cargo received by him beyond the commission on the sales. As early as 1639, this commission amounted to ten pounds of tobacco in the hundred.¹ In the latter part of the seventeenth century, the agent was entitled to ten per cent of that commodity passing through his hands, and five per cent of the goods. He was sometimes paid an annual salary.² Whether a native of Virginia or England, he derived his authority to act from a power of attorney drawn by the English merchant, acknowledged before an English notary and then forwarded to the Colony to be recorded in the county in which the factor was instructed to transact business.

In order to avoid the complications certain to arise in case the latter died without any one having the legal right to represent the interests of his principal, a second person was authorized on the same occasion to take the place of the original agent in this emergency.¹ A failure to provide against such a contingency was frequently the cause of serious loss. In 1638, John Woodcock, an English merchant who traded with the planters, was compelled by the death of his factor in Virginia and his consequent inability to collect debts from the persons into whose hands his goods had been dispersed, to make application to the Privy Council for assistance in his predicament; to this application, it ready response was given, and instructions were sent to the Governor and Council to aid Woodcock in securing what was due him.²

A second instance may be given. In 1672, one of the factors of George Lee, an English merchant, died in Virginia indebted to his principal in a balance of seven hundred pounds sterling. His property passed into the hands of his mother, who appointed an attorney to take charge of it. The latter proceeded immediately to convert the whole estate into tobacco, which he was about to ship to his own consignee in England, when the General Court interposed with an order requiring him to transfer the entire quantity to a third person in the mother country, until the justice of the claim of Lee on the property of his deceased agent had been decided. To facilitate this, all the books of the factor containing his accounts with his principal were directed to be sent to England.³

It not infrequently happened in the case of the death of a factor and the remarriage of his widow, if no one was appointed to act as his successor under it power of attorney from the owner of the goods, that the goods fell into the hands of the second husband, who very often showed no scruple in dealing with them as his private property. Such a case was that of Thomas Kingston, the agent of Thomas Cowell, who owned a plantation in the Colony about the year 1636. Kingston having died and his relict having become the wife of Thomas Loving, the latter at once appropriated the credits and merchandise of Cowell. Upon the petition of Cowell, Loving was required by the Governor and Council to take an inventory of the former’s property in his possession, and to give bond in a large sum to hold it without further purloining it.¹

Many of the factors proved themselves to be untrustworthy, and numerous suits arose in consequence of their defalcations. There were also many instances of controversies between the English traders and their agents, which were settled by boards composed of merchants residing in the Colony. The arbitrators appointed in the case of Lawrence Evans in 1638 were among the wealthiest and most prominent men interested in business in Virginia, including John Chew, Thomas Stegg, George Ludlow, and Thomas Burbage.² It was one of the conspicuous features of commercial intercourse with the Colony that all important portion of the dealings of

the persons engaged in it, whether living in Virginia or England, was transacted on a basis of credit, and many of the sales in consequence resulted in debts which it was found impossible to collect. This was a danger to which the trader was especially liable, not only in the early part of the seventeenth century when the population was still comparatively small, and when, its has been seen, there was a strong disposition among so many to move from one locality to another in search of virgin lands, thus enabling them to a large extent to evade their obligations, but also in the latter part of the century, when the older communities had become firmly established and their inhabitants as a mass fixed to the soil, with property that could be levied on without obstruction. A number of the planters were still disposed to shirk their debts and could only be trusted at a risk of loss. There were many instances of individuals among them who, having become deeply involved for advances of supplies, were induced to throw off the weight of their obligations by taking refuge in Maryland and so escaping the process of their creditors.¹ It was not improbably in consequence of this disposition to abscond on the part of debtors among the colonists, that the regulation was adopted that all persons residing in Virginia who decided to go on a journey or voyage beyond the boundaries of the Colony were required to put their intention on public record sometime beforehand, in order that it might become a matter of common notoriety.²

Strong influences were at work in the Colony encouraging the planter on the one hand to obtain credit from his merchant, whether residing in Virginia or acting in the person of his factor, and disposing the merchant on the other to extend it. Of all the staple crops, with the exception of cotton, tobacco is attended in its culture by the most numerous elements of speculation on account of the rapid fluctuations in its price. It may be depressed in the market during one year, and twelve months later be selling at very high rates. This was true of tobacco in the seventeenth century, as it is of the same commodity in the nineteenth. The Virginian planter in the seventeenth century, however much discouraged as to the results of the operations of one season, could indulge the hope that the following season would not only restore what he had lost on the crop of the present year, but add to the amount the margin of a very handsome profit. This expectation, which had its justification in actual experience, led him to make purchases on credit of goods from the importing merchants which the tobacco of the succeeding year did not always enable him to cover, and a series of unprosperous years not infrequently involved him in a slough of debts from which it was difficult, and, in many cases, impossible, to extricate himself. The merchant doubtless took a clearer view of the situation. It was natural that he should not be as sanguine as to the prices of future crops as the planter, and he sought to discount a possible period of depression twelve months later by selling not only at lucrative rates, but also in figures representing money sterling.

For the special encouragement of traders, an Act was passed in 1633 requiring that all contracts and bargains should be made and all accounts kept in money sterling, and not in tobacco, according to the prevailing custom at

that time;¹ this removed from the consideration received by the merchant in his sales that element of fluctuation which marked all valuation in the latter commodity from year to year. A large proportion of these sales were on credit in anticipation of the next year’s crop. In the course of this interval, the price of the leaf might sink to a point which would not only leave him without a margin of gain, but even expose him to heavy loss. If his contract had been drawn in figures representing a fixed amount in money sterling, his profit would be independent of an advance or decline in the value of tobacco, and the same would be true if his running accounts were kept in the same form. As a means of ensuring ample security for the payment of debts due them for advancement of goods, many of the merchants required a purchaser to give a bill to be placed on record in the books of the county court where the transaction occurred; in this document, be acknowledged the amount which he owed, accompanying the admission with a statement that the obligation was to be met in the succeeding autumn, when the tobacco crop had been got in. In case what was due was not settled, the creditor in the bill, that is to say, the merchant, could take possession of the landed property conveyed to him subject to the payment of the debt. If the crop in the autumn was sufficient to cover what was owed by the purchaser of the goods, he could claim a release in full.²

Another course followed by a merchant who had disposed of goods on credit was to insist that the purchaser should consent to a judgment in court in the amount of tobacco represented by his obligation, against all the property in his possession, and this judgment was enforced according to the provisions of a deed directing execution

to issue immediately upon the failure to pay at the appointed time.¹ In older to collect the debts which the planters in the Colony owed them, whether secured by a conditional deed or not, it seems to have been the custom of the English traders to send to Virginia agents who had, under powers of attorney carefully placed on record, the authority to represent their principals in suits if it was found necessary to have recourse to law to recover what was due. These men, like the ordinary factor who accompanied a cargo of goods, represented very frequently more than one trader. Merchants engaged in widely different branches of business seemed to have thus employed the same person.² The sea-captain especially was very often employed in this capacity, probably on account of the greater cheapness of his services, as the cost of the passage was thus saved. The agent was sometimes instructed to collect all the debts due his principal in Virginia, without regard to counties. In some instances, his jurisdiction was confined to one county. Very frequently, he was authorized to collect from a single person, this person being the regular factor of the principal in the Colony.

By the provisions of a law passed at the session of 1657-58, the creditor was deprived of all right to require the settlement of a debt on demand, if made payable in tobacco, except in the interval between October 10th and

January 31st.¹ If he was a resident of the Colony, he could bring no suit upon accounts which had been running three years; if a non-resident, on none which had been running five.² A strong disposition was shown at an early date to protect the debtor in cases in which he was unable to settle in kind. If he had promised to do so in grain, tobacco, and other agricultural products, and his crops failed or were destroyed, it was in 1644-45 provided that he should give an inventory of his estate to the creditor, and the Commissioners of Court should decide what part should be delivered in payment of his obligations.³ It was subsequently ordered that the valuation of the property of all persons who were imprisoned for debt and who were unable to settle in kind, should be made by two persons, one selected by the creditor and the other by the debtor, and whatever satisfaction they awarded should be final, and in case of a disagreement between the appraisers, the two next adjoining Commissioners should serve in their place.⁴ In 1663, it was provided that the debtor when laid under execution should first swear that he was unable to pay either in tobacco or money sterling; that he should then render an estate thrice the value of his debt; and that if he had no movable property, he should give an inventory of whatever he possessed to the creditor, who was to be at liberty to choose according to his preference. Whatever he selected was to be appraised by four men, two having been named for that purpose by each party. If the whole estate was not sufficient to discharge the obligation, the debtor remained in prison;⁵ from which it will be seen that the English law as to incarceration for

insolvency was in force in Virginia in the seventeenth century.¹

All debts made out of the Colony and due to merchants who did not live within its boundaries were subordinated to obligations contracted in Virginia, provided the claim based upon the latter was brought forward before the expiration of twelve months. If, however, the factor of the trader who was a non-resident took the precaution, two months after he arrived in the country with goods for sale, to enter on record the name of his principal and the value of the merchandise in his hands as agent, the principal acquired thereby all the rights enjoyed by the inhabitants of the Colony. A debt for goods was not recoverable in Virginia unless they had been really imported, no relaxation of the rule being allowed in case they had been captured by an enemy or had gone down in a wreck while on the way.² It showed the tenderness of the authorities for the merchants who, towards the end of the seventeenth century, supplied the people with commodities, that not infrequently when a debtor had fled, leaving a crop in the ground, which, unless worked and protected would go to ruin, the county court instructed the planter who lived nearest to the spot to give the tobacco the proper attention, compensation for his trouble and loss of time being subsequently allowed him.³

This spirit had not always been displayed towards the importing merchants. Their unconscionable dealings became at an early date the subject of legislative denunciation. To such a point were these exactions carried in 1628, that a large number of colonists, as we have seen, united in exporting their own tobacco to England and there exchanging it for the articles they required, instead of passing it into the hands of the English traders in return for goods at exorbitant charges. So great was the unpopularity of this class as late in the century as 1672, that during the course of the attack which the Dutch, then at war with England, made upon the fleet of vessels, which in that year were bound out of James River with heavy cargoes on board, the planters were not anxious to furnish assistance, alleging in excuse the oppressions of the owners of the cargoes.¹ The fault, however, did not lie entirely on the side of the latter. In the year 1632, when such a dearth of manufactured supplies prevailed in Virginia that vessels loaded with grain and tobacco had to be sent out to procure them from other Colonies, Captain Tucker, a leading trader, was accused of instructing his factors to sell only at the highest rates; this he denied, claiming that the planters were already deeply in his debt for goods advanced them, and that he was not justified in incurring the risk of additional loss, since there was already no profit in the prices at which his agents were selling.²

It was the most common ground of complaint against the merchants that they insisted on holding buyers to the payment of the quantity of tobacco agreed upon, notwithstanding

any rise in the price of that staple after the conclusion of the bargain. In such an instance, it was complained that the goods were sold at a more advanced rate than was anticipated. The course of events, however, might have worked in favor of the purchaser. Tobacco fell with as much rapidity as it rose. Articles to be paid for in so many pounds of that commodity in the following autumn might have been delivered when it was high, and before autumn arrived, might have fallen very low, entailing a heavy loss upon the trader. It is not likely that any complaint was heard from the planters in such a turn of prices as this.¹

Accusations of deception were also brought against many of the merchants in regard to the weights and measures which they used. The perpetration of this species of fraud, not only by the traders, but by the inhabitants of the Colony in general, became so notorious that a special law was passed, declaring the English statute concerning that offence to be in force in Virginia. Whoever endeavored to cheat by the use of false stillyards was required to pay to the person whom he had sought to injure three times the amount of damage which he would have inflicted by his deceit.² As a further means of discouraging the repetition of acts of this nature, every county was required to provide at the public charge scaled weights of half-hundred, quarterns, half-quarterns, seven, four, two, and one pounds, and measures of ell and yard, bushel and half-bushel, peck and gallon of Winchester measure, pottle, quart, pint, and half-pint; and these standards were to be used by all persons who were

not in possession of such as had been scaled or tried in England, upon the penalty of forfeiting one thousand pounds of tobacco. If the commissioners of the county, upon whom was imposed the duty of securing the proper measures and weights, failed to do so, they were to be fined five thousand pounds.¹

The measures and weights to be found at the different county seats were procured from England. In 1665, Colonel Lemuel Mason and Major Thomas Willoughby were appointed by the court of Lower Norfolk County to enter into an agreement with a reliable shipmaster to import a full set of these instruments for use in that county.² This was doubtless the manner in which they were always obtained.

The Navigation laws undoubtedly had the effect of placing the people more in the power of the English merchants by restricting to the latter the right of importing into the Colony all of its foreign supplies. These laws went into practical operation after the Restoration, and perhaps raised the prices of imported goods in Virginia higher at first than they did afterwards, when the demand for its staple in the English market had increased, furnishing a larger field for its sale, and when British shipping had grown in volume, thus reducing the charges for freight. It was observed as early as 1657, that shoes, bought at the rate of twelve pounds of tobacco during the time the Dutch traders were introducing supplies into the Colony, could not be obtained after the passage of the first

Navigation Act, which, as has been seen, was enforced with great laxity, for less than fifty pounds, and it was claimed that the prices of all other commodities rose in proportion, even before the second Navigation Act had excluded the merchants of Holland altogether.¹ The Act of 1660 added sensibly to the dearness of imported articles, because it removed all active competition between the Dutch and English. The Dutch trader had enjoyed a great advantage over the English in being able to sail his ship at lesser expense, not only because the vessel had more room, but also because it was manned by a smaller crew.² Throughout the greater part of the seventeenth century, the people of Holland were larger producers of certain kinds of manufactured goods than the people of England, and were in a position to sell at lower figures. As long as English and Dutch merchants stood upon an equal footing in the Colony, the English had to conform to the prices of the Dutch in disposing of their cargoes in Virginia, and from this fact its population reaped a decided advantage in the purchase of their supplies. The exclusion of the Dutch signified that the English trader was restricted only by competition with men of his own nationality in fixing his prices. The protection of the inhabitants lay in the improvement in the methods of British navigation, and in the increase in the number of persons engaged in commerce with the Colony. That this number was able in the last part of the century to supply the demand for goods is shown in the answer made by Culpeper in 1681 to the authorities in England who had instructed him to suppress every form of forestalling and engrossing; he declared that he had never received a single complaint with reference to such forms

of extortion; that they were not practised in Virginia; and that the Council were ignorant of the meaning of the terms.¹

However small or large the gains of the foreign merchant, whether dealing with the inhabitants of Virginia by means of annual vessels, the cargoes of which were peddled wherever on the various rivers purchasers could be found, or sold through factors or agents who resided in the Colony, which was the usual course, the profit was sufficiently great to tempt most of the enterprising planters to enter into trade on their own account. It was one of the most marked features of the economic life of Virginia in the seventeenth century, that the leading citizens were engaged in more than one pursuit. The lawyers and physicians were not only producers of tobacco, but also keen speculators who bought a large quantity of that commodity with goods or bills of exchange and shipped it to England to be disposed of by their representatives there. At a period as early as 1637, George Menefie, who was interested in planting, described himself as a merchant of the corporation of James City,² and he found distinguished successors as traders in tobacco at a later day in Fitzhugh and Byrd, who have left minute records in their correspondence of their different ventures. The authors of the Present State of Virginia, 1697, referred to the general class of merchants in the Colony as being simply country chapmen, but this was true only to the extent that they supplied the wants of a rural and scattered population.³ In 1687, it is stated that there were on all

of the navigable streams, from ten to thirty planters who had a part in this local trade,¹ and so considerable were the operations of these wealthy citizens in mercantile life, that Jones, who visited the Colony many years afterwards, affirms that they made as great and advantageous a business for the advancement of the public good as most merchants upon the Royal Exchange in London. He especially commended the “fair and genteel” way in which they carried on their transactions.² These merchant planters were men of the first consequence in the Colony, sitting not only as members of the house of Burgesses, but also as Councillors of the State and filling all of the higher offices. With few exceptions, the foundation of the great fortunes in lands, negroes, and live stock, which gave so much distinction to the leading families in the eighteenth century, had been laid in the seventeenth in largest part by trading in tobacco, in addition to cultivating that staple. The manner in which this trading was conducted is illustrated in many instances preserved in the letters of Colonel Fitzhugh. He was in the habit of contracting to deliver many thousand pounds of tobacco to the local representatives of an English merchant in return for so many pounds sterling worth of goods, and in case of a deficiency in the cargo he was to receive a certain amount of metallic money or a certain number of slaves and servants. The details of this arrangement had their counterpart, with some little variation, in the numerous bargains of other planters of the same period. Where such an agreement had been entered into with an English merchant, it was not uncommon to adopt the following plan in turning over the tobacco named in the stipulation:

as soon as the vessel arrived in Virginia, her master was handed notes for the delivery of one-third of her loading, these notes being honored at the rolling-houses where the tobacco was stored; when this part of the cargo had been taken on board, the planter was ready to give notes for the delivery of the second[,] third, and so on until the whole amount had been stored in the ship. In many instances, doubtless, he was prepared to transfer the whole amount in one series of notes. In a case mentioned by Fitzhugh, he contracted to deliver ninety-two thousand pounds, one-third of which was to be obtained from his own estate, and the other two-thirds from rolling-houses in his vicinity. Ninety-two thousand pounds made up a cargo of two hundred hogsheads, which, according to the prices prevailing at that time, were worth seven hundred and seventy-six pounds sterling. One-half of this amount, Fitzhugh desired to be paid him in the form of merchandise suitable to the needs of the country.¹ In a letter to Captain Samuel Jefferson in 1685, he proposed to deliver fifty thousand pounds of tobacco, in return for which he was to receive goods amounting in value to three hundred and fifty-eight pounds sterling.²

In the early history of the Colony, merchant planters in many instances had residences and storehouses at Jamestown while holding and cultivating large estates elsewhere; this was the case with John Chew, Arthur Bayley, and Edward Sanderson. Some at this period, on the other hand, lived on their plantations and kept

storehouses at Jamestown; this was the course followed by Abraham Piersey, the former Cape Merchant and the most prominent citizen in Virginia at the time of his death.¹ Very large areas of land were secured by men of this class in consideration of the importation or purchase by them of many servants and slaves. In 1638, George Menefie sued out a patent to three thousand acres on the basis of sixty head rights, and in the following year he acquired a patent to three thousand acres additional.² In 1634, Robert Vaulx and William Gooch obtained a patent to six thousand acres.³ Thomas Stegg, William Byrd, and others who combined the pursuits of trading and planting, are found from time to time acquiring large grants. Many of the English merchants owned much land in Virginia, not only in individual holdings, but also in partnership with persons who resided in the Colony.⁴

The store was one of the principal institutions in Virginia, whether the property of a foreign or a native merchant. In the course of time, stores which at first were confined to the principal ports were found in great numbers on every navigable stream, this situation being preferred not only because the adjacent country was the most thickly settled and the planters the wealthiest, but

also because the principal highways of each community were the creeks and rivers. The authors of the Present State of Virginia, 1697, complained that the stores were such important centres in each neighborhood that they had a powerful influence in repressing the growth of the towns, which it was sought to foster by legislation, and they suggested as the first step towards giving an impulse to the expansion of these towns that it should be required to build or keep open stores elsewhere.¹

The store was sometimes a room in the house of a planter; this was true in the case of the store of Robert Hodges of Lower Norfolk,² and also of Newell’s in York. Jerome Ham, who is described in the deed as “gentleman,” in making a lease of his plantation in the latter county, refers to his dwelling-house, kitchen, and store, as if they were grouped very closely together.³ The store was generally detached from the dwelling. It was probably as a rule a boarded house with a loft and with a shed.⁴ In the towns, it was very often a rented building; this being the case with the one at Hampton referred to in the records of Elizabeth City County for 1694. The charge for its use was twenty-five shillings a month.⁵

Whether the store was owned by a merchant who resided abroad, and who therefore carried on business through the agency of his factor, or was the property of a wealthy planter⁶ or a native merchant, the aim of the owner

was to supply the special goods demanded by the needs of the inhabitants of the Colony. To enumerate the contents of one of these establishments would be to name all the articles, with a few exceptions, in use in Virginia in the seventeenth century. A store in the rural districts of the State to-day is less of an epitome of the wants of the people in certain directions than it store in the valley of the James in the last half of the seventeenth century. In the present age, custom is diverted from the country store by the proximity of cities in which the best class of goods can be procured without difficulty, in person or by correspondence. It is true that in the seventeenth century, custom was diverted from the store by orders given to merchants in England, but these direct dealings with the mother country were practically restricted to planters engaged in trade or possessed of large wealth. It is not strange to find that cloths and garments made up the larger portion of the contents of the average establishment. In this respect, the inventory of the Hubbard store, situated in York County, which was taken in 1667, after the death of the owner, dud not differ from others which either preceded or followed it. It contained lockram, canvas, dowlas, Scotch cloth, blue linen, oznaburg, cotton, holland, serge, kersey, and flannel in bales, full suits for adults and youths, bodices, bonnets, and laces for women, shoes for persons of both sexes, gloves, hose, cloaks, cravats, handkerchiefs, hats, and other articles of dress in use in that age. In addition, there was a large miscellaneous collection of goods, such as hammers, hatchets, chisels, augers, locks, staples, nails, sickles, bellows, froes, saws, axes, files, bed-cords, dishes, knives, flesh-forks, porringers,

sauce-pans, frying-pans, gridirons, tongs, shovels, hoes, iron posts, tables, physic, wool-cards, gimlets, compasses, needles, stirrups, looking-glasses, candlesticks, candles, funnels, twenty-five pounds of raisins, one hundred gallons of brandy, twenty gallons of wine, and ten gallons of aquavitæ. The contents of the Hubbard store were valued at six hundred and fourteen pounds sterling, a sum which represented about fifteen thousand dollars in our present currency.¹

The inventory of the store of Edward Phelps, taken in 1679, showed the same enormous disproportion of cloths and clothing as compared with other kinds of goods. There were for one item alone about six hundred and seventy-five yards of linen of many varieties, and also about three hundred yards of woollen, eighty-one pairs of stockings, fifty pairs of shoes, a large quantity of tape, gimp and thread buttons, felt hats, blankets, curtains, and valances. In addition it included many articles of a miscellaneous character, such as smoothing-irons, scissors, knives, bellows, frying-pans, pots, kettles, spoons, hoes, axes, files and adzes, curry-combs, saddles, nutmegs, mustard, soap, twenty-four thousand ten-penny nails, seventeen thousand six-penny, eight thousand double-penny, one hundred and nine pounds of shot, twenty pairs of fishing lines, and fifteen hooks for sheepsheads. The contents of this store were appraised at one hundred and ninety-four pounds sterling, or about forty-eight hundred dollars in our present currency.²

The contents of the store kept by Mr. Isaac Cullen, as the agent of John Harris and John Cooper, merchants of England, in 1675, were chiefly composed of canvas, cottons, hollands, kerseys, Scotch cloth, jeans, broadcloth, blue linen, tape, ribbon, thread, buttons, combs, hose, shoes, and other articles for wear. The inventory of this store also included a large number of kitchen utensils, tools for the workshop, and scales and weights.

The inventory of the store owned by Colonel Francis Eppes of Henrico, taken in 1678, discloses contents still more remarkable for quantity, quality, and variety. In the matter of linen, there were one hundred and twenty ells of dowlas, fifty-one ells of oznaburg, sixty ells of canvas, three hundred and twelve ells of holland, and eighty yards of table and napkin diaper. There was a large quantity of serge, red cotton, kersey, broadcloth, Spanish cloth, white duffield, rugs, blankets, bed-ticking, sixty-two pairs of shoes, yarn and worsted hose for women and children, brown and white thread, tape, lace, hoods, pins, buttons, bodices and sleeves, razors, knives, scissors, shears, steel tobacco-boxes, pewter salts, candlesticks, tankards, spoons, tin quart pots, sauce-pans, lamps, cullenders, pepperboxes, lanterns, large and small fishing lines and hooks, wooden bellows and sifters, sieves, dishes, ladles and brooms, iron pots, chafing-dishes, frying-pans, shovels, spades, hoes, shares and colters, hammers, chisels, and augers, many thousand nails of all sizes, brass mortars, one barrel of powder, five barrels of shot, fifty pounds of sugar, half a firkin of butter, four pounds of ginger, and finally a small collection of books.¹

The store of Edward Lockey contained, in addition to the usual quantity of cloths and clothing, brass coat-buttons, a paper of hooks and eyes, andirons, sheep-shears, plough-chains, brass scales, and reap-hooks. Among the articles in the Foison store in Henrico were holland nightcaps, muslin neck-cloths, silk-fringed gloves, silver shoebuckles, embroidered holland waistcoats, two dozen pairs of white gloves, one lace cap, seven lace shirts, nine lace ruffles, holster caps of scarlet embroidered with silver and gold, gold and silver hat-bands, a parcel of silver lace, three yards of gold lace, and a feathered velvet cap. This storekeeper possessed at the time of his death eight buckskins and sixty-five doeskins. In the inventory of Edward Lockey, there were also three tanned doeskins.¹ There were few storekeepers in the Colony who were not engaged in the Indian trade, the exchange of merchandise for furs, skins, and other goods being attended with large profits. Guns, ammunition, rum, blankets, knives, end hatchets were the articles in greatest demand among the tribes. It will be interesting to make some examination of the various regulations which were from the earliest period adopted to control this trade. In the session of 1631-32 all traffic with the aborigines was prohibited, whether carried on by public or private enterprise.² In the following year, an Act was passed providing that

forfeiture of all his property and imprisonment for life should be inflicted upon any one who sold guns, powder, and shot to Indians or bartered these articles for their goods.¹ Previous to this time, it appears to have been the habit of many to purchase large quantities of cloth from the stores, and to exchange it for furs and skins, thus creating a dearth of this material, which led to much inconvenience and suffering among the planters; this trade was now forbidden unless the Governor had reason to know that the supplies of cloth to be found in the Colony could be diminished by partial withdrawal and dispersion among Indian buyers without trenching upon the needs of the people. A license, however, had to be obtained before this trade could be legally pursued.² Ten years later, the penalty for bartering guns, powder, and shot with the Indians was the forfeiture of his whole estate by the offender; if the commodities exchanged were ordinary goods, he was to undergo imprisonment for as long a period as the Governor and Council should consider his offence deserved.³

In 1656, the right was granted to every freeman to sell to the Indians any article not included in the list of those especially prohibited by law. It was still forbidden to exchange guns, powder, and shot.⁴ In 1658-59, this regulation was abolished on the ground that the people of the neighboring plantations, both English and Dutch, were furnishing the aborigines with large supplies of weapons and ammunition. By this alteration of the law, the safety of the Colony, it was stated, was not diminished, and the profits acquired by barter with the Indians were very much increased.⁵ It was soon found, however,

that the trade in arms and ammunition filled the settlements with rumors of projected outbreaks, leading to widespread uneasiness; it was determined, therefore, to require every person engaged in this trade, which seems at this time to have been practically confined to beaver, otter, and other furs, to obtain a commission from the Governor of the Colony. The latter was admonished to grant it only to those who were known to be distinguished for integrity, and who in consequence could be relied upon not to abuse the privilege.¹ This Act seems to leave been disregarded to a great extent, many unlicensed men continuing in a secret way to trade with the Indian tribes. To suppress this evil, it was provided that every uncommissioned person discovered dealing with the aborigines should forfeit treble the value of the articles which he obtained under these circumstances. All controversies between the Indians and the commissioned traders were to be settled by the Governor, or an arbitrator whom he should appoint for the purpose.²

The importance of the Indian trade was shown as early as 1663, by the report of a committee which at that time sat upon Indian affairs. This committee, finding that the traffic of the Virginians with the aborigines was seriously injured by the encroachments of the English and Indian inhabitants of Maryland, as well as of tribes residing further to the north, recommended that measures should be adopted to put a stop to this system of bartering on the part of these strangers, and in pursuance of this recommendation, a prohibitory law was passed.³ The exchange of arms and ammunition for the commodities of the Indians was again expressly interdicted in 1665.⁴ The punishment now prescribed was a fine of ten thousand

pounds of tobacco or imprisonment for two years, and if the offence was committed a second time, it was to be considered a felony. It was found later that far more severe steps had to be taken for the strict enforcement of the statute. In March, 1676, when the prospect of an Indian war was imminent, it was provided that all who supplied the aborigines with arms, powder, and shot should not only forfeit their whole estates but suffer death in addition. The only persons allowed to furnish friendly Indians with match-coats, hoes, and axes were such as had been nominated by the county courts.¹ One of the first of the laws passed by the Assembly controlled by Bacon made all trade with the aborigines illegal unless they were serving in the war with the English, in which case also no weapon or ammunition was to be given them.² In the following year, the right of absolute free trade was granted to the Indian population of the Eastern Shore,³ and a year later there was a relaxation of the rule forbidding all commerce with the tribes of the Western Shore, since it had been found highly injurious to the inhabitants of the Colony. Certain places were now appointed as public marts, to which all Indians who were at peace with the whites were invited to come at a specified time. These marts were situated respectively in Henrico, Isle of Wight, New Kent, Rappahannock, Lancaster, Stafford, Accomac, and Northampton, and were to be open in March, April, and May, and in September and November, the occasion for each being restricted to a day in one of the spring months and a day in one of the autumn. For each mart, an account of all the trading which took place there was kept by a clerk appointed by the Governor. The Wicocomico Indians in Northumberland

and the Cheskiack in Gloucester were to be permitted to trade with the English under special regulations adopted by the authorities of the counties in which they resided.¹ Three years subsequent to the passage of this Act, the rules it laid down were found to be the source of so much inconvenience that all obstructions to an absolute free trade with the friendly tribes were removed and the colonists were left at liberty to exchange commodities with them wherever and whenever the interests of both sides dictated. This rule was to remain in force only until the next Assembly convened, but in a few years it was reënacted in still more explicit terms. It was made “lawful for all persons at all times and at all places to carry on a free and open trade with all Indians whatsoever.”²

No description of the mercantile condition of Virginia in the seventeenth century would be complete without some reference to the repeated but unsuccessful attempts to establish regular markets in the Colony. The fair was one of the oldest of the trade institutions of the mother country, having its origin and principal encouragement in an age when population was sparse, and when it was therefore necessary to have fixed occasions on which people could come together from a distance and exchange their products. The introduction of the fair into Virginia would have been natural not only on account of the commercial traditions of the inhabitants as scions of the English stock, but also because of the scattered population of the Colony. In 1619, it was decided to hold markets every week at Jamestown, which was one form of the English fair. These markets were to be restricted to Wednesdays and Saturdays. The boundaries of the marketplace were to be carefully laid off. Execution was to issue upon any written and properly attested evidence

of debt that had been drawn in proof of a bargain entered into in its limits at any time between eight in the morning and six in the afternoon without the usual requirement of first obtaining judgment. The clerk was to record, in a book to be provided for the purpose, every bond, bill, or other writing passed in a sale, and if the amount represented in a bargain exceeded three hundred pounds of tobacco, his fee was to be four pounds, and if under that figure, one pound. Ground seems to have been assigned for the site of this market-place.¹

In 1655, the Assembly determined to establish one or more market-places in each county, to be situated in the neighborhood of a river or creek, with a view to greater accessibility. Here all the trade of the country was to be concentrated; the articles imported from England or elsewhere were to be brought to these points from the ports prescribed by law; and if the owners of such articles disposed of them without having done this, they were to be punished as forestallers. They were, however, left at liberty to sell their goods in any one which they preferred. All were to be kept open on certain days, but there was to be no conflict between the days of adjoining markets. The court-house, the prison, the offices of the clerk and sheriff, and, as far as possible, the churches and ordinaries of each county, were to be erected in the circuit of its market. When merchandise had been in the country for a period exceeding eight months, the owner could dispose of it wherever he wished without exposing himself to punishment as a forestaller.² It is a curious commentary upon

the provisions of this elaborate statute that only two years after its passage, the Assembly passed a second Act declaring that whoever established a market, “whether the merchants shall come for sale or not,” shall be looked upon as a public benefactor; a tacit confession that the previous law, like all laws restricting the action of the traders, had proved a failure.¹ The instructions given to Culpeper in 1679, to establish markets and fairs in the Colony, seem to have come to nothing. All endeavors of the kind were likely to have the same end, not only because they were opposed to the interests of the merchants but also because of the configuration of the country, which was unfavorable to any concentration of the population, even of the same parts, for however brief a time.