History of the United States Volume I Part 10

[1608]

A little exporting was immediately begun. So early as May 20, 1608, Jamestown sent to England a ship laden with iron ore, sa.s.safras, cedar posts, and walnut boards. Another followed on June 2d, with a cargo all of cedar wood. This year or the next, small quant.i.ties of pitch, tar, and gla.s.s were sent. From 1619 tobacco was so common as to be the currency. About 1650 it was largely exported, a million and a half pounds, on the average, yearly. The figure had risen to twelve million pounds by 1670. At the middle of the century, corn, wheat, rice, hemp, flax, and fifteen varieties of fruit, as well as excellent wine were produced. A wind-mill was set up about 1620, the first in America. It stood at Falling Creek on the James River. The pioneer iron works on the continent were in this colony, hailing from about the date last named.

Community of property prevailed at Jamestown in all the earliest years, as it did at Plymouth. After the event noted by John Rolfe: "about the last of August [1619] came in a Dutch man of warre that sold us twenty Negars," slavery was a continual and increasing curse, as is attested by the laws concerning slaves. It encouraged indolence and savagery of habit and nature. Virginian slaves, however, were better treated than those farther south. They were tolerably clothed, fed, and housed.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Tobacco Plant.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Captain John Smith.]

There was in Virginia little of that healthful social and political contact which did so much to develop civilization at the North. Of town life there was practically nothing. Even so late as 1716 Jamestown had only a sorry half-dozen structures, two of which were church and court-house. Fifteen years later Fredericksburg had, besides the manor house of Colonel Willis and its belongings, only a store, a tailor shop, a blacksmith shop, a tavern or "ordinary," and a coffeehouse. Richmond and Petersburg still existed only on paper, and if we come down to the middle of the eighteenth century, Williamsburg, the capital of the province, was nothing but a straggling village of two hundred houses, without a single paved street. Only the College and the governor's "palace" were of brick. The county-seats were mostly mere glades in the woods, containing each its court-house, prison, whipping-post, pillory, and ducking-stool, besides the wretched tavern where court and attendants put up, and possibly a church. Hardships and dissensions marked the whole early history of this infant state. At one time only forty settlers remained alive, at another meal and water were the sole diet. Hoping for instant riches in gold, poor gentlemen and vagabonds had come, too much to the exclusion of mechanics and laborers. For relief from the turbulence and external dangers of this period, the colony owed much to Captain John Smith, who, after all allowance for his boasting, certainly displayed great courage and energy in emergencies.

He, too, it was who did most to explore the country up the James and upon Chesapeake Bay.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "King Powhatan commands C:Smith to be flayne his daughter Pokahontas beggs his life his thankfullness and how he subiecled 39 of their kings reade ye history" Pocahontas saving Captain Smith's Life. From Smith's "General History."]

[1609-1610]

A new charter was granted in 1609, the council in England being now appointed by the stockholders instead of the king, and the governor of the colony being named by this council. Lord Delaware was made Governor and Captain-General of Virginia, and many more colonists sent out. By a wreck of two of the vessels there was delay in the arrival of the newly chosen officers. Smith, then Percy, meantime continued to exercise authority. This, again, was a critical period. Indians were troublesome.

Tillage having been neglected from the first, provisions became exhausted, and a crisis long referred to as "the starving time" ensued.

The colony had actually abandoned Jamestown and shipped for England, when met in James River by Lord Delaware, coming with relief. They at once returned, and an era of hope dawned. This was in June, 1610. One hundred and fifty new settlers accompanied Delaware. Planting was vigorously prosecuted, the Indians placated, and still further accessions of people and cattle secured from England.

[1612]

Delaware's brief, mild sway was always a benediction, in pleasing contrast with the severities of Dale and Argall, who successively governed after his departure. Under Dale, death was the penalty for slaughtering cattle, even one's own, except with the Governor's leave, also of exporting goods without permission. A baker giving short weight was to lose his ears, and on second repet.i.tion to suffer death. A laundress purloining linen was to be flogged. Martial law alone prevailed; even capital punishment was ordained without jury. Such arbitrary rule was perhaps necessary, so lawless were the ma.s.s of the population. It at any rate had the excellent effect of rousing the Virginians to political thought and to the a.s.sertion of their rights. In 1612 a change took place in the Company's methods of governing its colony. The superior council was abolished, its authority transferred to the corporation as a whole, which met as an a.s.sembly to elect officers and enact laws for the colony. The government thus became more democratic in form and spirit.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "POWHATAN Held this state & fashion when Capt.' Smith was delivered to him prisoner. 1607"

The Council of Powhatan. From Smith's "General History,"]

[1614-1619]

The year 1614 was distinguished by the marriage of Pocahontas, daughter of the native chief Powhatan, to the English colonist Rolfe. With him she visited England, dying there a few years later. The alliance secured the valuable friendship of Powhatan and his subjects--only till Powhatan's death, however. Thenceforth savage hostilities occurred at frequent intervals. In 1622 they were peculiarly severe, over three hundred settlers losing their lives through them. Another outbreak took place about 1650, this time more quickly suppressed. We shall see in a later chapter how Bacon's Rebellion was occasioned by Indian troubles.

As James I. broke with Parliament, a majority of the Virginia shareholders proved Liberals, and they wrought with signal purpose and effect to realize their ideas in their colony. To this political complexion of the Virginia Company not only Virginia itself, but, in a way, all America is indebted for a start toward free inst.i.tutions.

During the governorship of George Yeardley, was summoned an a.s.sembly of burgesses, consisting of two representatives, elected by the inhabitants, from each of the eleven boroughs or districts which the colony had by this time come to embrace. It met on June 10, 1619, the earliest legislative body in the New World. This was the dawn of another new era in the colony's history.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Pocahantas]

[1622-1625]

In 1622 arrived Sir Thomas Wyatt, bringing a written const.i.tution from the Company, which confirmed to the colony representative government and trial by jury. The a.s.sembly was given authority to make laws, subject only to the Governor's veto. This enlargement of political rights was due to the growth of the sentiment of popular liberty in England. In the meetings of the London Company debates were frequent and spirited between the court faction and the supporters of the political rights of the colonists. James I., dissatisfied with the authority which he had himself granted, appointed a commission to inquire into the Company's management, and also into the circ.u.mstances of the colony. A change was recommended, the courts decided as the king wished, and the Company was dissolved, The colony, while still allowed to govern itself by means of its popular a.s.sembly, was thus brought directly under the supervision of the Crown. Charles I., coming to the throne in 1625, gave heed to the affairs of the colony only so far as necessary to secure for himself the profits of the tobacco trade, It was doubtless owing to his indifference that the colony continued to enjoy civil freedom. He again appointed Yeardley Governor, a choice agreeable to the people; and in 1628, by asking that the a.s.sembly be called in order to vote him a monopoly of the coveted trade, he explicitly recognized the legitimacy and authority of that body.

[1642]

Yeardley was succeeded by Harvey, who rendered himself unpopular by defending in all land disputes the claims arising under royal grant against those based upon occupancy. Difficulties of this sort pervaded all colonial history.

In 1639 Wyatt held the office, succeeded in 1642 by Berkeley, during whose administration the colony attained its highest prosperity.

Virginians now possessed const.i.tutional rights and privileges in even a higher degree than Englishmen in the northern colonies. The colonists were most loyal to the king, and were let alone. They were also attached to the Church of England, ever manifesting toward those of a different faith the spirit of intolerance characteristic of the age.

[1650]

During the civil war in England, Virginia, of course, sided with the king. When Cromwell had a.s.sumed the reins of government he sent an expedition to require the submission of the colony. An agreement was made by which the authority of Parliament was acknowledged, while the colony in return was left unmolested in the management of its own affairs.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Signature of Berkeley.]

CHAPTER V.

PILGRIM AND PURITAN AT THE NORTH

[1612]

The Pilgrims who settled New England were Independents, peculiar in their ecclesiastical tenet that the single congregation of G.o.dly persons, however few or humble, regularly organized for Christ's work, is of right, by divine appointment, the highest ecclesiastical authority on earth. A church of this order existed in London by 1568; another, possibly more than one, the "Brownists," by 1580. Barrowe and Greenwood began a third in 1588, which, its founders being executed, went exiled to Amsterdam in 1593, subsequently uniting with the Presbyterians there.

These churches, though independent, were not strictly democratic, like those next to be named.

Soon after 1600 John Smyth gathered a church at Gainsborough in Lincolnshire, England, which persecution likewise drove to Amsterdam.

Here Smyth seceded and founded a Baptist church, which, returning to London in 1611 or 1612, became the first church of its kind known to have existed in England. From Smyth's church at Gainsborough sprang one at Scrooby, in Nottinghamshire, and this, too, exiled like its parent, crossed to Holland, finding home in Leyden in 1607 and 1608. Of this church John Robinson was pastor, and from its bosom came the Plymouth Colony to New England.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Plymouth Harbor, England.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Harbor of Provincetown, Cape Cod, where the Pilgrims landed.]

[1620]

This little band set out for America with a patent from the Virginia Company, according to James I.'s charter of 1606, but actually began here as labor-share holders in a sub-corporation of a new organization, the Plymouth Company, chartered in 1620. Launching in the Mayflower from Plymouth, where they had paused in their way hither from Holland, they arrived off the coast of Cape Cod in 1620, December 11th Old Style, December 21st New Style, and began a settlement, to which they gave the name Plymouth. Before landing they had formed themselves into a political body, a government of the people with "just and equal laws."

[Ill.u.s.tration: The Life of the Colony at Cape Cod.]

They based their civil authority upon this Mayflower compact, practically ignoring England. Carver was the first governor, Bradford the second. The colony was named Plymouth in memory of hospitalities which its members had received at Plymouth, England, the name having no connection with the "Plymouth" of the Plymouth Company. The members of the Plymouth Company had none but a mercantile interest in the adventure, merely fitting out the colonists and bearing the expense of the pa.s.sage for all but the first. On the other hand, the stock was not all retained in England. Shares were allotted to the Pilgrims as well, one to each emigrant with or without means, and one for every 10 pounds invested.

Plymouth early made a treaty with Ma.s.sasoit, the chief of the neighboring Wampanoags, the peace lasting with benign effects to both parties for fifty years, or till the outbreak of Philip's War, discussed in a later chapter. The first winter in Plymouth was one of dreadful hardships, of famine, disease and death, which spring relieved but in part. Yet Plymouth grew, surely if slowly. It acquired rights on the Kennebec, on the Connecticut, at Cape Ann. It was at first a pure democracy, its laws all made in ma.s.s-meetings of the entire body of male inhabitants; nor was it till 1639 that increase of numbers forced resort to the principle of representation. In 1643 the population was about three thousand.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Signatures to Plymouth Patent.

/In witnes whereof the said President & Counsell haue to the one pt of this pute Indenture sett their seales* And to th'other pt hereof the said John Peirce in the name of himself and his said a.s.sociate haue sett to his seale geven the day and yeeres first aboue written/]

[1626-1630]

Between 1620 and 1630 there were isolated settlers along the whole New England coast. White, a minister from Dorchester, England, founded a colony near Cape Ann, which removed to Salem in 1626. The Plymouth Company granted them a patent, which Endicott, in charge of more emigrants, brought over in 1628. It gave t.i.tle to all land between the Merrimac and Charles Rivers, also to all within three miles beyond each.

These men formed the nucleus of the colony to which in 1629 Charles I.

granted a royal charter, styling the proprietors "the Governor and Company of the Ma.s.sachusetts Bay in New England." Boston was made the capital. Soon more emigrants came, and Charlestown was settled.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Site of First Church and Governor Bradford's House at Plymouth.]

It was a momentous step when the government of this colony was transferred to New England. Winthrop was chosen Governor, others of the Company elected to minor offices, and they, with no fewer than one thousand new colonists, sailed for this side the Atlantic. In Ma.s.sachusetts, therefore, a trading company did not beget, as elsewhere, but literally became a political state. Many of the Ma.s.sachusetts men, in contrast with those of Plymouth, had enjoyed high consideration at home. Yet democracy prevailed here too. The Governor and his eighteen a.s.sistants were chosen by the freemen, and were both legislature and court. As population increased and scattered in towns, these chose deputies to represent them, and a lower house element was added to the General Court, though a.s.sistants and deputies did not sit separately till 1644.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Governor Winthrop.]

[1631]

At this time Ma.s.sachusetts had a population of about 15,000. To all New England 21,200 emigrants came between 1628 and 1643, the total white population at the latter date being about 24,000.