The Planters of Colonial VirginiaWertenbaker, Thomas Jefferson
History
The Planters of Colonial Virginia
Wertenbaker, Thomas Jefferson
Slavery -- Virginia; Virginia -- Economic conditions; Virginia -- History -- Colonial period, ca. 1600-1775
At the time of Bacon's Rebellion the annual importation of servants was
between 1,500 and 2,000. The headrights for 1674 show 1931 names.[8-1]
Seven years later the whites were still arriving in large numbers, the
rolls for 1682 having 1,565 names. As the century drew to a close,
however, the effect of the slave trade upon white immigration is
reflected in the dwindling number of headrights. The change that was
taking place is illustrated by a patent of 13,500 acres to Ralph
Wormleley for the transportation of 249 persons, 149 of whom were white
and 100 black.[8-2] Yet so late as 1704 the servants were still coming
in appreciable numbers. In 1708 however, the number of servants at work
in the colony had dwindled away almost entirely.[8-3] In 1715 the names
of white persons listed as headrights was but ninety-one; in 1718 but
101.[8-4] In other words, the first great migration of Englishmen to
continental America, a migration extending over a century and comprising
from 100,000 to 150,000 men, women and children, had practically come to
an end.
English statesmen at the time looked upon this event as an unalloyed
blessing. The day had passed when they felt that there existed a surplus
of labor at home and that the country was in need of blood letting. The
proper policy was to keep Englishmen in England, to devote their
energies to local industries and so strengthen the economic and military
sinews of the nation. And if unemployment existed, it was the correct
policy to bring work to the idle rather than send the idle out of the
country in quest of work.[8-5] And the colonies were to be utilized, no
longer as outlets for the population, but as a means to the upbuilding
of local industry. They were to supply a market for English goods, keep
employed English mariners and furnish the tobacco and sugar which when
re-exported weighed so heavily in the balance of trade. And since these
great staple crops could be produced by the work of slaves, it was
thought highly advantageous for all concerned that the negro should
replace the white servant in both the tobacco and the sugar fields. The
planters would profit by the lowered cost of production, English
industry would gain by the increased volume of traffic, the Crown
revenues would be enhanced and English laborers would be kept at
home.[8-6]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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