Virginia's Story Part 1

Virginia's Story Part 1

Virginia is my home state. I have lived in it for over 35 years. Therefore, I know about its extensive history and culture. This following story of Virginia will cover thousands of years and people from numerous backgrounds. From the Tidewater region to the Piedmont, the Blue Ridge Mountains, and the Appalachian Mountains region, we know of the geographic beauty of the state of Virginia. Virginia is not only part of America, but Virginia is an integral part of the whole essence of what America is. This is the land where the Native Americans formed complex civilizations. This is the land where descendants of black African slaves became a Governor, became civil rights heroes, and led lives of distinction plus heroism. This land has a lot of my relatives to this very day. Every era of American history involve Virginia indirectly or directly. This state is the location of contradicting people like Thomas Jefferson and proclaimers of liberty like Evelyn Butts. The Civil War has a long history in Virginia with Virginia being the location of the capital of the evil Confederacy. Not to mention that this state had leaders who fought oppression and championed civil rights too. It has been conservative for a long time.

Recently, with the state, in the majority, voting for Barack Obama in 2008 plus 2012 including Hillary Clinton in 2016, Virginia is very diverse ideologically. From Alexandria, Norfolk, Richmond, Roanoke, and to the rural areas, Virginia certainly encompasses the multicultural atmosphere of the United States of America. It is very important to recognize the strong African American influence in Virginia as a lot of strong, progressive black Americans live in the state today (during the early part of the 21st century). Today, Virginia is one of the most resilient states in the United States of America. It has experienced great controversies and great victories. It is known for its resources in water, transportation, and farming. Now, it is the perfect time to evaluate the mistakes of Virginia and praise people in Virginia who promoted the august values of human dignity and human justice. In the future, Virginia will rise up to even greater heights of technological and social development too. This series about Virginia's story is a 7 part series.

The history of Virginia is long. The indigenous Native Americans lived in Virginia for thousands of years. Anthropologist Helen C. Rountree and others used archaeological and historical research to find 3,000 years of settlement in much of the Tidewater. There is a historical marker. It has been dedicated in 2015, and it stated that recent archaeological work at Pocahontas Island revealed prehistoric habitation dating to about 6,500 B.C. By the 16th century, three main Native American cultures dominated Virginia. There are the Iroquoian, the Eastern Siouan, and the Algonquian. The Algonquian Nanticoke lived on the tip of the Delmarva Peninsula south of the Indian River. The Tidewater region along the Chesapeake Bay coastline seemed to have been controlled by the Algonquian Piscataway (who lived around the Potomac River), the Powhatan plus Chowanoke, or Roanoke (who lived between the James River and Neuse River). Inland of them were two Iroquoian tribes known as the Nottoway, or Managog plus the Meherrin. The rest of Virginia was almost entirely Eastern Sioux, divided between the Monaghan and the Manahoac, who held lands from central West Virginia, through southern Virginia and up to the Maryland border (the region of the Shenandoah River Valley was controlled by a different people). Also, people, connected to the Mississippian Culture, may have just barely crossed over into the state into its southwestern corner. Later, these tribes merged to form the Yuchi.

The Algonquian

Rountree researched the Powhatan, who are Algonquian people. The political structure of the Powhatan was complex. By the late 16th and early 17th centuries, there was a chief named Wahunsunacock. He formed a large, powerful empire. This empire revolved around the conquering or affiliating with about 30 tribes in eastern Virginia. He was called the Powhatan or paramount chief. His area was called Tenakomakah (or “densely inhabited land”). Monacan people threatened the empire. Jamestown was the first English colony, and they were allowed to be settled by Chief Powhatan. Powhatan wanted new military and economic advantages over the Siouans to the west of his people. The following chief, Opechancanough, succeeded him within only a couple of years after contact. He had a much different view of the English. He led several failed uprisings, which caused his people to fracture. Some tribes went south to live among the Chowanoke or north to live among the Piscataway. After that, one of his sons took several Powhatans and moved off to the northwest, becoming the Shawnee. They took over former Susquehannock territories. As recorded in the states of Maryland and Pennsylvania all over the 17th century, they eventually came into the Ohio River Valley. It is believed that they merged with other native peoples to form the powerful confederacy that controlled areas of West Virginia until the Shawnee Wars (1811-1813).

By only 1646, very few Powhatans remained and were policed harshly by the English, no longer even allowed to choose their own leaders. They were organized into the Pamunkey and Mattaponi tribes. They eventually dissolved altogether and merged into Colonial society. The Piscataway were pushed north on the Potomac River early in their history. They were cut off from the rest of their people. While some stayed, others chose to migrate west. Their movements are generally unrecorded in the historical record, but they reappear at Fort Detroit in modern-day Michigan by the end of the 18th century. These Piscataways are said to have moved to Canada and probably merged with the Mississaugas, who had broken away from the Anishinaabeg. They migrated southeast into that same region. Despite that, many Piscataway stayed in Virginia and Maryland until the modern day. Other members of the Piscataway also merged with the Nanticoke. The Nantiocke seem to be in towns. They relocated to New York in 1778. Later, they dissolved with groups joining the Iroquois and Lenape. The Chowanoke were moved to reservation lands by the English in 1677, where they remained until the 19th century. By 1821, they had merged with other tribes and were generally dissolved. However, the descendants of these peoples reformed in the 21st century and re-acquired much of their old reservations in 2014.

The Eastern Siouan

The Siouan peoples of Virginia originally were a collection of smaller tribes with uncertain affiliation. There are names recorded during the 17th century like that: Monahassanough, Rassawek, Mowhemencho, Monassukapanough, Massinacack, Akenatsi, Mahoc, Nuntaneuck, Nutaly, Nahyssan, Sapon, Monakin, Toteros, Keyauwees, Shakori, Eno, Sissipahaw, Monetons and Mohetons. They lived and migrated throughout what is now West Virginia, Virginia, North Carolina and South Carolina. All of these people were said to have spoken at least two distinct languages. They are Saponi, which appears to be a missing link language existing between the Chiwere and Dhegihan variants. The other language is Catawba (which is most closely related to Biloxi and the Gulf Coast Siouan languages). John Smith was the first to note the two groups in the Virginian interior—the Monaghans and the Monahoacs. The words came from the Powhatan & translations are uncertain, however Monaghan seems similar to a known Lenape word, Monaquen, which means "to scalp."  They were also commonly referred to as the Eastern Blackfoot, which explains why some Saponi today identify as the Siouan-Blackfoot people, and later still as the Christannas.

Many people assumed that the Eno, Shakori, and Sapoini lived inland of the Powhatan. Around the James River, there were the Occaneechi or Akenatsi. They were assumed to be the grandfather tribe of the region. In West Virginia, there was the Moneton of the Kanawha River and the Tutelo of the Bluestone River, which separates West Virginia from Kentucky. About midway along the southern shores of the James River, there has been the Sissipahaw. They were probably the only Eastern Siouan tribe in the state who would have spoken a form of Catawba language, rather than Saponi/ Tutelo. North of them were the Manahoac, or Mahock. The Keyauwee are also of note. It is difficult to say whether they were a subtribe of others mentioned, a newly formed tribe, or from somewhere else. These people lived on the current western border of Virginia and up through some of the southwestern mountains of West Virginia plus Kentucky. They seem to have first been driven east by the Iroquoian Westo during the Beaver Wars.  Historians have since come to note that the Westo were almost definitely the Erie and Neutrals/Chonnonton, who had conquered wide swathes (of what is now northern and eastern Ohio approximately during the 1630's). They were subsequently conquered and driven out by the Iroquois Confederacy around 1650. The Tutelo of West Virginia first seem to be noted as living north of the Saponi, in northern Virginia in around 1670. The Iroquois lost their new lands in Ohio and Michigan to the French via the Beaver Wars. The Iroquois later fought the Saponi related tribes and pushed them down into North Carolina.

It is noted in 1701 that the Saponi, Tutelo, Occaneechi, Shakori and Keyauwee were then going to form a confederacy to take back their homeland.  The Saponi wanted to return to their lands, but they weren’t able to do so. By 1702, the Governor of Virginia Colony gave them reservation land and opened Fort Christanna. The fort offered Native Americans economic and educational aid to the locals. The fort was closed in 1718 and the Saponi left. With continued conflicts between the Saponi and Iroquois in the region, the governors of Virginia, Pennsylvania and New York all stepped in together to organize a peace treaty, which did ultimately end the conflict. Sometime around 1722, the Tutelo and some other Saponis migrated to the Iroquoian held Pennsylvania territory and settled there. Among many other refugees of local tribes who had been destroyed, they were absorbed into Colonial society, or simply moved on without them. At 1753, the Iroquois reorganized them into the Tutelo, Delaware, and Nanticoke tribes. They were relocated to New York and were given full honors among the Confederacy. They weren’t Iroquoian though. After the American Revolution, these tribes accompanied them to Canada. Later, the descendants of the Tutelos migrated again to Ohio, becoming the Saponi and Tutelo Tribes of Ohio. Many of the other Siouan peoples of Virginia were also noted to have merged with the Catawba and Yamasee tribes.

The Iroquoian

The Tuscarora migrated from Virginia into the Delmarva Peninsula in the early 17th century. John Smith noted them on an early map as the Kuskarawocks, (They may have also absorbed the Tockwoghs, who also appear on the map and were most likely Iroquoian). After an extended war with the English, the Tuscarora began leaving for New York and began merging with the Iroquois in groups around 1720. This continued until the Iroquois were banished to Canada following the American Revolution. Those who remained became a new tribe—the Coharie—and migrated south to live near the Meherrin. The Meherrin worked with the Tuscarora in a war. In 1717, the English gave them a reservation just south of the North Carolina border. The North Carolina government contested their land rights and tried to take them away due to a surveyor's error that caused both Native and English settlers to claim parts of the reservation.

However, they managed to, more or less, stay put well into the modern day. The Nottoway also managed to largely stay in the vicinity of Virginia until the modern day without much conflict or loss of heritage. The Iroquois had issues with the Susquehannocks of central Pennsylvania, as was the English colony of Maryland. Although, the two were not known to be allies themselves. Sometime around the 1650's or 1660's, Maryland made peace with and allied themselves to the Susquehannocks. Thus, the Iroquois labelled them an enemy as well. This comes despite being allied with England by this time. After ending their war with the Susquehannocks in 1674, however, the Iroquois went on a more or less inexplicable rampage against Maryland and its remaining Native allies (which included the Piscataways and the Eastern Siouans tribes). The Eastern Siouans were forced out of the state during the 1680's. After the Beaver Wars officially ended in 1701, the Iroquois sold off their extended holdings—including their land in Virginia—to the English. The West Iroquoian people invaded Virginia. They were called the Westo.

Other Native American peoples

There were many Spanish and English explorers who said that the Cherokee were found as north as Virginia. Some historians believe that there were a large mixed language confederacy in the region called the Coosa.  The Spanish also gave them the nicknames Chalaques and Uchis during the 16th century. The English turned Chalaques into Cherokees. The Cherokees we know today were among these people but lived much further south. Both the Cherokee language (of Iroquoian origin) and the Yuchi language (Muskogean) have been heavily modified by Siouan influence (and carry many Siouan borrow words). This nation would have existed throughout parts of the states of Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee, North and South Carolina, and Georgia. There were scores of different culture groups organized at different extremes of the territory, probably, speaking Yuchi as a common tongue. After the Westo punched straight through them, they seem to have split along the line of the Tennessee River to create the Cherokee to the south and the Yuchi to the north. Then, following the Yamasee War (1715–1717), the Yuchi were forced across Appalachia and split again, into the Coyaha and the Chisca. The French, seeing an opportunity for new allies, ingratiated themselves with the Chisca and had them relocated to the heart of the Illinois Colony to live among the Algonquian Ilinoweg.

Later, as French influence along the Ohio River waned, the tribe seems to have split away again, taking many Ilinoweg tribes with them, and moved back to Kentucky, where they became the Kispoko. The Kispoko later became the fourth tribe of Shawnee. Meanwhile, the Coyaha reforged their alliance with the Cherokee and brought in many of the smaller Muskogean tribes of Alabama (often referred to as the Mobilians) to form the Creek Confederacy. While this tribe would go on to have great historical influence to the remaining Colonial Era and the early history of the United States, they never returned to Virginia. Furthermore, alike the Sawannos, it seems many splinter groups fractured off from the core group and moved into places like West Virginia including Kentucky. Afterwards, those lands seemed to be filled with native peoples who claimed "Cherokee" ancestry, yet had no organized tribal affiliation. The descendants of those people live throughout West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Kentucky, and Ohio today. However, it also seems probable that these populations married into the surviving Monongahela and other Siouan groups. Yet, the populations must have been quite small on both sides to allow these peoples to create  a government. They remained nomadic for a great deal of time afterwards.

Early European exploration

European explorers traveled to the New World by the 15th century. Later, European states started to form their colonies. England, the Dutch Republic, France, Portugal, and Spain were very active in forming new colonies in America.  Spanish Spanish explorers regularly traveled into Virginia. By 1540, there was a party of people. They were led by two Spaniards whose names were Juan De Villalobos and Francisco de Silvera. They were sent by Hernando de Soto as part of a search for gold in now Lee County. By the spring of 1567, Hernando Moyano de Morales, who was a sergeant of Spanish explorer Juan Pardo, led a group of soldiers northward from Fort San Juan in Joara (or a native town in western North Carolina) to attack and destroy the Chisca village of Maniatique near the present day Saltville. The attack near Saltville was the first recorded European vs. Native American related battle in Virginia history. There was another Spanish party. This group was captained by Antonio Velazquez in the caravel called Santa Catalina. They explored the lower Chesapeake Bay region of Virginia in mid-1561 under the orders of Angel de Villafane.

During the voyage, two Kiskiack or Paspahegh youth including Don Luis were taken back to Spain. An expedition sent from Spanish Florida in 1566, which was sent by Pedro Menedez de Aviles, reached the Delmarva Peninsula. The expedition was made up of two Dominican friars, thirty soldiers, and Don Luis. They failed to set up a Spanish colony in the Chesapeake. They believed it to be an opening in the fabled Northwest Passage. In 1570, Spanish Jesuits established the Ajacán Mission on the Lower Peninsula. However, in 1571 it was destroyed by Don Luis and a party of his indigenous allies. In August 1572, Pedro Menéndez de Avilés arrived from St. Augustine with thirty soldiers and sailors to take revenge for the massacre of the Jesuits, and hanged approximately 20 Native Americans. In 1573, the governor of Spanish Florida, Pedro Menéndez de Márquez, conducted further exploration of the Chesapeake. In the 1580's, captain Vicente González led several voyages into the Chesapeake in search of English settlements in the area. In 1609, Spanish Florida governor Pedro de Ibarra sent Francisco Fernández de Écija from St. Augustine to survey the activities of the Jamestown colonists, yet Spain never attempted a colony after the failure of the Ajacán Mission.

The English

The Roanoke Colony was the first English colony in the Americas. It was created at Roanoke Island at Dare County, North Carolina (which was called Virginia back then). Sir Walter Raleigh, between 1584 and 1587, sponsored two major groups of settlers. He wanted to form a permanent settlement at Roanoke Island, but each attempt failed. The final group disappeared completely after supplies from England were delayed three years by a war with Spain. They were called “The Lost Colony” since they disappeared. The name Virginia came from information gathered by the Raleigh-sponsored English explorations along what is now the North Carolina coast. Philip Amadas and Arthur Barlowe reported that a regional "king" named Wingina ruled a land of Wingandacoa. Queen Elizabeth modified the name to "Virginia", perhaps in part noting her status as the "Virgin Queen." Although the word is latinate, it stands as the oldest English language place-name in the United States. On the second voyage, Raleigh discovered that, while the chief of the Secotans was indeed called Wingina, the expression wingandacoa, heard by the English upon arrival, actually meant "You wear good clothes" in Carolina Algonquian, and was not the native name of the country, as previously misunderstood.

The Virginia Company of London existed. After Queen Elizabeth I died, King James I assumed the throne of England in 1603. This came after years of war. England was soon strapped for funds. So, he granted responsibility for England’s American colonization to the Virginia Company. The Virginia Company became incorporated as a joint stock company by a proprietary charter drawn up in 1606. There were two competing branches of the Virginia Company and each hoped to establish a colony in Virginia in order to exploit gold (which the region did not actually have), to establish a base of support for English privateering against Spanish ships, and to spread Protestantism to the New World in competition with Spain's spread of Catholicism. Within the Virginia Company, the Plymouth Company branch was assigned a northern portion of the area known as Virginia, and the London Company area to the south.

Jamestown

In December of 1606, the London Company sent 104 colonists in three ships. They were called the Susan Constant, Godspeed, and Discovery. They were under command of Captain Christopher Newport. The voyage of the ships was long and harsh. It lasted 144 days. The colonists came to Virginia by April 26, 1607 at the entrance of the Chesapeake Bay. At Cape Henry, they went ashore, erected a cross, and did a small amount of exploring. This event was called the “First Landing.” Under orders from London to seek a more inland location safe from Spanish raids, they explored the Hampton Roads area and sailed up the newly christened James River to the Fall Line at what would later become the cities of Richmond and Manchester. The colonists explored for weeks. They found a location and founded Jamestown on May 14, 1607. It was named after King James I (as was the river). Yet, while the location of Jamestown Island was favorable for defense against foreign ships, the low and marshy terrain was harsh. It was also inhospitable for a settlement. It lacked drinking water, access to game for hunting, or much space for farming.

While it seemed favorable that it was not inhabited by the Native Americans, within a short time, the colonists were attacked by members of the local Paspahegh tribe. The colonists arrived ill-prepared to become self-sufficient. They had planned on trading with the Native Americans for food, were dependent upon periodic supplies from England, and had planned to spend some of their time seeking gold. Leaving the Discovery behind for their use, Captain Newport returned to England with the Susan Constant and the Godspeed, and came back twice during 1608 (with the First Supply and Second Supply missions). Trading and relations were very tenuous. Many of the colonists died from disease, starvation, and conflicts with the Native Americans. There were many failed English leaders. Captain John Smith took charge of the settlement. Many credit him with sustaining the colony during its first years, as had some success in trading for food and leading the discouraged colonists.

After Smith’s return to England in August of 1609, there was a long delay in the scheduled arrival of supplies. During the winter of 1609/10 and continuing into the spring and early summer, no ships arrived. The colonists faced the era of “starving time.”  When the new governor Sir Thomas Gates, finally arrived at Jamestown on May 23, 1610, along with other survivors of the wreck of the Sea Venture that resulted in Bermuda being added to the territory of Virginia, he discovered over 80% of the 500 colonists had died; many of the survivors were sick.

Back in England, the Virginia Company was reorganized under its Second Charter, ratified on May 23, 1609, which gave most leadership authority of the colony to the governor, the newly appointed Thomas West, 3rd Baron De La Warr. In June 1610, he arrived with 150 men and ample supplies. De La Warr began the First Anglo-Powhatan War, against the Native Americans. Under his leadership, Samuel Argall kidnapped Pocahontas, daughter of the Powhatan chief, and held her at Henricus. There were economic problems in the Colony too. Gold never was found. Efforts to make profitable industries in the colony failed until John Rolfe introduced his two foreign types of tobacco: Orinoco and Sweet Scented. These produced a better crop than the local variety and with the first shipment to England in 1612, the customers enjoyed the flavor, thus making tobacco a cash crop that established Virginia's economic viability.

The First Anglo-Powhatan War ended when Rolfe married Pocahontas in 1614. George Yeardley was the Governor of Virginia by 1619. He ended the one man rule and created a representative system of government with the General Assembly or the first elected European legislative assembly in the Americas. In 1619, the Virginia Company sent 90 single women as potential wives for the male colonists to help populate the settlement. That same year the colony acquired a group of "twenty and odd" Angolans, brought by two English privateers. They were some of the first Africans in the colony. They, along with many European indentured servants helped to expand the growing tobacco industry which was already the colony's primary product. Although these black men were treated as indentured servants, this marked the beginning of America's history of slavery. Major importation of enslaved Africans by European slave traders did not take place until much later in the century. In some areas, individual rather than communal land ownership or leaseholds were established, providing families with motivation to increase production, improve standards of living, and gain wealth. Sir Thomas Dale’s Henricus was a development on the south bank of the James River. This was where Native Americans were also to be provided an education at the Colony’s first college. About 6 miles (9.7 km) south of the falls at present-day Richmond, in Henrico Cittie, the Falling Creek Ironworks was established near the confluence of Falling Creek, using local ore deposits to make iron. It was the first in North America.

Virginians were intensely individualistic at this point, weakening the small new communities. According to Breen (1979) their horizon was limited by the present or near future. They believed that the environment could and should be forced to yield quick financial returns. Thus everyone was looking out for number one at the expense of the cooperative ventures. Farms were scattered and few villages or towns were formed. This extreme individualism led to the failure of the settlers to provide defense for themselves against the Native Americans, resulting in two massacres.

English settlers and Native Americans in Virginia were known for their further conflicts. There were some successful interactions. Yet, they disagreed with issues of ownership, control of land, and disputes about dealing with other resources. This grew distrust of many peoples. Virginia had drought conditions on an average of every three years. The colonists didn’t understand that the Native Americans were ill-prepared to feed them during hard times. In the years after 1612, the colonists cleared land to farm export tobacco, their crucial cash crop. As tobacco exhausted the soil, the settlers continually needed to clear more land for replacement. This reduced the wooded land which Native Americans depended on for hunting to supplement their food crops. As more colonists arrived, they wanted more land. The tribes fought the encroachment by the colonists. There was the massacre of Native Americans in 1622 and the Second Anglo-Powhatan war. Both wars were under the  leadership of the late Chief Powhatan's younger brother, Chief Opechancanough. 

By the mid-17th century, the Powhatan and allied tribes were in serious decline in population, due in large part to epidemics of newly introduced infectious diseases, such as smallpox and measles, to which they had no natural immunity. The European colonists had expanded territory so that they controlled virtually all the land east of the fall line on the James River. Fifty years earlier, this territory had been the empire of the mighty Powhatan Confederacy. The surviving members of many tribes assimilated into the general population of the colony. Some had small communities with more traditional identity and heritage. By the 21st century, the Pamunkey and Mattaponi are the only two tribes to maintain reservations originally assigned under the English. As of 2010, the state has recognized 11 Virginia Native American tribes. Others have a renewed interest in seeking state and federal recognition since the 400th year anniversary of Jamestown in 2007.

There are many celebrations from Native American tribes showing their prominent formal roles in building up the state of Virginia. English forces grew their powers in 1619 and beyond. They wanted more tobacco, many Native Americans were concerned about this like the Powhatan. By this time, the remaining Powhatan Empire was led by Chief Opechancanough, chief of the Pamunkey, and brother of Chief Powhatan. He had earned a reputation as a fierce warrior under his brother's chiefdom. Soon, he gave up on hopes of diplomacy, and resolved to eradicate the English colonists. On March 22, 1622, the Powhatan killed about 400 colonists in the Indian Massacre of 1622. With coordinated attacks, they struck almost all the English settlements along the James River, on both shores, from Newport News Point on the east at Hampton Roads all the way west upriver to Falling Creek, a few miles above Henricus and John Rolfe's plantation, Varina Farms.

At Jamestown, a warning by a Native American boy named Chanco to his employer, Richard Pace, helped to reduce total deaths. Pace secured his plantation. He rowed across the river during the night to alert Jamestown. Those colonists there used some defensive preparation at almost every locations. Several entire communities were essentially wiped out, including Henricus and Wolstenholme Towne at Martin's Hundred. At the Falling Creek Ironworks, which had been seen as promising for the Colony, two women and three children were among the 27 killed, leaving only two colonists alive. The facilities were destroyed.

Despite the losses, two thirds of the colonists survived; after withdrawing to Jamestown, many returned to the outlying plantations, although some were abandoned. The English carried out reprisals against the Powhatan and there were skirmishes and attacks for about a year before the colonists and Powhatan struck a truce. The colonists invited the chiefs and warriors to Jamestown. They proposed a toast of liquor.  Dr. John Potts and some of the Jamestown leadership had poisoned the Native Americans' share of the liquor, which killed about 200 men. Colonists killed another 50 Native Americans by hand. The period between the coup of 1622 and another Powhatan attack on English colonists along the James River (see Jamestown) in 1644 marked a turning point in the relations between the Powhatan and the English. In the early period, each side believed it was operating from a position of power; by the Treaty of 1646, the colonists had taken the balance of power, and had established control between the York and Blackwater Rivers.

Governor Berkeley and the English Civil War

The Virginia Company’s charter was revoked in 1624. The colony transferred to the royal authority as a crown colony. Yet, the elected representatives in Jamestown continue to have a fair amount of power.  Under royal authority, the colony began to expand to the North and West with additional settlements. In 1634, a new system of local government was created in the Virginia Colony by order of the King of England. Eight shires were designated, each with its own local officers; these shires were renamed as counties only a few years later. The first major attempts at exploring the Trans-Allegheny region (by the English) happened under the administration of Governor William Berkeley. There were English attempts to go further into Virginia. That was hampered in 1644. The reason was that about 500 colonists were killed in another Native American massacred led by Opechancanough. Berkeley is credited with efforts to develop other sources of income for the colony other like tobacco (like the cultivation of mulberry trees for silkworms and other crops at his large Green Spring Plantation). The colonists viewed the 1644 event as an uprising.  Chief Opechancanough expected the outcome would reflect what he considered the morally correct position: that the colonists were violating their pledges to the Powhatan. During the 1644 event, Chief Opechancanough was captured. While imprisoned, he was murdered by one of his guards.

After the death of Opechancanough, and following the repeated colonial attacks in 1644 and 1645, the remaining Powhatan tribes had little alternative but to accede to the demands of the settlers. Most Virginia colonists were loyal to the crown of Charles I during the English Civil War. Yet, in 1652, Oliver Cromwell sent a force to remove and replace Governor Berkeley with Governor Richard Bennett, who was loyal to the Commonwealth of England. This governor was a moderate Puritan who allowed the local legislature to exercise most controlling authority, and spent much of his time directing affairs in neighboring Maryland Colony. Bennett was followed by two more "Cromwellian" governors, Edward Digges and Samuel Matthews, although in fact all three of these men were not technically appointees, but were selected by the House of Burgesses, which was really in control of the colony during these years. Many royalists fled to Virginia after their defeat in the English Civil War. Some intermarried with existing plantation families to create influential families in Virginia like the Washingtons, Randolphs, Carters, and Lees.  However, most 17th-century immigrants were indentured servants, merchants or artisans. After the Restoration, in recognition of Virginia's loyalty to the crown, King Charles II of England bestowed Virginia with the nickname "The Old Dominion", which it still bears today.

Bacon’s Rebellion

Governor Berkeley was popular after his first administration. He returned to the governorships at the end of Commonwealth rule. Yet, his second administration experienced many problems. They included: disease, hurricanes, battles with Native Americans, and economic difficulties in Virginia. Berkeley formed autocratic authority over the colony. He tried to protect his power by refusing to have new legislative elections for 14 years in order to protect a House of Burgesses that supported him. He only agreed to new elections when rebellion became a serious threat.

Berkeley finally did face a rebellion in 1676. Native Americans started to attack encroaching settlers as they expanded to the north and west. Serious fighting broke out when settlers responded to violence with a counterattack against the wrong tribe. This extended the violence. Berkeley did not assist the settlers in their fight. Many settlers and historians believe Berkeley's refusal to fight the Native Americans stemmed from his investments in the fur trade. Large scale fighting would have cut off the Native Americans suppliers Berkeley's investment relied on. Nathaniel Bacon organized his own militia of settlers who retaliated against the Native Americans. Bacon became very popular as the primary opponent of Berkeley, not only on the issue of Native Americans, but on other issues as well.

Berkeley condemned Bacon as a rebel, but pardoned him after Bacon won a seat in the House of Burgesses and accepted it peacefully. After a lack of reform, Bacon rebelled outright, captured Jamestown, and took control of the colony for several months. The incident became known as Bacon's Rebellion. Berkeley returned himself to power with the help of the English militia. Bacon burned Jamestown before abandoning it and continued his rebellion, but died of disease. Berkeley severely crushed the remaining rebels. In response to Berkeley's harsh repression of the rebels, the English government removed him from office. After the burning of Jamestown, the capital was temporarily moved to Middle Plantation, located on the high ground of the Virginia Peninsula equidistant from the James and York Rivers.

Williamsburg’s Origin

Local leaders wanted a school of higher education for the sons of planters and for trying to “educate” Native Americans. There was an earlier attempt to establish a permanent university at Henricus failed after the Native American massacre of 1622 that wiped out the entire settlement. Seven decades later, with the encouragement from the Colony's House of Burgesses and other prominent individuals, Reverend Dr. James Blair, the colony's top religious leader, prepared a plan. Blair went to England and in 1693, obtained a charter from Protestants King William and Queen Mary II of England who had just deposed Catholic James II of England in 1688 during the Glorious Revolution. The college was named the College of William and Mary in honor of the two monarchs. The rebuilt statehouse in Jamestown was burned down again in 1698. After that fire, upon suggestion of college students, the colonial capital was permanently moved to nearby Middle Plantation again. The town was renamed Williamsburg in honor of the king. Plans were made to build a capitol building and plan the new city according to the survey of Theodorick Bland.

The English used more and more tobacco products. Tobacco became a large part of the economic force in the Tidewater region surrounding the Chesapeake Bay. Large plantations were built along the rivers of Virginia. Specific social/economic systems were formed to grow and distribute the tobacco cash crop. Some parts of this system included the importation and employment of slaves to grow crops. Planters would then fill large hogsheads with tobacco and convey them to inspection warehouses. In 1730, the Virginia House of Burgesses standardized and improved quality of tobacco exported by establishing the Tobacco Inspection Act of 1730, which required inspectors to grade tobacco at 40 specified locations.

Social Structures


The social structure of colonial Virginia was apparent. Many white people back then were planters. They included the upper middle class and the rich. They had political power and social prestige. They also controlled the Anglican Church. They could choose ministers and handled church property. They were involved in charities and they sought elected and appointed officers. About 60 percent of white Virginians were part of the middle class. They owned farms. By the second generation, death rates from malaria and other local diseases declined. They developed their family structure. About one third of these white Virginians owned no land and verged on poverty. Many people left indentured servitude. Social stratification existed badly in the North Neck. This was where the Fairfax family had been given a proprietorship. In some districts there 70 percent of the land was owned by a handful of families, and three-fourths of the whites had no land at all. In the frontier districts, large numbers of Irish and German Protestants had settled, often moving down from Pennsylvania. Tobacco was not important there; farmers focused on hemp, grain, cattle, and horses. Entrepreneurs had begun to mine and smelt the local iron ores.

Many settlers hunted animals. Slaves hunted. People, who were rich and poor, hunted in colonial Virginia. Sports existed back then.  In 1691, Sir Francis Nicholson, the governor, organized competitions for the "better sort of Virginians only who are Batchelors," and he offered prizes "to be shot for, wrastled, played at backswords, & Run for by Horse and foott." Horse racing was the main event. The typical farmer did not own a horse in the first place, and racing was a matter for gentlemen only, but ordinary farmers were spectators and gamblers. Selected slaves often became skilled horse trainers. Horse racing was especially important for knitting the gentry together. The race was a major public event designed to demonstrate to the world the social status of the gentry through expensive breeding, training, boasting and gambling, and especially winning the races themselves. The historian Timothy Breen wrote that horse racing and high stakes gambling funded the social class system. There was individualism, materialism, and competitiveness back then. After the 1650’s, the corporate elites in Virginia used slavery, racism, and oppression more as a means to maintain control over the Virginia colony.

By 1700, the population reached 70,000 and continued to grow rapidly from a high birth rate, low death rate, importation of slaves from the Caribbean, and immigration from Britain and Germany, as well as from Pennsylvania. The climate was mild; the farm lands were cheap and fertile. During the early 1700’s, Virginia extended its territory past the Shenandoah Valley to West Virginia, Kentucky, and most of the Northwest Territory. There was westward expansion of the colonists. In 1716, Governor Alexander Spotswood led the Knights of the Golden Horseshoe Expedition, reaching the top ridge of the Blue Ridge Mountains at Swift Run Gap (elevation 2,365 feet (721 m)). Spotswood promoted Germanna, a settlement of German immigrants brought over for the purpose of iron production, in modern-day Orange County.

This painting showed innocent black people awaiting sale. 

Tons of history existed involving African Americans. The first African Americans were in Virginia by the early 1600's. Most black people in early Virginia were slaves and many were free. In 1621, an enslaved African named Antonio arrives in Virginia aboard the James. The following March, he will be one of only a handful of people who manage to survive an Native American attack on the plantation of Edward Bennett. In 1622, an enslaved African woman named Mary arrived in Virginia aboard the Margaret and John. A 1642 census of the Virginia colony reveals about 300 Africans and African Americans (blacks imported to Virginia from the West Indies or second- or third-generation Africans born in Virginia) out of a total population of 15,000. By the 1650's, Anthony and Mary Johnson, two former slaves, are living in Northampton County on the Eastern Shore, where they own 250 acres. Their two sons own adjoining farms of 450 and 100 acres each.

By 1656,  the General Assembly ordered Elizabeth Key, a woman of African descent, to be freed, in part because she is Christian and her father, Thomas Key, is white. In December of 1662, In a newly passed law designed to clarify conditions by which people are enslaved or free, the General Assembly declares that "all children borne in this country shalbe held bond or free only according to the condition of the mother." By 1677, John Johnson Jr., whose grandfather Anthony was a Virginia slave who bought his freedom, buys a forty-four-acre farm in Maryland and names it Angola, suggesting the origin of his family. By the late 1600's, things changed in Virginia. Virginia authorities by that time made it more difficult for black people to own land. Slavery became more race- based and part of the legal fabric of early Virginia. Also, General Assembly in 1691 restricting rights, continuing slavery, outlawing interracial marriage (as interracial marriage did exist back in the 1600's), and making newly freed slaves to leave the colony. Black people, biracial people, and Native Americans couldn't vote back then either.

During the 1730’s, the Three Notch’d Road extended from the vicinity of the fall line of the James River at Richmond to the Shenandoah Valley (it crossed the Blue Ridge Mountains at Jarmans Gap). During this time, Governor William Gooch promoted settlement of the Virginia backcountry as a means to insulate the Virginia colony from the Native American and New France settlements in the Ohio County. In response, a wide variety of settlers traveled southward on the Native Americana Trails called the Great Wagon Road along the Shenandoah Valley from Pennsylvania. More colonists moved into the Piedmont area from the Tidewater/Chesapeake area. There was some uncertainty as to the exact tax boundaries of Virginia land versus the Land patent quit-rentrights held by Thomas Fairfax, 6th Lord Fairfax of Cameron in the Northern Neck Proprietary. When Robert "King" Carter died in 1732, Lord Fairfax read about his vast wealth in Magazine and decided to settle the matter himself by coming to Virginia. Lord Fairfax travelled to Virginia for the first time between 1735 and 1737 to inspect and protect his lands.  He employed a young George Washington (Washington's first employment) to survey his lands lying west of the Blue Ridge. Once this legal battle was ironed out, Frederick County, Virginia was founded in 1743 and the "Frederick Town" settlements there became a fourth city charter in Virginia, now known as Winchester, Virginia in February 1752.

In the late 1740's and the second half of the 18th century, the British angled for control of the Ohio Country. Virginians Thomas Lee and brothers Lawrence and Augustine Washington organized the Ohio Company to represent the prospecting and trading interests of Virginian investors.  In 1749, the British Crown, via the colonial government of Virginia, granted the Ohio Company a great deal of this territory on the condition that it must be settled by British colonists. Governor Robert Dinwiddie of Virginia was an investor in the Ohio Company, which stood to lose money if the French held their claim. To counter the French military presence in Ohio, in October 1753 Dinwiddie ordered the 21-year-old Major George Washington (whose brother was another Ohio Company investor) of the Virginia Regiment to warn the French to leave Virginia territory. Ultimately, many Virginians were caught up in the resulting French and Indian War that occurred 1754–1763.

At the completion of the war, the Royal Proclamation of 1763 forbade all British settlement past a line drawn along the Appalachian Mountains, with the land west of the Proclamation Line known as the Indian Reserve. British colonists and land speculators objected to the proclamation boundary since the British government had already assigned land grants to them. Many settlements already existed beyond the proclamation line, some of which had been temporarily evacuated during Pontiac's War, and there were many already granted land claims yet to be settled. For example, George Washington and his Virginia soldiers had been granted lands past the boundary. Prominent American colonials joined with the land speculators in Britain to lobby the government to move the line further west. Their efforts were successful, and the boundary line was adjusted in a series of treaties with the Native Americans. In 1768, the Treaty of Fort Stanwix and the Treaty of Hard Labour, followed in 1770 by the Treaty of Lochaber, opened much of what is now Kentucky and West Virginia to British settlement within the Virginia Colony. However, the Northwest Territories north of the Ohio continued to be occupied by native tribes until US forces drove them out in the early decades of the 1800's.

Religion

The Church of England was legally established in the colony in 1619. The Bishop of London sent 22 Anglican clergymen by 1624. Local taxes were sent through the local parish to handle the needs of the local government like roads and poor relief. Salaries were paid to ministers. No bishop existed in colonial Virginia. In practice the local vestry, consisting of gentry laymen controlled the parish. By the 1740's, the Anglicans had about 70 parish priests around the colony. Missionaries didn’t readily convert Native Americans except  for the Nansemond tribe, which had converted in 1638. The other Powhatan tribes converted to Christianity around 1791. The stress on personal piety opened the way for the First Great Awakening in the mid-18th century, which pulled people away from the formal rituals of the established church. Especially in the back country, most families had no religious affiliation whatsoever and their low moral standards were shocking to proper Englishmen. The Baptists, Methodists, Presbyterians and other evangelicals directly challenged these lax moral standards and refused to tolerate them in their ranks.

Baptists, German Lutherans and Presbyterians, funded their own ministers, and favored disestablishment of the Anglican church. The spellbinding preacher Samuel Davies led the Presbyterians, and converted hundreds of slaves.  By the 1760's Baptists were drawing Virginians, especially poor white farmers, into a new, much more democratic religion. Slaves were welcome at the services, and many became Baptists at this time. Methodist missionaries were also active in the late colonial period. Also, many Baptists were complicit in slavery which shows the imperfections of many religious leaders. Methodists encouraged an end to slavery, and welcomed free black people and slaves into active roles in the congregations.

The Baptists and Presbyterians were subject to many legal constraints and faced growing persecution; between 1768 and 1774, about half of the Baptists ministers in Virginia were jailed for preaching, in defiance of England's Act of Toleration of 1689 that guaranteed freedom of worship for Protestants. At the start of the Revolution, the Anglican Patriots realized that they needed dissenter support for effective wartime mobilization, so they met most of the dissenters' demands in return for their support of the war effort. Historians have debated the implications of the religious rivalries for the American Revolution. The struggle for religious toleration was played out during the American Revolution, as the Baptists, in alliance with Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, worked successfully to disestablish the Anglican church. After the American victory in the war, the Anglican establishment sought to reintroduce state support for religion. This effort failed when non-Anglicans gave their support to Jefferson's "Bill for Establishing Religious Freedom", which eventually became law in 1786 as the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom. With freedom of religion the new watchword, the Church of England was dis-established in Virginia. It was rebuilt as the Episcopal Church in the United States, with no connection to Britain.

The American Revolution


There were independence sentiments in Virginia long before the Revolutionary War. After the French and Indian War, there was a tension among the British government and the colonists. That war ended in 1763. The Virginian legislature had passed the Two-Penny Act. This was used to stop clerical salaries from inflating. King George III vetoed the measured. The clergy sued for back salaries. Patrick Henry first came into prominence by arguing in the case of Parson’s Clause against the veto. Henry considered the veto tyrannical. The British government had a large debt via spending on its war. The Parliament wanted to pay off this debt by passing the 1764 Stamp Act and the 1765 Stamp Act. The General Assembly opposed the passage of the Sugar Act on the grounds of no taxation without representation, and in turn passing the "Virginia Resolves" opposing the tax. Governor Francis Fauquier responded by dismissing the Assembly. The Northampton County court overturned the Stamp Act February 8, 1766. Various political groups, including the Sons of Liberty met and issued protests against the act. Most notably, Bland published a pamphlet entitled An Enquiry into the Rights of The British Colonies, setting forth the principle that Virginia was a part of the British Empire, not the Kingdom of Great Britain, so it only owed allegiance to the Crown, not Parliament. The Stamp Act was repealed.

Additional taxation came about via the Revenue Act. There was the 1769 attempt to transport Bostonian rioters to London for trial incited more protest from Virginia. The Assembly met to consider resolutions condemning on the transport of the rioters, but Governor Botetourt, while sympathetic, dissolved the legislature. The Burgesses reconvened in Raleigh Tavern and made an agreement to ban British imports. Britain gave up the attempt to extradite the prisoners and lifted all taxes except the tax on tea in 1770. In 1773, because of a renewed attempt to extradite Americans to Britain, Richard Henry Lee, Thomas Jefferson, Patrick Henry, George Mason, and others in the legislature created a committee of correspondence to deal with problems with Britain. This committee would serve as the foundation for Virginia's role in the American Revolution.
After the House of Burgesses expressed solidarity with the actions in Massachusetts, the Governor, Lord Dunmore, again dissolved the legislature. The first Virginia Convention was held August 1–6 to respond to the growing crisis. The convention approved a boycott of British goods and elected delegates to the Continental Congress.

On April 20, 1775, Dunmore ordered the gunpowder removed from the Williamsburg Magazine to a British ship. Patrick Henry led a group of Virginia militia from Hanover in response to Dunmore’s order. Carter Braxton negotiated a resolution to the Gunpowder Incident by transferring royal funds as payment for the powder. The incident caused Dunmore to have more of a declining support. Dunmore fled the Governor’s Palace to a British ship at Yorktown. On November 7, Dunmore issued a proclamation declaring Virginia was in a state of rebellion. By this time, George Washington had been appointed head of the American forces by the Continental Congress and Virginia was under the political leadership of a Committee of Safety formed by the Third Virginia Convention in the governor's absence. On December 9, 1775, Virginia militia moved on the governor’s forces at the Battle of Great Bridge. The Virginia militia won the battle. Dunmore responded by bombarding Norfolk, Virginia with his ships on January 1, 1776.

After the Battle of Great Bridge, little military conflict took place in Virginia soil for the first part of the American Revolutionary War. Yet, Virginia sent forces to help in the fighting in the North and the South (plus in the frontier in the northwest). May 6, 1776 was when the Fifth Virginia Convention met and later it declared Virginia a free and independent state on May 15, 1776. The convention instructed its delegates to introduce a resolution for independence at the Continental Congress. Richard Henry Lee introduced the measure on June 7. While the Congress debated, the Virginia Convention adopted George Mason's Bill of Rights (June 12) and a constitution (June 29) which established an independent commonwealth. Congress approved Lee's proposal on July 2, 1776 and approved Jefferson's Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776. The constitution of the Fifth Virginia Convention created a system of government for the state that would last for 54 years, and converting House of Burgesses into a bicameral legislature with both a House of Delegates and a Senate. Patrick Henry served as the first Governor of the Commonwealth (1776-1779). The British briefly brought the war back to coastal Virginia in May 1779.

Governor Thomas Jefferson feared the vulnerability of Williamsburg, so he moved the capital father inland to Richmond in 1780. Yet, in December, Benedict Arnold betrayed the Revolution. He became a general for the British and attacked Richmond. Part of Richmond, Virginia was burned before the Virginia militia drove Arnold’s army out of the city. Arnold moved his base of operations to Portsmouth, Virginia. He was joined by troops under General William Phillips. Phillips led an expedition that destroyed military and economic targets, against ineffectual militia resistance. The state's defenses, led by General Baron von Steuben, put up resistance in the April 1781 Battle of Blandford, but were forced to retreat. The French General Lafayette and his forces arrived to help defend Virginia, and though outnumbered, engaged British forces under General Charles Cornwallis in a series of skirmishes to help reduce their effectiveness. Cornwallis dispatched two smaller missions under Colonel John Graves Simcoe and Colonel Banastre Tarleton to march on Charlottesville and capture Gov. Jefferson and the legislature, though was foiled when Jack Jouett rode to warn Virginia government.

Cornwallis moved down the Virginia Peninsula towards the Chesapeake Bay. This was where Clinton planned to extract part of the army for a siege of New York City. After surprising American forces at the Battle of Green Spring on July 6, 1781, Cornwallis received orders to move his troops to the port town of Yorktown. The started to construct fortifications and a naval yard, though when discovered American forces surrounded the town. General Washington and his French ally Rochambeau moved their forces from New York to Virginia. The defeat of the Royal Navy by Admiral de Grasse at the Battle of the Virginia Capes ensured French dominance of the waters around Yorktown, thereby preventing Cornwallis from receiving troops or supplies and removing the possibility of evacuation. Following the two-week siege to Yorktown, Cornwallis decided to surrender. Papers for surrender were officially signed on October 19. As a result of the defeat, the king lost control of Parliament, and the new British government offered peace in April 1782. The Treaty of Paris of 1783 officially ended the war. America became fully independent and Virginia would be its own state.

Part 2 of this series will involve the antebellum period and the American Civil War involving the state of Virginia. 

By Timothy