In the spring of 1689, Virginians flocked to Jamestown to hear William
and Mary proclaimed Lord and Lady of Virginia. The next year there
entered, as Lieutenant-Governor, Francis Nicholson, an odd character
in whom an immediate violence of temper went with a statesmanlike
conception of things to be. Two years he governed here, then was
transferred to Maryland, and then in seven years came back to the James.
He had not been liked there, but while he was gone Virginia had endured
in his stead Sir Edmund Andros. That had been swapping the witch for the
devil. Virginia in 1698 seems to have welcomed the returning Nicholson.
Jamestown had been hastily rebuilt, after Bacon's burning, and then by
accident burned again. The word malaria was not in use, but all knew
that there had always been sickness on that low spit running out from
the marshes. The place might well seem haunted, so many had suffered
there and died there. Poetical imagination might have evoked a piece of
sad pageantry--starving times, massacres, quarrels, executions, cruel
and unusual punishments, gliding Indians. A practical question, however,
faced the inhabitants, and all were willing to make elsewhere a new
capital city.
Seven miles back from the James, about halfway over to the blue York,
stood that cluster of houses called Middle Plantation, where Bacon's men
had taken his Oath. There was planned and builded Williamsburg, which
was to be for nearly a hundred years the capital of Virginia. It
was named for King William, and there was in the minds of some loyal
colonists the notion, eventually abandoned, of running the streets in
the lines of a huge W and M. The long main street was called Duke of
Gloucester Street, for the short-lived son of that Anne who was soon
to become Queen. At one end of this thoroughfare stood a fair brick
capitol. At the other end nearly a mile away rose the brick William and
Mary College. Its story is worth the telling.
The formal acquisition of knowledge had long been a problem in Virginia.
Adult colonists came with their education, much or little, gained
already in the mother country. In most cases, doubtless, it was
little, but in many cases it was much. Books were brought in with other
household furnishing. When there began to be native-born Virginians,
these children received from parents and kindred some manner of
training. Ministers were supposed to catechise and teach. Well-to-do
and educated parents brought over tutors. Promising sons were sent to
England to school and university. But the lack of means to knowledge for
the mass of the colony began to be painfully apparent.
In the time of Charles the First one Benjamin Symms had left his means
for the founding of a free school in Elizabeth County, and his action
had been solemnly approved by the Assembly. By degrees there appeared
other similar free schools, though they were never many nor adequate.
But the first Assembly after the Restoration had made provision for a
college. Land was to have been purchased and the building completed as
speedily as might be. The intent had been good, but nothing more had
been done.
There was in Virginia, sent as Commissioner of the Established Church,
a Scotch ecclesiastic, Dr. James Blair. In virtue of his office he had a
seat in, the Council, and his integrity and force soon made him a
leader in the colony. A college in Virginia became Blair's dream. He
was supported by Virginia planters with sons to educate--daughters'
education being purely a domestic affair. Before long Blair had raised
in promised subscriptions what was for the time a large sum. With this
for a nucleus he sailed to England and there collected more. Tillotson,
Archbishop of Canterbury, and Stillingfleet, Bishop of Worcester, helped
him much. The King and Queen inclined a favorable ear, and, though he
met with opposition in certain quarters, Blair at last obtained his
charter. There was to be built in Virginia and to be sustained by
taxation a great school, "a seminary of ministers of the gospel where
youths may be piously educated in good letters and manners; a certain
place of universal study, or perpetual college of divinity, philosophy,
languages and other good arts and sciences." Blair sailed back to
Virginia with the charter of the college, some money, a plan for the
main building drawn by Christopher Wren, and for himself the office of
President.
The Assembly, for the benefit of the college, taxed raw and tanned
hides, dressed buckskin, skins of doe and elk, muskrat and raccoon. The
construction of the new seat of learning was begun at Williamsburg. When
it was completed and opened to students, it was named William and Mary.
Its name and record shine fair in old Virginia. Colonial worthies
in goodly number were educated at William and Mary, as were later
revolutionary soldiers and statesmen, and men of name and fame in
the United States. Three American Presidents--Jefferson, Monroe, and
Tyler--were trained there, as well as Marshall, the Chief Justice, four
signers of the Declaration of Independence, and many another man of
mark.
The seventeenth century is about to pass. France and England are at war.
The colonial air vibrates with the struggle. There is to be a brief lull
after 1697, but the conflict will soon be resumed. The more northerly
colonies, the nearer to New France, feel the stronger pulsation, but
Virginia, too, is shaken. England and France alike play for the support
of the red man. All the western side of America lies open to incursion
from that pressed-back Indian sea of unknown extent and volume. Up and
down, the people, who have had no part in making that European war,
are sensitive to the menace of its dangers. In Virginia they build
blockhouses and they keep rangers on guard far up the great rivers.
All the world is changing, and the changes are fraught with significance
for America. Feudalism has passed; scholasticism has gone; politics,
commerce, philosophy, religion, science, invention, music, art, and
literature are rapidly altering. In England William and Mary pass away.
Queen Anne begins her reign of twelve years. Then, in 1714, enters the
House of Hanover with George the First. It is the day of Newton and
Locke and Berkeley, of Hume, of Swift, Addison, Steele, Pope, Prior, and
Defoe. The great romantic sixteenth century, Elizabeth's spacious time,
is gone. The deep and narrow, the intense, religious, individualistic
seventeenth century is gone. The eighteenth century, immediate parent of
the nineteenth, grandparent of the twentieth, occupies the stage.
In the year 1704, just over a decade since Dr. Blair had obtained the
charter for his College, the erratic and able Governor of Virginia,
Francis Nicholson, was recalled. For all that he was a wild talker, he
had on the whole done well for Virginia. He was, as far as is known,
the first person actually to propose a federation or union of all
those English-speaking political divisions, royal provinces, dominions,
palatinates, or what not, that had been hewed away from the vast
original Virginia. He did what he could to forward the movement for
education and the fortunes of the William and Mary College. But he is
quoted as having on one occasion informed the body of the people that
"the gentlemen imposed upon them." Again, he is said to have remarked of
the servant population that they had all been kidnapped and had a lawful
action against their masters. "Sir," he stated to President Blair, who
would have given him advice from the Bishop of London, "Sir, I know how
to govern Virginia and Maryland better than all the bishops in England!
If I had not hampered them in Maryland and kept them under, I should
never have been able to govern them!" To which Blair had to say, "Sir,
if I know anything of Virginia, they are a good-natured, tractable
people as any in the world, and you may do anything with them by way
of civility, but you will never be able to manage them in that way you
speak of, by hampering and keeping them under!"*
* William and Mary College Quarterly, vol. I, p. 66.
About this time arrived Claude de Richebourg with a number of Huguenots
who settled above the Falls. First and last, Virginia received many of
this good French strain. The Old Dominion had now a population of
over eighty thousand persons--whites, Indians in no great number, and
negroes. The red men are mere scattered dwellers in the land east of the
mountains. There are Indian villages, but they are far apart. Save upon
the frontier fringe, the Indian attacks no more. But the African is here
to stay.
"The Negroes live in small Cottages called Quarters... under the
direction of an Overseer or Bailiff; who takes care that they tend such
Land as the Owner allots and orders, upon which they raise Hogs
and Cattle and plant Indian Corn, and Tobacco for the Use of their
Master.... The Negroes are very numerous, some Gentlemen having Hundreds
of them of all Sorts, to whom they bring great Profitt; for the Sake of
which they are obliged to keep them well, and not over-work, starve or
famish them, besides other Inducements to favour them; which is done
in a great Degree, to such especially that are laborious, careful and
honest; tho' indeed some Masters, careless of their own Interest or
deputation, are too cruel and negligent. The Negroes are not only
encreased by fresh supplies from Africa and the West India Islands, but
also are very prolific among themselves; and they that are born here
talk good English and affect our Language, Habits and Customs.... Their
work or Chimerical (hard Slavery) is not very laborious; their greatest
Hardship consisting in that they and their Posterity are not at their
own Liberty or Disposal, but are the Property of their Owners; and
when they are free they know not how to provide so well for themselves
generally; neither did they live so plentifully nor (many of them) so
easily in their own Country where they are made Slaves to one another,
or taken Captive by their Ennemies."*
* It is an English clergyman, the Reverend Hugh Jones, who
is writing ("The Present State of Virginia") in the year
1724. He writes and never sees that, though every
amelioration be true, yet there is here old Inequity.
The white Virginians lived both after the fashion of England and after
fashions made by their New World environment. They are said to have
been in general a handsome folk, tall, well-formed, and with a ready and
courteous manner. They were great lovers of riding, and of all country
life, and few folk in the world might overpass them in hospitality. They
were genial, they liked a good laugh, and they danced to good music.
They had by nature an excellent understanding. Yet, thinks at least
the Reverend Hugh Jones, they "are generally diverted by Business
or Inclination from profound Study, and prying into the Depth of
Things....They are more inclinable to read Men by Business and
Conversation, than to dive into Books... they are apt to learn, yet they
are fond of and will follow their own Ways, Humours and Notions, being
not easily brought to new Projects and Schemes."
It was as Governor of these people that, in succession to Nicholson,
Edward Nott came to Virginia, the deputy of my Lord Orkney. Nott
died soon afterward, and in 1710 Orkney sent to Virginia in his stead
Alexander Spotswood. This man stands in Virginia history a manly,
honorable, popular figure. Of Scotch parentage, born in Morocco, soldier
under Marlborough, wounded at Blenheim, he was yet in his thirties when
he sailed across the Atlantic to the river James. Virginia liked him,
and he liked Virginia. A man of energy and vision, he first made himself
at home with all, and then after his own impulses and upon his own lines
went about to develop and to better the colony. He had his projects and
his hobbies, mostly useful, and many sounding with a strong modern tone.
Now and again he quarreled with the Assembly, and he made it many a
cutting speech. But it, too, and all Virginia and the world were growing
modern. Issues were disengaging themselves and were becoming distinct.
In these early years of the eighteenth century, Whig and Tory in England
drew sharply over against each other. In Virginia, too, as in Maryland,
the Carolinas, and all the rest of England-in-America, parties were
emerging. The Virginian flair for political life was thus early in
evidence. To the careless eye the colony might seem overwhelmingly for
King and Church. "If New England be called a Receptacle of Dissenters,
and an Amsterdam of Religion, Pennsylvania the Nursery of Quakers;
Maryland the Retirement of Roman Catholicks, North Carolina the Refuge
of Runaways and South Carolina the Delight of Buccaneers and Pyrates,
Virginia may be justly esteemed the happy Retreat of true Britons and
true Churchmen for the most Part." This "for the most part" paints the
situation, for there existed an opposition, a minority, which might grow
to balance, and overbalance. In the meantime the House of Burgesses at
Williamsburg provided a School for Discussion.
At the time when Parson Jones with his shrewd eyes was observing society
in the Old Dominion, Williamsburg was still a small village, even though
it was the capital. Towns indeed, in any true sense, were nowhere to be
found in Virginia. Yet Williamsburg had a certain distinction. Within
it there arose, beneath and between old forest trees, the college, an
admirable church--Bruton Church--the capitol, the Governor's house or
"palace," and many very tolerable dwelling-houses of frame and brick.
There were also taverns, a marketplace, a bowling-green, an arsenal, and
presently a playhouse. The capitol at Williamsburg was a commodious
one, able to house most of the machinery of state. Here were the Council
Chamber, "where the Governor and Council sit in very great state, in
imitation of the King and Council, or the Lord Chancellor and House of
Lords," and the great room of the House of Burgesses, "not unlike the
House of Commons." Here, at the capitol, met the General Courts in April
and October, the Governor and Council acting as judges. There were also
Oyer and Terminer and Admiralty Courts. There were offices and committee
rooms, and on the cupola a great clock, and near the capitol was "a
strong, sweet Prison for Criminals; and on the other side of an open
Court another for Debtors... but such Prisoners are very rare, the
Creditors being generally very merciful.... At the Capitol, at publick
Times, may be seen a great Number of handsome, well-dressed, compleat
Gentlemen. And at the Governor's House upon Birth-Nights, and at Balls
and Assemblies, I have seen as fine an Appearance, as good Diversion,
and as splendid Entertainments, in Governor Spotswood's Time, as I have
seen anywhere else."
It is a far cry from the Susan Constant, the Goodspeed, and the
Discovery, from those first booths at Jamestown, from the Starving Time,
from Christopher Newport and Edward-Maria Wingfield and Captain John
Smith to these days of Governor Spotswood. And yet, considering the
changes still to come, a century seems but a little time and the far cry
not so very far.
Though the Virginians were in the mass country folk, yet villages or
hamlets arose, clusters of houses pressing about the Court House of each
county. There were now in the colony over a score of settled counties.
The westernmost of these, the frontier counties, were so huge that they
ran at least to the mountains, and, for all one knew to the contrary,
presumably beyond. But "beyond" was a mysterious word of unknown
content, for no Virginian of that day had gone beyond. All the way from
Canada into South Carolina and the Florida of that time stretched the
mighty system of the Appalachians, fifteen hundred miles in length and
three hundred in breadth. Here was a barrier long and thick, with
ridge after ridge of lifted and forested earth, with knife-blade
vales between, and only here and there a break away and an encompassed
treasure of broad and fertile valley. The Appalachians made a true
Chinese Wall, shutting all England-in-America, in those early days, out
from the vast inland plateau of the continent, keeping upon the seaboard
all England-in-America, from the north to the south. To Virginia these
were the mysterious mountains just beyond which, at first, were held
to be the South Sea and Cathay. Now, men's knowledge being larger by a
hundred years, it was known that the South Sea could not be so near.
The French from Canada, going by way of the St. Lawrence and the Great
Lakes, had penetrated very far beyond and had found not the South Sea
but a mighty river flowing into the Gulf of Mexico. What was the real
nature of this world which had been found to lie over the mountains?
More and more Virginians were inclined to find out, foreseeing that they
would need room for their growing population. Continuously came in folk
from the Old Country, and continuously Virginians were born. Maryland
dwelt to the north, Carolina to the south. Virginia, seeking space, must
begin to grow westward.
There were settlements from the sea to the Falls of the James, and
upon the York, the Rappahannock, and the Potomac. Beyond these, in the
wilderness, might be found a few lonely cabins, a scattered handful of
pioneer folk, small blockhouses, and small companies of rangers charged
with protecting all from Indian foray. All this country was rolling and
hilly, but beyond it stood the mountains, a wall of enchantment, against
the west.
Alexander Spotswood, hardy Scot, endowed with a good temperamental blend
of the imaginative and the active, was just the man, the time being
ripe, to encounter and surmount that wall. Fortunately, too, the
Virginians were horsemen, man and horse one piece almost, New World
centaurs. They would follow the bridle-tracks that pierced to the hilly
country, and beyond that they might yet make way through the primeval
forest. They would encounter dangers, but hardly the old perils of
seacoast and foothills. Different, indeed, is this adventure of the
Governor of Virginia and his chosen band from the old push afoot into
frowning hostile woods by the men of a hundred and odd years before!
Spotswood rode westward with a company drawn largely from the colonial
gentry, men young in body or in spirit, gay and adventurous. The
whole expedition was conceived and executed in a key both humorous and
knightly. These "Knights"* set face toward the mountains in August,
1716. They had guides who knew the upcountry, a certain number of
rangers used to Indian ways, and servants with food and much wine in
their charge. So out of settled Virginia they rode, and up the long,
gradual lift of earth above sea-level into a mountainous wilderness,
where before them the Aryan had not come. By day they traveled, and
bivouacked at night.
* On the sandy roads of settled Virginia horses went unshod,
but for the stony hills and the ultimate cliffs they must
have iron shoes. After the adventure and when the party had
returned to civilization, the Governor, bethinking himself
that there should be some token and memento of the exploit,
had made in London a number of small golden horseshoes, set
as pins to be worn in the lace cravats of the period. Each
adventurer to the mountains received one, and the band has
kept, in Virginian lore, the title of the Knights of the
Golden Horseshoe.
Higher and more rugged grew the mountains. Some trick of the light made
them show blue, so that they presently came to be called the Blue Ridge,
in contradistinction to the westward lying, gray Alleghanies. They were
like very long ocean combers, with at intervals an abrupt break, a gap,
cliff-guarded, boulder-strewn, with a narrow rushing stream making way
between hemlocks and pines, sycamore, ash and beech, walnut and linden.
Towards these blue mountains Spotswood and his knights rode day after
day and came at last to the foot of the steep slope. The long ridges
were high, but not so high but that horse and man might make shift to
scramble to the crest. Up they climbed and from the heights they looked
across and down into the Valley of Virginia, twenty miles wide, a
hundred and twenty long--a fertile garden spot. Across the shimmering
distances they saw the gray Alleghanies, fresh barrier to a fresh west.
Below them ran a clear river, afterwards to be called the Shenandoah.
They gazed--they predicted colonists, future plantations, future towns,
for that great valley, large indeed as are some Old World kingdoms.
They drank the health of England's King, and named two outstanding
peaks Mount George and Mount Alexander; then, because their senses were
ravished by the Eden before them, they dubbed the river Euphrates. They
plunged and scrambled down the mountain side to the Euphrates, drank
of it, bathed in it, rested, ate, and drank again. The deep green woods
were around them; above them they could see the hawk, the eagle, and the
buzzard, and at their feet the bright fish of the river.
At last they reclimbed the Blue Ridge, descended its eastern face, and,
leaving the great wave of it behind them, rode homeward to Williamsburg
in triumph.
We are thus, with Spotswood and his band, on the threshold of expanding
American vistas. This Valley of Virginia, first a distant Beulah land
for the eye of the imagination only, presently became a land of pioneer
cabins, far apart--very far apart--then a settled land, of farms,
hamlets, and market towns. Nor did the folk come only from that elder
Virginia of tidal waters and much tobacco, of "compleat gentlemen" at
the capital, and of many slaves in the fields. But downward from
the Potomac, they came south into this valley, from Pennsylvania and
Maryland, many of them Ulster Scots who had sailed to the western
world. In America they are called the Scotch Irish, and in the main
they brought stout hearts, long arms, and level heads. With these they
brought in as luggage the dogmas of Calvin. They permeated the Valley
of Virginia; many moved on south into Carolina; finally, in large
part, they made Kentucky and Tennessee. Germans, too, came into the
valley--down from Pennsylvania--quiet, thrifty folk, driven thus far
westward from a war-ravished Rhine.
Shrewd practicality trod hard upon the heels of romantic fancy in the
mind of Spotswood. His Order of the Knights of the Horseshoe had a
fleeting existence, but the Vision of the West lived on. Frontier folk
in growing numbers were encouraged to make their way from tidewater
to the foot of the Blue Ridge. Spotsylvania and King George were names
given to new counties in the Piedmont in honor of the Governor and
the sovereign. German craftsmen, who had been sent over by Queen
Anne--vine-dressers and ironworkers--were settled on Spotswood's own
estate above the falls of the Rapidan. The little town of Germanna
sprang up, famous for its smelting furnaces.
To his country seat in Spotsylvania, Alexander Spotswood retired when
he laid down the office of Governor in 1722. But his talents were too
valuable to be allowed to rust in inactivity. He was appointed deputy
Postmaster-General for the English colonies, and in the course of his
administration made one Benjamin Franklin Postmaster for Philadelphia.
He was on the point of sailing with Admiral Vernon on the expedition
against Cartagena in 1740, when he was suddenly stricken and died. He
was buried at Temple Farm by Yorktown. On the expedition to Cartagena
went one Lawrence Washington, who named his country seat after the
Admiral and whose brother George many years later was to receive the
surrender of Cornwallis and his army hard by the resting-place of
Alexander Spotswood. Colonial Virginia lies behind us. The era of
revolution and statehood beckons us on.