Colonial Records of Virginia Part 1

Colonial Records of Virginia.

by Various.

INTRODUCTION.

The doc.u.ments herewith presented are printed from copies obtained from the Public Record Office of Great Britain. When the question of the boundary line between Maryland and Virginia was before the Legislature of the latter State, in 1860, Colonel Angus W. McDonald was sent to England to obtain the papers necessary to protect the interests of Virginia. He brought back "nine volumes of ma.n.u.scripts and one book containing forty-eight maps" (see his report, Virginia Legislative Doc.u.ments, No. 39, 1861,). The volumes of ma.n.u.scripts contained, upon an average, 425 pages each, and were filled with valuable historical doc.u.ments, of many of which no copies had ever been seen on this continent since the originals were sent from the Colony of Virginia. In a conversation with the writer, held soon after his return from England, in March, 1861, Colonel McDonald stated that having obtained copies of all the doc.u.ments relating to the question of the boundary line which could be found, and having more money left of the appropriation made than was needed to pay the expenses of his return home, he decided to devote the surplus to obtaining copies of papers relating to the early history of the State, without reference to the question of the boundary line. This statement will, we presume, satisfactorily account for the presence in his collection of such papers as do not relate to the subject upon which he was engaged. That he was well qualified to select such papers is evident from an examination of the list which he made out.

During the occupation of the State capital building by the Federal troops and officials, after the surrender of the Confederate authorities in April, 1865, a very large quant.i.ty of the official doc.u.ments filed in the archives of the State were removed from that building, and at the same time four of the nine volumes and the portfolio of maps above mentioned. Nothing has been heard from any of them since. In 1870, the question of the boundary line being again before the Legislature of Virginia, the Governor sent the Hon. D.C. De Jarnette upon the same errand that Colonel McDonald had so well performed, and the result was the obtaining of such papers as he could find relating to the subject under consideration, including duplicates of some of those which though useful in this connection, are included in the five volumes remaining of those collected by Col. McDonald; also, charters of great length, but which are to be found in print in the histories and statutes of the State, and many of the miscellaneous papers which Colonel McDonald had copied under the circ.u.mstances above named. Among the latter is the account of the first meeting of the a.s.sembly at Jamestown in 1619. When Colonel McDonald visited the State Paper Office (as it was then called) in 1860, this great repository of historical materials had not been thrown open to the public, and he tells us in his report that it was "twenty days after his arrival in London before he could obtain permission to examine the archives of the State Paper Office." A year or two afterwards all of the restrictions which had existed were removed, the papers arranged chronologically, and an index made by which they could be referred to. Farther, W. Noel Sainsbury, Esq., one of the officers of what is now called the Public Record Office, had published a calendar of all the papers relating to the British colonies in North America and the West Indies, from the first discoveries to 1660 (soon be followed by another coming down to the period of the independence of the United States), which contains a brief abstract of every paper included in the above named period, so that enquirers upon subjects embraced in this calendar can by reference see what the office has on file relating to it, and obtain copies of the doc.u.ments required, at a much less cost than a voyage to England. Acting upon this knowledge, the Library Committee of the Virginia Legislature has made a contract with Mr.

Sainsbury for copies of the t.i.tles and copious abstracts of every paper in the Public Record Office, and other repositories, which relates to the history of Virginia while a Colony. All of which he proposes to furnish for about 250, being less than one-half the cost of either of the missions sent, which have obtained only a small fraction of the papers which we are to receive. He is performing his work in a most satisfactory manner; so much is he interested in the task that he has greatly exceeded his agreement by furnis.h.i.+ng gratuitously full and complete copies of many doc.u.ments of more than ordinary interest. Yet notwithstanding the known facilities afforded by the British Government and its officials, Mr. De Jarnette complains that he was refused permission to examine the Rolls Office and the State Paper Office (see his report, Senate Doc.u.ments Session 1871-'2, p. 12); and further, on page 15, he informs us that the papers which he obtained "had to be dug from a mountain of Colonial records with care and labor." His troubles were further increased by the fact that "the Colonial papers are not arranged under heads of respective Colonies, but thrown promiscuously together and const.i.tute an immense ma.s.s of ill kept and badly written records," ib. p. 22.

The reader will infer from the preceding remarks that the State has two complete copies of the record of the proceedings of the first a.s.sembly which met at Jamestown, viz: the McDonald and the De Jarnette copies, and also an abstract furnished by Mr. Sainsbury. Bancroft, the historian, obtained a copy of this paper, which was printed in the collections of the New York Historical Society for 1857. We have therefore been enabled to compare three different versions, and in a measure, a fourth. The De Jarnette copy being in loose sheets, written on one side only, was selected as the most convenient for the printer, and the text is printed from it. Where this differs from either of the others the foot notes show the differences, and, when no reference is made it is because all of them correspond.

When these papers were submitted as a part of the report of the Commissioners on the Boundary Line a joint resolution was adopted by both houses of the Legislature authorizing the Committee on the Library to print such of the papers as might be selected, provided the consent of the Commission could be obtained. Application was made to allow the first and second papers in this pamphlet to be printed but it was refused. The Commission having been dissolved the Committee on the Library have a.s.sumed the responsibility and herewith submit this instalment of these interesting doc.u.ments, which were written before the Colony of Maryland was known, and all of which, save the first, were never before printed.

The Report of the proceedings of the first a.s.sembly is prefaced with the introductory note published with Mr. Bancroft's copy, to which a few notes explanatory have been added.

Trusting that this instalment of these historical records of the Ancient Dominion will be acceptable to the students of our early history, and sufficiently impress the members of the Legislature with their value to move them to make an appropriation sufficient to print all that has been obtained, this is

Respectfully submitted, by your obedient servants.

THOS. H. WYNNE.

_INTRODUCTORY NOTE._

Virginia, for twelve years after its settlement, languished under the government of Sir Thomas Smith, Treasurer of the Virginia Company in England. The Colony was ruled during that period by laws written in blood; and its history shows how the narrow selfishness of despotic power could counteract the best efforts of benevolence. The colonists suffered an extremity of distress too horrible to be described.

In April, 1619, Sir George Yeardley arrived. Of the emigrants who had been sent over at great cost, not one in twenty then remained alive. "In James Citty were only those houses that Sir Thomas Gates built in the tyme of his government, with one wherein the Governor allwayes dwelt, and a church, built wholly at the charge of the inhabitants of that citye, of timber, being fifty foote in length and twenty foot in breadth." At Henrico, now Richmond, there were no more than "three old houses, a poor ruinated Church, with some few poore buildings in the Islande."[1] "For ministers to instruct the people, he founde only three authorized, two others who never received their orders." "The natives he founde uppon doubtfull termes;" so that when the twelve years of Sir Thomas Smith's government expired, Virginia, according to the "judgements" of those who were then members of the Colony, was "in a poore estate."[A]

From the moment of Yeardley's arrival dates the real life of Virginia.

He brought with him "Commissions and instructions from the Company for the better establis.h.i.+nge of a Commonwealth heere."[B] He made proclamation, "that those cruell lawes by which we" (I use the words of the Ancient Planters themselves) "had soe longe been governed, were now abrogated, and that we were to be governed by those free lawes which his Majesties subjectes live under in Englande." Nor were these considerations made dependent on the good will of administrative officers.

"And that they might have a hande in the governinge of themselves," such are the words of the Planters, "yt was graunted that a generall a.s.semblie shoulde be helde yearly once, whereat were to be present the Gov^r and Counsell w^{th} two Burgesses from each Plantation, freely to be elected by the Inhabitants thereof, this a.s.semblie to have power to make and ordaine whatsoever lawes and orders should by them be thought good and proffitable for our subsistance."[C]

In conformity with these instructions, Sir George Yeardley "sente his summons all over the country, as well to invite those of the Counsell of Estate that were absente, as also for the election of Burgesses;"[D] and on Friday, the 30th day of July, 1619, the first elective legislative body of this continent a.s.sembled at James City.

In the relation of Master John Rolfe, inserted by Captain John Smith in his History of Virginia,[E] there is this meagre notice of the a.s.sembly: "The 25 of June came in the _Triall_ with Corne and Cattell in all safety, which tooke from vs cleerely all feare of famine; then our gouernor and councell caused Burgesses to be chosen in all places and met at a generall a.s.sembly, where all matters were debated thought expedient for the good of the Colony."

This account did not attract the attention of Beverley, the early historian of Virginia, who denies that there was any a.s.sembly held there before May, 1620.[F]

The careful St.i.th, whose work is not to be corrected without a hearty recognition of his superior diligence and exemplary fidelity, gives an account[G] of this first legislative body, though he errs a little in the date by an inference from Rolfe's narrative, which the words do not warrant.

The prosperity of Virginia begins with the day when it received, as "a commonwealth," the freedom to make laws for itself. In a solemn address to King James, which was made during the government of Sir Francis Wyatt, and bears the signature of the Governor, Council, and apparently every member of the a.s.sembly, a contrast is drawn between the former "miserable bondage," and "this just and gentle authoritye which hath cherished us of late by more worthy magistrates. And we, our wives and poor children shall ever pray to G.o.d, as our bounden duty is, to give you in this worlde all increase of happines, and to crowne you in the worlde to come w^{th} immortall glorye."[H]

A desire has long existed to recover the record of the proceedings of the a.s.sembly which inaugurated so happy a revolution. St.i.th was unable to find it; no traces of it were met by Jefferson; and Hening,[I] and those who followed Hening, believed it no longer extant. Indeed, it was given up as hopelessly lost.

Having, during a long period of years, inst.i.tuted a very thorough research among the papers relating to America in the British State Paper Office, partly in person and partly with the a.s.sistance of able and intelligent men employed in that Department, I have at last been so fortunate as to obtain the "Proceedings of the First a.s.sembly of Virginia."[5] the doc.u.ment is in the form of "a reporte" from the Speaker; and is more fall and circ.u.mstantial than any subsequent journal of early legislation in the Ancient Dominion.

Many things are noticeable. The Governor and Council sat with the Burgesses; and took part in motions and debates. The Secretary of the Colony was chosen Speaker, and I am not sure that he was a Burgess.[6]

This first American a.s.sembly set the precedent of beginning legislation with prayer. It is evident that Virginia was then as thoroughly a Church of England colony, as Connecticut afterwards was a Calvinistic one. The inauguration of legislative power in the Ancient Dominion preceded the existence of negro slavery, which we will believe it is destined also to survive. The earliest a.s.sembly in the oldest of the original thirteen States, at its first session, took measures "towards the erecting of" a "University and Colledge." Care was also taken for the education of Indian children. Extravagance in dress was not prohibited, but the ministers were to profit by a tax on excess in apparel. On the whole, the record of these Proceedings will justify the opinion of Sir Edward Sandys, that "they were very well and judiciously carried." The different functions of government may have been confounded and the laws were not framed according to any speculative theory; but a perpetual interest attaches to the first elective body representing the people of Virginia, more than a year before the Mayflower, with the Pilgrims, left the harbor of Southampton, and while Virginia was still the oldest British Colony on the whole Continent of America.

GEORGE BANCROFT.

NEW YORK, _October 3, 1856_.

[A] "A Briefe Declaration of the Plantation of Virginia during the first twelve yeares, when Sir Thomas Smyth was Governor, of the Companie, and downe to this present tyme. By the Ancient Planters now remaining alive in Virginia."--_MS. in my possession._[2]

[B] "A Briefe Declaration," &c.

[C] "A Briefe Declaration," &c.

[D] "Proceedings of the first a.s.sembly," now first printed in this volume.

[1] "Henrico, now Richmond," is a grievous error. "Henrico, or Henricus, was situated ten miles below the present site of Richmond, on the main land, to which the peninsula known as Farrar's Island was joined." See footnote Q.--ED.

[2] This doc.u.ment is the third in this collection. It is printed from the copy obtained by Col. McDonald.--ED.

[E] Smith's Generall Historie of Virginia, Richmond edition, Vol. ii.

pp. 38, 39.

[F] See Beverley's History of Virginia, p. 37 of the first edition, and p. 35 of the second.[3]

[G] St.i.th's History of Virginia p. 160, Williamsburg edition.[4]

[H] MS. Copy of Address of Sir Francis Wyatt, &c., &c., to King James I., signed by Sir Francis Wyatt and 32 others.

[I] Hening's Statutes at Large, I., p. 119. refers to the acts of 1623-'4 as "the earliest now extant."

[3] "These Burgesses met the Governor and Council at Jamestown in 1620, and sat in consultation in the same house with them as the method of the Scots Parliament is." "This was the first Generall a.s.sembly that ever was held there."--Beverley.--ED.

[4] "And about the latter end of June (1619) he (Sir George Yeardley, Governor,) called the first General a.s.sembly that was ever held in Virginia. Counties were not yet laid of, but they elected their representatives by towns.h.i.+ps. So that the Burroughs of Jamestown, Henrico, Bermuda Hundred, and the rest, each sent their members to the a.s.sembly." * * * * "and hence it is that our lower house of a.s.sembly was first called the House of Burgesses," St.i.th, p. 160. "In May, this year (1620), there was held another Generall a.s.sembly, which has, through mistake, and the indolence and negligence of our historians in searching such ancient records as are still extant in the country, been commonly reported the first General a.s.sembly," Ib. p. 182. We do not see that St.i.th "errs" even "a little in the data." Rolfe says, "The 25 of June came in the _Triall_ with Corne and Cattell in all safety, which took from us cleerely all feare of famine, then our gouernor and councell caused Burgesses to be chosen in all places, and met at a general a.s.sembly," Smith, p. 128. St.i.th says, "And about the latter end of June he called," &c., St.i.th, p. 160. Neither intimate _when_ the a.s.sembly _met_, only that the governor called them to the latter part of June.--ED.

[5] The first published notice of the existence of this paper occurred in the proceedings of the annual meeting of the Virginia Historical society, held December 15, 1853. In the report of the Executive Committee the chairman, Conway Robinson, Esq., states that he had seen the original report in the State Paper Office in London, on a recent visit to that city.--See Virginia Historical Reporter, Vol. I., 1854.

Whatever question there may be in regard to priority of discovery, it is to be regretted that it was left to the Historical Society of another State to publish a doc.u.ment of so much value to the one to which it solely relates.--ED.

[6] The Secretary of the Colony and Speaker of the first a.s.sembly was John Pory. If he had been one of the Burgesses his name would have appeared with the others. Through the influence of the Earl at Warwick he was made Secretary to the Virginia Company. Campbell says, "He was educated at Cambridge, where he took the Master of Arts in April, 1610.

It is supposed he was a member of the House of Commons. He was much of a traveller, and was at Venice in 1613, at Amsterdam in 1617, and shortly after at Paris." "Sir George Yeardley appointed him one of his Council."--Campbell, p. 139. The record shows that he acted as the presiding officer of the first a.s.sembly, whether _ex officio_ or by selection is not stated. It will be seen that a typographical error in Bancroft's pamphlet makes his name Povy. In Smith's General Historie there is a paper styled "The observations of Master John Pory, Secretarie of Virginia, in his travels;" it gives an account of his voyage to the eastern sh.o.r.e.--Smith, p. 141. Neill says of him, "John Pory was a graduate of Cambridge, a great traveller and good writer, but gained the reputation of being a chronic tipler and literary vagabond and sponger." When young he excited the interest of Hakluyt, who, in a dedication to the third volume of his, remarks: "Now, because long since I did foresee that my profession of Divinitie, the care of my family; and other occasions, might call or divert me from these kind of endeavour, I, therefore have, for these three years last past, encouraged and gathered in these studies of Cosmographia and former histories my honest, industrious and learned friend, Mr. John Porey, one of speciall skill and extraordinary hope, to perform great matters in the same, and beneficial to the Commonwealth." "Pory, in 1600, prepared a _Geographical History of Africa_, but he soon disappointed the expectations of his friends."

A letter from London, dated July 26, 1623, says: "Our old acquaintance, Mr. Porey, is in poore case, and in prison at the Terceras, whither he was driven by contrary winds, from the north coast of Virginia, where he had been upon some discovery, and upon his arrival he was arraigned and in danger of being hanged for a pirate." "He died about 1635." For further particulars from contemporary authorities, see Neill's History of the Virginia Company of London. Albany, Munsell, 1869.--ED.

COLONIAL RECORDS OF VIRGINIA.

STATE PAPERS.

COLONIAL. VOL. I.--NO. 45.