The scenario as it played out: 1607, 1608

The scenario as it played out: 1607, 1608

For different and varied reasons Virginia failed during the Company period. It originated from a proposed local-regional economic development initiative that lacking financial capacity and needing royal authority and permission was brought to London for both. Taken over by Court and London-based elites, the project was transformed into a national, Kennedy-esque “man on the moon” assertion of English aspirations, and thrust upon a king whose ambitions drove him elsewhere (Ireland) rather than Virginia. The Virginia Company was sent off with his signature, his royal appointed board of directors—with a pat on the head of its private merchant investors–and no money. What little money England had for colonization under James I went to Ireland. As for Virginia Company money, the first investment paid of the voyages of 1606 and 1607, with the leftovers sufficient only for a very bad start at Jamestown. An optimist could say that was better than its first colony, 1606 Sagadahoc in Maine.

the effects of Sagadahoc

Few have ever heard of Sagadahoc. When the King signed the Virginia Company charter in April 1606 Plymouth activists and board members purchased their shares, shares sufficient to send out an exploratory voyage to determine where their colony ought to be located. It was clear from the start that the London Company was heading to someplace south they called Virginia, somewhere to the north of Raleigh’s old settlement. The Plymouth Company leadership (primarily Popham and Gorgas) were closely associated with past voyages of exploration led by Weymouth, and so they funded an exploratory voyage to scout out a more precise and suitable location for their colony.

In August of 1606, Plymouth Company set off the “Richard of Plimouth” with seasoned captain, pilots and crew, along with a contingent number of men intended to hold any ground they might discover until a second voyage could be sent to formally start the colony. Well, the Richard of Plimouth, contrary to its instructions, took a different route to America, got adverse winds, and ran into a Spanish fleet around Puerto Rico. Something told the English this was not New England. Captured by the Spanish, only the leadership was set free to return to England, and the crew and contingent was sent, a la Ben-Hur, to row the Spanish galleys.

By the time these folk got back to England and relayed their tale, the Plymouth Board readied the second ship, which was being organized awaiting news from the first voyage, in October 1606, under an experienced captain and crew from Bristol. It was intended to carry out the exploratory mission of the Richard of Plimouth, and to report back its discovered location for the permanent colony. In the interim before the second Plymouth Company ship returned, the three vessels of the London Company set off for Jamestown (December 1606).

The second ship returned in February 1607 with a location they considered “made in heaven”. If there were any competition between the two sub-corporations, the pressure was on the Plymouth colony to catch up. So, in May 1607 they launched their three ships, carrying 120 men and two Indians (who were also men), and headed for contemporary New England.

The ships met off the coast of Maine in early August and by the middle of that month they found a suitable location that matched the instructions given them by the Privy Council, on todays Sagadahoc River, upriver from the mouth of the Kennebec River. As had Jamestown, they both operated under the same set of instructions and congruent to which set up their plantation, called the Popham Plantation. The instructions appointed the local resident council, which, like Jamestown, appointed company investors and high status individual . The Sagadahoc colonists, as did the Jamestown colonists, set about to build their port/fort and home away from home using an identical building plan, schedule, through common labor.

To make a short story even shorter, the settlement did not prosper. While Sagadahoc had one huge advantage over Jamestown–it didn’t locate next to a disease ridden tropical swamp–it soon became clear that the faults in planning the expedition and settling the colony were replicated in Maine. In particular, the leadership chosen to form the resident council was shallow; dominated by close relatives of the London incorporators, Gilbert, Popham, they were not chosen for leadership abilities. As Gorgas wrote to Lord Salisbury:

“the chief causes were the insufficiency of the food supply to carry the colonists through the winter, and the ‘childish factions, ignorant timorous and ambitious persons’ who ‘bread an unstable resolution and a general confusion in all theyre affairs’ … for at first, the President [of the resident council] George Popham himself is an honest man, but auld [old-he was 53], and of an unweildy body [fat], and timerously fearful to offend or contest with others that will or do oppose him, but otherwise a discrete caeful man. Captain Gilbert [24 years of age] is described to be from thence to be, desiroous of supremacy and rule, a loose life, prompt to sensuality, little zeal in religion, humorose, head strong and small judgement and experience, otherwise valient inough. [99] Andrews, Vol. 1, p. 92

There was, however, one major difference. Jamestown arrived in May and had time to clear a field and plant a crop that would harvest before winter came. Sagadahoc arrived in mid August. Even trade with the Indians, if successful, was not likely to fill a gap so late in the year. Like Jamestown, food supplies could not be stored on ship without deterioration, and in winter the haphazardly built storage facilities were prone to fire. When one of the ships left in August, it carried forty-five of the colonists back.  Andrews, citing Popham’s take on the colony, complained bitterly that the quality of the people sent over was not sufficient to the task. Idleness, disregard for the common welfare, argumentative and faction-prone they were at best difficult to govern. [99] Charles Andrews, Vol. 1, p. 93.

As expected the winter proved harsh, and in February one of its two key leaders, George Popham died. The storehouse and a number of dwellings burned, no supply ships came–and most important of all, the single key founder of the Plymouth Company, Sir John Popham died in London. His loss left Gorgas, a younger, more idealistic devotee of colonization (earlier writings called him “the father of North American colonization”, in error I believe) as the guiding spirit of the Plymouth Company–and the Governor of the port of Plymouth, England. With a family legacy that reached back to the days of William the Conqueror, Gorgas held such social status sufficient to keeping the Company functioning.

When a second ship returned to London in December 1606, it brought rather discouraging news about Sagadahoc, which disheartened a number of Company investors. When the first ship, the Mary and John returned to Sagadahoc in early spring, it found a broken, conflict-ridden community on the brink of starvation. It brought no new settlers to replace those who left or had died. At that point the Plymouth Company in London, discouraged, but still committed to the colony, but the Sagadahoc residents were not. They returned on the Mary and John–along with the surviving Gilbert, whose older brother had died, leaving him with his English inheritance. Sagadahoc had been abandoned.

This did not cause the Plymouth Company to fail. There were debts to be paid, and the Company owned two ships, manned by good captains and crew. Knowing the forests had great potential for fur trade, and the coast one of the most bountiful fishing banks than known–with more than a century of fisherman who had fished off its coasts and used small trading posts to store necessaries and trade for fur. Jamestown’s John Smith had explored the area, and in his writings and contacts further confirmed the image of New England as being a promising area for a permanent settlement.

Gorgas and Sir Francis Popham sent Company ships over to trade for fish and furs–and continued to so so for better part of the next decade. A byproduct of this was the publicity and general good perception of New England, especially its cod fishing potential. Others followed suit, and although no permanent developed, small fishing and trading posts did appear on the coast and on mouths of major rivers. When the time was to come for a second settlement, as it would in the late teens, a proto fishing cluster was in place off the coast of Maine [99] See Andrews, Vol. 1, pp. 95-7.

Do-Do Hits the Fan

Hindsight is nearly all to be sure, but it at minimum suggests the first charter was at risk in its origins, and for whatever the reason, the guiding leadership had not thought through what colonization entailed. As we shall later see, even after a bad start, it would take two full years for the light to dawn in the [London] Company leadership as to what they needed to do to establish a colony–not a trading factory.

In any event, as was the pattern a trading company advocates, tapped its knights, nobles  and merchants who were interested in a colonial venture, and wealthy knighted subscribers were the bond purchasers. One was a Keeper of the Tower of London, and another the son of the Lord Chief Justice. In American histories these folk are usually referred to as “gentlemen”, but the reality was they were family members of key policy-makers-implementers of Elizabeth’s court, and associated nobility-gentry. The others were servants, indentured to the Virginia Company, intended to serve as laborers, farmers, explorers and ordinary soldiers/militia. Those people who were blamed for not earning their keep, were the sons of these wealthy folk, looking to get the experience of a trading factory, and to set up shop in Jamestown for further adventures. That is one reason why these entitled, little skilled young gentlemen, born to the manor so to speak, made such fine candidates for mob rule and starvation.

Different investors wanted different things. One influential investor Richard Hakluyt (who BTW went to Jamestown) wanted to stress colonialization, i.e. a permanent settlement and installation of an economic base that yielded returns like that of Spanish gold mines. Others wanted to convert the Indians to Protestantism—we are in the middle of the English Protestant Reformation. Others wanted a port from which English trade routes could be secured. [99] https://encyclopediavirginia.org/entries/virginia-company-of-london.

The explanation behind investor interest in the initial Jamestown expedition is its centrality in the popular culture of its day which is more than hinted at in Shakespeare’s 1605 play ‘Eastward Ho!”. Specifically citing Virginia, the play relates “I tell thee golde is more plentiful there than copper is with us … Why man all their dripping pans and their chamber pottes are pure golde … and as for rubies and diamonds, they go forth on holy dayes and gather ‘hem by the seashore to hang on their children’s coats and sticke in their cappes’. This theme ironically appears to have had more effect than the modern tourist theme “Virginia is for lovers” [99] Virginius Dabney, Virginia: the New Dominion (University Press of Virginia, 1971), p. 7. Today, I can read the equivalent in a Robinhood chat room. Merrie Old England is still around.

So now we are ready to explore more deeply the establishment of the Virginia- London Company

Through info obtained from Captain Newport, the captain of the expedition and its supply ships, Smythe and the board of directors kept informed about Jamestown affairs. The first supply ship arrived in January 1608, the second in October of that year. The news Newport carried was hesitant at best, but from it a replication of Sagadahoc did not seem imminent. Probably, the ineffectual resident council was becoming an issue of concern, as was the need for more supplies  and settlers. There was also a greater appreciation for “artisans”, if only to locate and build infrastructure prospects for export trade.

It was clear from the beginning the 1606 investor core were hungry for dividends, impatient the colony was not sending exports for quick profits. During this period, the colonists obliged by search for gold (the so-called gold rush that supposedly distorted the priorities of the colonists) yielded only ore, fool’s gold, which was sent to England where it was not well-received. The return of the deposed members of the resident council (Wingate, Archer and Ratcliffe) lent credibility to Newport’s warnings, and sensitized London about the failure of the resident council as the government of the settlement.

When Jamestown council returned on later supply ships (Wingfield, especially), they knew they were facing the need to seriously rethink the endeavor. To this end, for example they started to slightly change the demographic configuration of the settlers, and import more artisans. They also knew their local governance structures had not been viable from the start. “Placing the control of the colony in the hands of a group of councilors liable to faction and dispute was leading to continued mismanagement” was thought to be the obvious mistake, and so they searched for the proper manager to send over [99] Charles M. Andrews, the Colonial Period of American History: the Settlements, Vol. 1. (Yale University Press, 1964, p. 101. Their previous merchant trading legacy stressed a military background was essential to fend off the hostile environment, and to manage internal control of the outpost itself.

When Newport returned from his third voyage in January 1609, however, his commentary raised concern and elevated fears the colony was not going well–in need of radical reform and reorganization if it was to succeed and prosper. The winter of 1608 and 1609 was the turning point in the Virginia Company’s coming to grip with its (and investor’s) expectations, and the realities of establishing a permanent settlement in Virginia. Whatever else, the lingering possibility of a “Jamestown as Sagadahoc” alerted the London leadership that something had to be done–and fast.

According to Andrews the London leadership perceived two main causes of concern: (1) the route and timing of the supply voyages (too long at sea and consumed too much food in travel); and, (2) the failure of the resident council as the local government. The first problem could be addressed by the Company, but the second required a charter revision, and certainly approval of the royal council, a risky and time-consuming process.

Specifically, the charter had to be amended to allow the Company greater prerogatives in the administration of the colony, and that meant strengthening its ability to respond as required in a timely fashion. If they were given sufficient authority and autonomy, the Company was willing to finance and send over a large supply fleet, with five hundred settlers and sufficient supplies. Rather than dribble colonists in, a commitment was made to to link charter reform with a serious effort at establishing a permanent settlement (although even at this point, it remained rather vague in its conceptual design and strategy implications) [99] Andrews, Vol. 1, pp. 101-2.

The contemporary idea of colonization had advanced no further than to conceive of settlement in terms of ships reasonably well equipped and captained, of hardy men in sufficient number, but of any class or quality, drawn together in part by the prospect of gold and in part by the need of employment, and of supplies adequate for the purpose. The early desire to obtain wealth from mythical mines or Spanish plate fleets, though far from spent, was yielding to the wiser design of promoting trade in the commodities of the country, fish and furs chiefly, and of creating a legitimate barter … the company in England had not yet learned in the hard school of experience the fundamental lesson that a colony to be successful and permanent must be self-supporting, that it must raise its own food, and render itself independent of supplies furnished by the promoters at home [England] [99] Charles M. Andrews, the Colonial Period of American History: the Settlements, Vol. 1. (Yale University Press, 1964, pp. 99-100.

Barrels full of supplies and ships full of immigrants were not enough:

Facing the hard reality that nothing substantial could be gained without the production of staple crops, they initiated a full-scale effort at colonization. The Company took complete charge of production, which was [to be] carried out on company land by indentured servants and supplied at company expense. The Company’s chosen agents, a governor and council residing in Virginia, implemented decisions on planting, distributions and trade as well as government … As sole proprietor the company collected what was produced; as monopoly merchant it carried out all colonial marketing functions … the Virginia Company’s plantations required a good deal of time to reach a level of development sufficient to produce the staple exports required to yield profits. [99] Robert Brenner, Merchants and Revolution: Commercial Change, Political Conflict, and London’s Overseas Traders. 1550-1653 (Verso, 2003, first published, Princeton University Press, 1993), pp. 93-4

[It is worth note to observe the structure underlying the provision of staples was more feudal than post-enclosure, and the reader should also note there is nothing about “homesteading” in all this. Nor is there serious doses of capitalism. The workforce in 1608 was indentured and as such company employees—although legally consider as company “property”.]

It is at this point that Edwin Sandys probably entered into the Company’s centers of decision-making. Andrews and others credit him with writing the draft of the proposed 1609 charter revision. Sandys was then forty-eight, a member of the Royal Council, and since 1607 an investor in the Virginia Company. Likely, the revision was first drafted in February, 1609, and then sent through channels; the revision process was completed, with royal approval and seals, by May 23 of that year. In that my research has uncovered no significant discussion of the intervening process, I suspect the King, usually distant from the details. If so, without direct ties to the Privy Council, the Royal Council, whatever that meant in terms of quorums, likely housed  the discussion. Popham was dead, and the Plymouth Corporation was busted. With thirty-nine shareholders at this point, it is certain this is a closed circle of interested advocates—probably linking with court officials such as Salisbury.

Presumably, they were smart enough to realize they could not expect to micromanage the colony from London, and that the settler configuration was unstable and of little support in the colony’s governance. Rather than seeing a mission failure, they sensed mismanagement due to poorly designed local government. Quick profits were likely not going to happen soon, debt repayments were all the closer, and more supply ships had to be financed and that meant more debt-investment. Still, the late medieval mercantilist definition of trade had not yet been ruptured or broken; challenged yes, but the Company still believed the traditional trading model might yet be made to work. By 1608-9 the Virginia Company needed a financial refill and a rather significant restructuring.

Ireland—England’s real colonial objective in the early Stuart period:

To set the stage, to complete the “Big Picture” we ought to look at the Plantation Strategy as it had been developed under Elizabeth, and how it evolved during the reforms of 1606-12. To inject the Irish Ulster Plantation at this point may seem as a rather odd intrusion to our Jamestown and Virginia story. But its inclusion here is my attempt to reverse American thought processes about early Stuart American colonization by introducing them to the unpatriotic assertion that Virginia’s colonization was a top priority on England’s policy agenda in 1608, or at least it was the pinnacle of the English colonization agenda. It was neither.

Virginia was the “tail” and Ireland was the dog of first decade English colonization. That, I assert, is itself a major explanation of why Jamestown got off to such a bad start–and why the Virginia colonization languished in Ireland’s (and later Bermuda and West Indies) shadows well into the 1660’s. Thought today as the English King’s fondest overseas possession, knick-named the “Old Dominion”, the moniker was given to Virginia, not by Charles I, but by Charles II–in 1660-after the Civil War and Cromwell’s Protectorate. It took that long for Virginia to occupy a noticeable position in Crown priorities–and even then it was not all that prominent. In many ways Virginia was always England’s forgotten and often neglected child.

While there were similarities between Ireland and North America (they were overseas; one was over three thousand nautical miles, the other less than 80). The geography, England’s past involvement with Ireland and Irish colonization, and Irish internal dynamics were, of course, quite different from Virginia and gave Ireland the advantage. When James I negotiated with Virginia Company merchant adventurers after his accession to power in 1603, he would adopt this Elizabethan style of colonization, and would also consider Ireland as his primary colonial effort. We shall explain this more fully in modules to follow.

That reality, as much as the terrible charter structure, cratered the Virginia Company, and made it a “trading company zombie”–a company waiting to be put out of its misery.

A Short Assessment Regarding the Formation and First Years of the Virginia Company

The timing of the Virginia Company’s incorporation was neither fortunate or unfortunate. It was atypical and distinctive policy-making context or environment—and awkward juncture in the course of British history. The incorporation was one instance in a series of policy disruptions that had been brewing in the last Tudor years, which when combined with the ascent to power of a Scottish king and the very evident transition of the English economy, taking with it the older medieval social hierarchical structure, and translocating it into larger scale urban centers, and pained with what amounted to a thirty year war with Catholic Spain made James I’s honeymoon  as King of England very short indeed.

Dynastic change is not altogether natural, and it involves the interweaving of elites, allies, recasting of enemies, and in general invites miscommunication, shifting of alliances, opportunities for new policy directions. In James’s instance he was by no means an “insider”. Despite his considerable experience in managing kingship in Scotland, he assumed the English throne with his own mind about policy, especially foreign—and his more relaxed relationships with Catholicism did not help matters. There were some very significant policy fractures evident in these early years of the formation of the Virginia Company.

James certainly danced to different tunes than had Elizabeth. Early on, the early Stuart policy system polarized. The Gunpowder Plot, coming as it did a year or so after his ascension, did not help. That the arguably chief author of the Virginia Company charter was the chief judge who presided over the Gunpower Plot trials demonstrates how actors, themes, and reactions interwove themselves into the larger policy-making process/atmosphere and are reflected in odd spots in the Virginia Company, its proponents’ actions/roles, and its charter.

To add to this, Americans, less sensitive and aware of English history, discount the English goings on—preferring to concentrate on the hard-luck starving, yet lazy and contentious Jamestown settlers—if settlers is in fact the right word. They weren’t settlers; they were Virginia Company employees, accompanied by gentry-aristocratic opportunists unused to self-reliance and governed by a divided, unprepared “city” council appointed by unknown Londoners. Jamestown in these years was the horrible backwater; London was where the action was if one is concerned about the larger colony and its potential to survive and prosper.

That the Plymouth subsidiary colony was stillborn, and its joint stock corporation reduced to simple survival and repivot, only made the early Jamestown years more traumatic and desperate. By the time we get to 1608 and early 1609, the Ulster Plantation is “taking off” and dominates the court policy-agenda, while Virginia is the opposite.

If 1609-10 was to be Jamestown’s Valley Forge, 1608-09 was the Virginia London Company’s.

What should the Reader take away from this “Formation” Discussion?

First and foremost, most of the historical discussion concerning Jamestown and its immediate founding in 1607 through 1609 needs be repositioned. Primary attention ought not be placed on the poor souls that landed and tried to survive. That horrible experience should be placed in the context of the greater problem—if one is mostly concerned with the future of the colony and its development into an American state. Jamestown was the second act, and the goings on in London the primary event. The problem that Jamestown was coping with had been caused by the Virginia Company, and realistically could only be fixed in London. Those problems were personified in the structure and leadership of the Virginia Company—both the conglomerate and the subsidiary London Companies.

In the process that had resulted in the formation and incorporation of the Virginia Company and its subsidiaries, a flawed structure, a 40,000 foot high business plan complete with detailed instructions, a lack of financial and fiscal plan, on top of misplaced leadership priorities implemented by a part-time corporate governance, who gave inadequate thought on Jamestown’s governance, its capacity and the quality of its leadership relative to the problems it could encounter.

All that was bad enough, but even less oversight was made in the preparations and the all important selection of those to be sent over. At least the ships didn’t sink and their Captain was first rate. Hubris in the end is probably behind all of this. They knew beforehand this expedition was an experiment—a toe in the water—but they conflated the long term with the short term—and got neither. The expedition was DOA. The engine that was supposed to cause the colony’s growth and prosperity broke down on the Virginia shore—and was not to start, no earlier than 1612-13.

By then the damage had been done. For the first five years at minimum Jamestown and future Virginia fought an existential and physical battle for survival—while London tried to fix the Virginia Company—and manage to fail two more times in the effort. That the present day state of Virginia was able to grow out of this, is, in itself, amazing. That is the story I wish to tell in As the Twig is Bent.