USA > Virginia > City of Williamsburg > City of Williamsburg > Site of old "James Towne," 1607-1698 : a brief historical and topographical sketch of the first American metropolis > Part 8
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& Although this name is now spelled both with and without an e in the last syllable, the former style appears to have been that used by the above-mentioned person.
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yt ye sd porch room att ye first building of ye State House was made use of for an office for ye Secretary, yet ye House of Bur- gesses whilst it soe remained, all along observed it, both incon- venient and incommodious to them whilst sitting; there being nothing spoken or proposed in ye House, that was not equally to be heard there, as wel as in ye Assembly room itselfe, besides ye same gave continuall opportunity to all sorts of psons to crowd before the Assembly room, under pretence of coming to ye Office.
And this House doe again propose to your Excelcy & Honrs such part of ye room, under ye Assembly rooms, as is necessary for ye Secretaries office, wch by seeling ye Walls and raising ye floor will become as safe & commodious for preservation of ye Records, as its possible any other place can be made, wch they doubt not will soe appear to yr Excellency and ye Councel, to whom they submit ye manner of doing and directions thereof, and againe request ye acceptance thereof, to that purpose.
Test ROBERT BEVERLEY Clk Assbly.
The following answer was ordered to be returned.
By His Excellency & Council.
Your reasons given for ye Porch room to remaine an office for your Clerk, have been considered and agreed to, upon condition his Majestys Secretary upon ye first notice given him, be content that his office shall be in ye lower room you propose wch is not in ye least to be doubted, and that you will provide, that a strong partition be made under ye second girder, att ye West end of ye said room, ye floor raised two foot from ye ground, ye walls ceeled, with sawen boards smoothd and battened, and ye Win- dows iron barred, and shutters or Window leaves, of half inch board with a crosse barr to each, with shelves, table & benches to be well done and compleatly finished before ye next general court, att ve charge of ye Country, to be paid for ye next Gen- eral Assembly, and that you agree with some workman accord- ingly."
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It is interesting to note that Robert Beverley, who was the clerk of the Assembly in 1685, probably never occupied the porch chamber as an office, for by a letter from King James II, dated August 1, 1686, he was forever disqualified for holding office, the reason assigned for which in the letter being that he had " chiefly occasioned and promoted those disputes and con- tests " of the Assembly, in the stormy session of 1685. The king's letter also deprived the House of the privilege of electing its clerk, transferring to the governor authority to fill the posi- tion by appointment, and ordered Beverley's prosecution for altering the records." Beverley died shortly before April, 1687.
By an order of the General Assembly there was to be placed a " railing with rails and banisters of Locust or Cedar wood laid double in Oyle & and as close as may be ye forepart of ye State House, of convenient height & att convenient distance from ye House."" The above is taken to mean that the railing was to be placed across the Assembly room to exclude spectators from the part of the hall appointed for the sessions of the burgesses.
In uncovering the foundations it was discovered that nearly all of the brick of which the walls were composed and parts of those belonging to the foundations had been removed, also some of the brick paving.
It is inferred from finding fragments of slate and tiles around the foundations that the roofs of the buildings were covered with those materials. They were specified in the statute of De- cember, 1662.
The row of buildings was probably completed about 1666, burned in 1676, and partly rebuilt in 1685 and 1686. The re- mainder of the row was possibly rebuilt between 1694 and 1698. The buildings comprising it were destroyed in the fire of Octo- ber 31, 1698.
The foregoing views as to the arrangement of rooms in the fourth state house are exhibited on the accompanying plate.
10 Hening's Statutes, Vol. III, page 41.
" McDonald Papers, Vol. VII, p. 397.
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During the fall and early winter of 1903 the Association built up the foundations to the level of the ground with concrete and the walls of the cellars with the original brick. On account of the brick being very fragile the cellar walls were protected with cement plaster.
From what has preceded it is evident that the " James Citty " state houses, although substantial, were not imposing structures. In the case of the first, third and fourth, they formed part of a row or block of buildings.
It is not surprising that the colony, which a few years before the building of the fourth state house had a population of but 50,000 to 60,000 free holders,42 could not afford out of its pov- erty and under its heavy burden of taxation, to have any better public buildings. The annual allowances of Culpeper as governor in 1681, alone, drained the colony of 2,150 pounds sterling,“ which, with the perquisite of five hundred pounds sterling for house rent, reduced to present values, aggregated about $50,000.
Recurring to the Journal of the General Assembly of 1685, it contains a resolution of the House of Burgesses providing for building a prison not concurred in by the governor and Coun- cil.“ A prison was probably erected after the completion of the fourth state house, for one was burned in the fire of Octo- ber, 1698.45
The last meeting of the Assembly at " James Citty " was held in April, 1699, in some building unknown. At the above ses- sion an act was passed for removing the seat of government to Williamsburg. In the four succeeding years the college of Wil- liam and Mary was used as a state house. In 1705 the capitol building at Williamsburg was completed. It was occupied un- til burned about 1747. The college was again used as a state
42 Sainsbury's Calendar of State Papers, Vol. 1681-1685.
13 The Present State of Virginia, p. 31, Hartwell, Chilton and Blair.
" McDonald Papers, Vol. VII, p. 356.
15 Present State of Virginia, p. 25, Hugh Jones, A. M.
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house until the capitol was rebuilt in 1755. By 1779, the centre of population having moved westward, Williamsburg was no longer well adapted as a point for assembling the legislature. For the above reason principally, and also on account of its be- ing thought that the place was rendered unsafe by the then existing state of war, it was decided by an act of Assembly passed in the above year to transfer the seat of government to Richmond, which statute went into effect in 1780.
Vincere vil Pulver
Acordares
Arms of Captain John Smith.
7-J. T.
THE TURF AND BRICK FORTS.
HE earliest fort of the settlers, called by them "James Forte," as previously shown, was probably situated on the river bank, at the upper extremity of the fourth ridge.
From the description of "James Citty," previously alluded to, written by the Rev. John Clayton in 1688,1 about two years after his return to England, it appears that during his residence at " James Citty," from 1684 to 1686, there was in the town an old dismantled earth work, quadrangular in plan, " with something like Bastions at the four corners." In a grant to Henry Hartwell in 1689,2 the western line of his tract is de- scribed as " passing along by ye angular points of ye trench which faceth two of ye Eastern Bastions of an old ruined turf fort." The above quotations undoubtedly refer to the same fort.
The Hartwell tract being accurately located, the approximate position of the fort was ascertained. According to Mr. Clay- ton's letter, the fort was dismantled before 1684. No mark or vestige of it remains above ground. There is apparently no in- formation available as to when it was constructed. As the land on which it was situated was patented to Captain Ralph Hamor in 1624, the time of its construction must have been subsequent to that year, or to that of his death, 1626, on the 11th of Octo- ber of which year his will was probated and his widow, Eliza- beth, qualified as administratrix.3
It is possible that the turf fort was the one referred to by Beverley, as follows: "The news of this plot (the Birkenhead conspiracy in September, 1663), being transmitted to King Charles the second, his Majesty sent his royal commands to build a fort at James town, for security of the governor, and to
1 Force's Historical Tracts, Vol. III.
' Va. Land Pat. Records, Book VII, p. 701.
ª Transcripts Robinson MSS., p. 159.
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be a curb upon all such traitorous attempts for the future. But the country, thinking all danger over, only raised a battery of some small pieces of cannon.""
In the account of the town by Mr. Richard Randolph in 1837 5 it is stated in substance that some of the walls and mounds of the ancient fort still remained, that a few hundred yards to the right of the fort stood the building reputed to have been a powder magazine, and that a part of the fort had been destroyed by the encroachments of the river.
It appears from what follows that the fort referred to by Ran- dolph was the last erected at "James Citty." The site of the former " magazine " is shown on the map.
It is assumed that, in making his observations, Mr. Randolph faced the river, the fort being down stream from, or below the magazine. If the distance between the two structures had been several hundred yards, as given by him, the site of the fort would now be in the deep water opposite the Confederate fort of 1861. This would involve an extensive change of position of the deep channel since 1837, which palpably would be impossi- ble, for, as has been pointed out, the channel of James River at Jamestown Island is very stable, and no marked changes of its position or depth occur, even in centuries. It is, therefore, be- lieved that Mr. Randolph meant feet, and not yards, or it is possible that the word yards is a typographic error.
The distance between the shore lines of 1837 and 1891, near the uppermost of the four jetties marked "a " on map, three hundred and twenty feet below the reputed magazine, is found approximately by using the average annual rates of abrasion of two and four feet, previously determined, to have been one hun- dred and ninety feet. The shore of 1891 was accurately located in that year. In 1896 it was cut back about seventy feet at the uppermost jetty to bring it to a fair line for receiving protec- tion work. Since 1896 the recession of the bank has been very
"History of the Present State of Virginia, p. 56.
5 Southern Literary Messenger, Vol. III, pp. 303, 304.
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slight at the locality referred to. When viewed by Mr. Ran- dolph, therefore, the shore was about two hundred and sixty feet further west than at present, and some of the mounds of the fort were then standing. At from two hundred to three hundred and fifty feet off shore, where, according to the above deductions, the fort would have stood, are what appear to be masses of masonry submerged from one and one-half to two and one-half feet below low water. The débris lies in what would be the extension of the "little vale" between the third and fourth ridges, from three hundred and fifty to four hundred and fifty feet to the left of the reputed magazine, with the observer facing the river, thus agreeing fairly well with Mr. Randolph's estimate of distance, amended as above suggested.
From Mr. Clayton's description of "James Citty," before re- ferred to, it is learned that the brick fort was crescent-shaped, that a brick wall formed a part of it, probably one of its faces to retain encompassing earthworks, or mounds, as Mr. Randolph styles them, and that it was situated at the beginning of the swamp, above the town, where the channel was very near the shore.
According to Mr. Clayton also, on account of being in a vale and having its guns pointed down stream, its shot intended for an enemy's fleet would have lodged in the bank below, which was at a higher elevation than the fort, and from ten to forty yards distant. The bank which would have received the shot from the fort's guns was the former head of the fourth ridge, which formed the eastern boundary of the " little vale."
In September, 1667, an act of Assembly was passed ® for building five forts, one of which was to be at "James Citty." Its walls were to be of brick, ten feet high, and the part facing the river ten feet thick. The fort, according to the above act, was to have an armament of eight great guns; according to another authority, it was to mount fourteen guns." The above
"Hening's Statutes, Vol. II, pp. 255-257.
McDonald Papers, Vol. V. p. 4.
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act undoubtedly refers to the brick fort. The contractors for building the fort were Major Theophilus Hone, Colonel William Drummond, and Colonel Matthew Page. The funds for its con- struction do not appear to have been raised as late as September, 1672.8 Between 1672 and 1676 a peremptory order was issued by the court requiring the surviving contractors for the fort, Hone and Drummond, to forthwith complete its construction, and providing that no further payment should be made until the work was completed.º
As has been shown, the channel opposite the site of the for- mer turf fort is about twice as far from the shore as it is three hundred yards above the tower ruin, or about where the brick fort stood. This coincides with Mr. Clayton's statement that opposite the turf fort the channel was nearer the middle of the river than off the brick fort.1º
From what has preceded it is evident that the fort referred to by Mr. Randolph was the brick fort described by Mr. Clayton, that it was situated in the extension of the depression between the third and fourth ridges, which he refers to as " a little vale," and which in fact is a minor branch of Pitch and Tarr Swamp," and that the masonry debris now lying under water off the uppermost of the four jetties marked "a" on chart are most probably parts of its wall, which it was proposed to make ten feet high and ten feet thick.
From Mr. Clayton's allusion to the relative positions of the brick and turf forts, with reference to that of the town, " but it is the same as if a Fort were built at Chelsea to secure London from being taken by shipping," and "There was indeed an old Fort of Earth in the town," it is apparent that in 1684 and 1686 the town, or at least the greater part of it, was below the brick fort. This agrees with available information, for at that time the only buildings known to have been standing on the third ridge were the "Country House " and the state house.
8 Hening's Statutes, Vol. II, pp. 293, 294.
° Robinson's Transcripts, General Court Records, 1670-1676, p. 149. 10 Force's Historical Tracts, Vol. III.
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It is probable that the building reputed to have been a maga- zine was also standing and possibly one or two dwelling houses. There are no signs of house foundations on the ridges above the third ridge.
There appears to be no picture extant of Jamestown. In a little Dutch booklet styled the " Scheeps-togt " (ship's log), by Anthony Chester, Captain of the " Margaret and John," pub- lished in Holland in 1707, is an engraving of the massacre of 1622. In the clouds of the picture, mirage like, are the dim outlines of a town within a stockade. This cloud picture has been assumed by two writers to represent Jamestown in 1620 and 1622, although there is not a word in the text of the " Scheeps-togt " to warrant such an assumption. The picture is most probably an invention of a Dutch draftsman, made nearly a century after Chester wrote his log (1622), and who, most probably, had never been in Virginia.
AMES Citty," in its best days, was little more than a straggling hamlet, holding besides a church and a few unostentatious public buildings, hardly ever more than a score of dwellings, and a larger permanent population than one hundred souls. It was the foreshore on which the inrolling waves of immigration, on their way up the " Greate River," first broke. Its life, a feverish one, whose term was less than a century, terminated two centuries ago. Attempts to encourage the growth of the town by offering land bounties to those who should erect brick dwellings, as well as enactments and re-enactments making it the sole port of entry for the colony, failed signally to raise it to a place of any proportions, and after being twice lifted from its ashes, it succumbed under a third conflagration and was left prone. The town must have been held in disfavor, and avoided as a place of residence by many of the early colonists, on account of a well-earned reputation of being " insalubritious " in summer. The period of its life was
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not propitious for town building, as the principal efforts of the colonists were then devoted to agriculture, particularly tobacco raising.
Few relics of the old town mark its site, but its name is imperishable. Its requiem is unceasing sung in the rhythmic surgings of the "King's River."
HISTORICAL SUMMARY OF THE JAMESTOWN PERIOD.
HE form of local government with which "the first col- ony," the Virginia colony, was initiated, consisted of a president and a Council of six persons. The president was elected annually by the Council out of its number. The Council also filled vacancies in its own body by elections. The methods of procedure in this body, in some respects, re- sembled those of a military court.
At the end of three years, the results accomplished in Vir- ginia being unsatisfactory to the London Company, changes were made in its form of local government by abolishing the office of president and appointing instead as governor a man of high social order, and introducing a code of severe military laws. The new system was introduced on the arrival in Vir- ginia of Sir Thomas Gates, Knight, with the title of lieutenant- governor. Of Gates and his code of laws more will be said anon.
Of the first Council, Captain Edwin Maria Wingfield, the first president, was deposed September 10, 1607, and sent home, Captain Bartholomew Gosnold, a famous navigator, " The first mover of this plantation," died within a few months after reach- ing Jamestown, Captain John Ratcliffe was killed by the Indians about three years later, Captain George Kendall was summarily executed in December, 1607, on account of his connection with some vaguely described "mutiny," Captain Christopher Newport died in the far East in 1617, and Captain John Smith lived to write the most complete account that we have of affairs in the early days of " Old Virginia." The remaining confrére of Smith in the first Council was Captain John Martin. At the abandonment of Jamestown by Gates in 1610, Martin alone opposed this measure. He was the founder of the Brandon estate on James River. This grant carried privileges similar to those of a lord of the manor. Being deprived of these privileges
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To: candy. CAPTAIN JOHN SMITH
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by the first legislature in 1619, Martin became an aggressive partisan of the Smythe faction of the London Company, here- inafter referred to.
The three years under the presidents constituted a most eventful part of the Jamestown period. In its beginning, Cap- tain John Smith, being unjustly deprived of his seat in the Council, was restored through the efforts of Rev. Robert Hunt, and within sixteen months was elected to the presidency, while those who had connived at his downfall were abased and returned to England.
Notwithstanding the fatal illness of members of the party during the first summer, by which two-thirds of its number lost their lives within three months, much was accomplished in exploring the streams of the adjacent country. Before Newport returned to England after arriving with the advance guard of the settlers, he explored James River to the "Falls," where Richmond now stands, in quest of the "Southern Sea," or of information concerning it.
As an explorer, Captain John Smith was nearly always the leader, and it was while absent on one of his expeditions, under the presidency of Ratcliffe, that Captain Kendall of the Council was implicated in the conspiracy, before alluded to.
About this time discoveries and adventures crowded rapidly on one another. Captain Smith explored the Chickahominy to its head waters, where he was captured by the Pamunkey Indians in the "slashes " of Hanover County, not far from Richmond. He was rescued from death by Pocahontas, only to be condemned by his own people immediately after his return to Jamestown, by a singular form of reprisal, to atone for the deaths of three of his party on the Chickahominy expedition. From this latter fate he was rescued by the timely arrival of Captain Newport from England with the "first supply," or reinforcement (January 4, 1608).
Next followed Newport's visit to Wahunsunacock, the Pow- hatan, at Werowocomico on the York River, then called the Pamunkey; then the burning of the shelter huts of the settlers
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in the stockade during the dead of winter. Following this disaster Newport's ship was loaded for a return voyage with clay containing mica or pyrites, under the delusion that it was gold ore. Newport and his supposed precious cargo of gold being dispatched, Smith undertook the work that made him most famous, viz., the exploration of Chesapeake Bay, which he com- pleted in about three months. Smith's map of Virginia, based on this reconnoissance made in an open boat, often exposed to tempestuous seas, and with the crudest of instruments, was the authority for over a century. On returning from this expe- dition, Smith found Ratcliffe under arrest, on account of plan- ning a desertion with the pinnace. Smith then succeeded to the presidency (September 10, 1608), and immediately after, Newport arrived with another reinforcement, called the second supply.
Shortly after Newport's arrival, the Powhatan was invited to Jamestown to be crowned, and receive as presents certain articles of apparel and household furniture. The old savage was not sufficiently complaisant to come, but demanded that the presents be brought to him. This was accordingly done, and the ludicrous farce of a forced coronation in an Indian tepee was enacted, the chief presenting Newport with his skin mantle and old shoes in return for the presents received by him. The mantle is said to be in the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford, England.
After the coronation, Newport made his second trip up the James as far as the Monacan Country, probably twenty miles above Richmond, carrying a boat in sections, all in readiness to sail on the waters of the " South Sea," or at least on a stream flowing towards it, if either should be discovered. In the second reinforcement were the first two women that came to Virginia, viz., " Mistress Forest," wife of one of the gentlemen of the party, and her maid, Anne Buras, who soon after married John Laydon, a member of the first, or original party of settlers.
Now ensued a period of great scarcity of provisions, and to make matters worse, an addition was made to the population by
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the arrival of the third supply (August, 1609), also scantily provided in the above respect. The newcomers were without their leader, Sir Thomas Gates, Lord La Warr's lieutenant, who had been shipwrecked in the Bermudas, and there was, for a while, as a result of his absence, much disputing as to who should be the temporary head of the colony. Some sort of order, however, was finally restored, and Smith continued, under the silent protest of the minority, to serve out his term as president. Among the last arrivals were Archer, Ratcliffe and Martin, who, while formerly living at Jamestown, had shown great animosity towards Smith. This triumvirate, in all probability, was in- strumental in having Smith sent back to England in disgrace, if, indeed, this was really done, as a few writers seem to believe.
About the close of Captain Smith's presidency, Captain West, Lord La Warr's brother, who had come in the " second supply," went to the neighborhood of Richmond to establish a post, but became involved in a quarrel with the Indians, and the enter- prise had to be abandoned. While returning from an inspection of this post, Captain Smith was injured by an accidental ex- plosion of gunpowder, and lying thus wounded at Jamestown, a plot was concocted to assassinate him. This attempt failed, through the misgivings of the elected assassin. From all accounts, Smith's enemies appear to have made his life a burden, on account of which, and of his burns from the explosion, he re- turned to England. It is stated that charges were preferred against him. This appears very doubtful, for there is no record of his ever being brought to trial.
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