Program Information

Jamestown was the first English settlement in Virginia in 1607. Within a few years, though, the colony began to stretch its boundaries both in population and territory. "Jamestown: A Fruitful Soil" provides a historical overview of the people and events of 17th-century Virginia.

Transcript

Jamestown was the first English settlement in Virginia in 1607. Within a few years, though, the colony began to stretch its boundaries both in population and territory.

I’m Steve Clark with Jamestown: A Fruitful Soil, a celebration of Virginia’s Quadricentennial sponsored by Jamestown Settlement, a living history museum in the Williamsburg area of Virginia.

By 1613, there were several fortified Virginia Company settlements on the James River. Kecoughtan guarded the mouth of the estuary. Henrico and Bermuda Hundred were sited westward near the falls of the James. By 1616, John Rolfe listed five areas of settlement along the river and one on the Eastern Shore.

Around 1618, there was another burst of settlement. Despite the absence of profits to pay shareholders, the Virginia Company did have land… in great abundance. Early settlers and stockholders were issued land tracts based on the amount of stock held or tenure in the colony. Some pooled their acreage forming large plantations which began to appear up and down the James River.

The headright system, initiated in 1618, allowed immigrants who paid their own way to the colony, as well as transportation for others, to claim “headrights,” fifty acres per "head" after residing in the colony for three years.

All of this expansion occurred with little regard for the rights of Virginia Indians. The inevitable violent reaction came in 1622 and then again in 1644. Each time, the warfare spawned vicious atrocities on both sides, and the peaceful interludes brought little relief to the Indians. English settlement was growing rapidly north to the Potomac and progressively west. After the 1720s increasing numbers of Europeans were settling near the Blue Ridge, eventually crossing into the western valleys on the way to claiming a continent.

To learn more, visit history is fun dot org.

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