Invading America. David Childs
also introduced: a geographical boundary and a timeframe, stating that Sir Humphrey’s jurisdiction would cover those who ‘abide within two hundred leagues of any said place where the said Sir Humphrey . . . shall inhabit within six years next ensuing the date hereof’, and a legal control in requiring that the Secretary, Lord Treasurer and Privy Council be involved in the licensing of the resupply of any settlements. There is also a mention of the paying of duty and other taxes on any gold or silver ore that might be discovered, an acknowledgement of the success the Spanish had had in discovering such wealth, ignoring Frobisher’s constant failure to do likewise.
The geographical boundaries and timeframe for establishing a settlement were obviously felt to be sound, for they remained in the Charter that Elizabeth granted to Sir Walter Ralegh in 1584, which was a redrafting of the Gilbert original, so that it could be rescued from the watery grave that was the unlucky Gilbert’s lot and presented to a man who was both a relative of Gilbert and the Queen’s current favourite. So beloved was he that, unlike either Cabot or Gilbert, his half-brother, Ralegh was not allowed to travel across the ocean in person. This seemingly capricious decision by the enamoured Queen established yet another pattern in the Charters, whereby the investors stayed in England and encouraged others to risk their all on their behalf. This would necessitate the appointment of a leader or governor, who might hold neither the rank nor the relationship with the sponsor to demand undisputed authority over those over whom they had been placed in command in these isolated, strange and dangerous lands. The fatal flaw thus soon emerged; where harmony was essential discord would develop.
Ralegh’s demesne was created to include the shoreline settlements stretching six hundred miles both north and south from the first township he intended to build called, modestly, the City of Ralegh. To encourage wealthy sponsors he offered, the second time around, county-size estates to all who backed his scheme, selling some 8.5 million acres of these in Virginia. Sir Philip Sidney acquired 3 million acres, giving him title to an estate that was as large as the combined area of Devon and Cornwall and half of Somerset. To give just two more comparisons: the National Trust in England and Wales, owns some 550,000 acres, while the Crown estates measure just 384,000 acres. Ralegh and his friends were rewarding themselves with empires hewn from other men’s lands by other men’s efforts. Neither were monopolies on the extractive industries neglected: Sir Thomas Gerard was promised two-fifths of the profit from all the gold, silver, pearl and precious stones extracted from the settlement, which gave him, as it turned out, two-fifths of nothing to increase his fortune. This proposed greedy land grab again illustrates that the English were planning, badly, an invasion of Virginia. Estates of the size being offered covered lands already occupied by native peoples; the English could only claim them as their own by seizing these peoples’ land and imposing their own land grant laws above that of the traditional authority.
For Ralegh, the requirement to have established settlements within six years of his Charter being granted must have seemed at the time just a legal technicality until, after Lane’s colony withdrew in 1586 and White’s was finally reported missing in 1590, it looked as if its term was ending. Desperate to retain his generous award, Ralegh needed to prove both that he had settlers alive in America and that he would confront any who tried to flout his authority. Thus, in 1602, he not only had Samuel Mace seek to make contact with the lost colonists but also wrote a note to Sir Robert Cecil, demanding that the cargo of sassafras landed from the returning Concord, following the voyage to North Virginia by Bartholomew Gilbert and Bartholomew Gosnold that same year, be impounded as infringing his monopoly. Then, realizing that he might be on shaky ground, he used his justly famous silver-tongued flattery to persuade John Brereton, who wrote the account of the Gosnold voyage, to dedicate his book to him and to include a note which stated, erroneously, that the voyage had been made ‘by the permission of the honourable knight, Sir Walter Ralegh’ – a tacit reminder of Ralegh’s suzerainty.
This was Ralegh’s last effort to retain his Charter rights. In March 1603 his Queen was dead. In July he was placed in the Tower to answer charges of treason. In November he was tried and sentenced to death. Only King James’s cunning clemency granted him a stay of execution long enough to have him embroiled in a voyage to Guiana in 1617, the failure of which would finally lead him to the block. Among those who passed judgment at his first trial were Sir Robert Cecil, Sir John Popham, the Lord Chief Justice, and Sir Edward Coke, the Attorney General. A cynic might see some link in the fact that it is their names which are associated with the drafting of the first Charter for Virginia in April 1606, at a time when Ralegh had been in the Tower long enough to be either no longer a disruptive force or a man with any public following. Nevertheless, his shadow fell on the deliberations, for, among the eight suitors to be named in the Charter were Raleigh Gilbert and William Parker, respectively a relative and a servant of Sir Walter, who it can be presumed were included to avoid any outbreak of unpleasantness.
The continuing issue of Charters so early in James’s reign is a cause for some surprise since the King’s major foreign policy was to secure peace with Spain and not to go to war again. Yet he was content not only to sign a potentially contentious document but also to remain resolute in the face of Spanish objections. One reason for his support of this new venture was that, in the years since Ralegh’s failure at Roanoke, many English merchants and speculators had learned more about the potential opportunities that America might offer. In the north, fishing, furs and forestry seemed available for exploitation, while in the south the climate could encourage the planting of crops traditionally imported from the Mediterranean, as well as offering a chance to increase the acreage the nation had devoted to industrial crops such as flax and hemp and silk, a special favourite of the King. Thus began a fault line between an extractive north and an agricultural south, which would be emphasized in the Charter of 1606 and finally shear into the earthquake of 1861. Back in 1606, however, what investors hoped to find within this landscape was mineral wealth and a navigable route to ‘nearby’ Cathay.
In England, the north–south divide of Virginia was reflected in an east–west divide of investors in the first Charter for Virginia, with West Country merchants of Bristol, Plymouth and Exeter being granted the right to settle and exploit the land lying between 38º and 45º North, that is from Chesapeake Bay to present-day Bangor, Maine, while London businessmen were offered the bloc between 34º and 41º North, from Cape Fear to Manhattan Island. The obvious overlap seems to have been inserted to encourage competition and expansion, but even within their exclusive boundaries the two companies established to manage the colonies were only given control of a square of territory stretching fifty miles either side of any settlement and a hundred miles inland, as well as the adjoining seas out to the same distance.
The two colonies thus created were to be organized by two separate companies that would be overseen by a royal council of thirteen members appointed by the King and named the Council for Virginia, which would include four representatives of both sub-groups.
The Charter named eight individual suitors; four West Countrymen for the northern plantation and four Londoners for the southern one. Their names and backgrounds are indicative of the purpose and development of the nascent colonies. The link with the jailed Ralegh remains even here, and there can be little doubt that the noxious Wade was present to act as a spy on the ‘shepherd of the sea’ now locked up ashore.
Suitors for Licence to Establish a Colony in Virginia, 1606
Excluded by name are the ‘divers others of our loving subjects’, which probably encompassed Sir Robert Cecil, by now Lord Salisbury.
Members of the Council for Virginia
Unlike Ralegh before them, many of these investors did risk their own lives to gain their reward. Of the eight grantees named in the 1606 Charter of Virginia, Sir Thomas Gates, Sir George Somers and Edward-Maria Wingfield sailed to Jamestown, while Raleigh Gilbert and George Popham established the short-lived northern colony. Later, in 1628, George Calvert tried to settle in Newfoundland, where he had been granted extensive charter lands. Thus there was an attempt to lead by example and