Prior to 1663 the Albemarle section lay as a geographical and political orphan. Included in the grant of the “Province of Carolana” made by King Charles I in 1629 to Robert Heath, his Attorney-General, the colony had languished and, except for small settlements, had lain fallow. Carolina’s first proprietor had discovered that the expense of colonization was too great for one man to bear, and his neglect increased after England was ripped asunder by the violent upheavals of a civil war.
Despite this negligence and apparent abandonment, the section known as the Albemarle was not without its attractions. It was, in the opinion of a London “Well-Willer” in 1649, no less than a veritable Eden, a cornucopia of “the naturall Commodities of the Country, which fall into your hands without labour or toyle, for in the obtaining of them you have a delightful recreation.” “The Soyle,” he went on to say, “you may trust it with anything,” and it would yield no less than two crops a year. Six years later Francis Yeardley was praising the pleasant climate of a place “unacquainted with our Virginia’s nipping frosts,” and thereby promising favorable harvests for those who ventured to engage in the production of silk, olives and wines for the London market.
In 1612, John Rolfe’s agricultural experiments with tobacco in Virginia had given the lie to Edward Sandys’ declaration, “You can’t build an empire on smoke.” Crossing the native weed, “poor and weak and of a biting taste,” with the milder South American varieties, Rolfe was able to produce a “Sweet-cented” variety that was pleasing to the taste of the pipe smokers of England. Within a short time, “Virginia” tobacco was outselling the Spanish variety that had dominated the London market for the past fifty years. Tobacco became the “gold” for which the early settlers had so diligently searched.
In 1663, however, the tumult of the restoration of King Charles II to England’s throne brought about many radical changes, which were reflected in England’s overseas colonial policies.
Carolina was to demonstrate best the changing outlook in colonial policy.
the prime movers behind colonization were no longer the merchants or religious groups. Now they were the gentility or nobility, the friends and political supporters of Charles II and his brother James, the Duke of York. For this group, there was not only the patriotic impulse to expand the limits of the empire, but also a dream of profits which made the venture into colonization more attractive.
Among those to whom he owed much were those influential characters who had been instrumental in restoring his sovereignty, powerful men who could make demands that the King could not refuse. And to this group, in 1663, was issued a new charter to Carolina, replacing the old Heath Charter of 1629. Sir Anthony Ashley-Cooper (to become the Earl of Shaftesbury in 1672), Chancellor of the Exchequer and known as “a man violent in his Passions,” seems to have been the originator of the scheme. A son of one of the members of the Virginia Company of London that had planted the colony at Jamestown, Ashley-Cooper had assumed an active interest in colonization and as early as 1646 had invested funds in West Indian projects. His original companions in the Carolina venture were Sir John Colleton and the Governor of Virginia, Sir William Berkeley, who was in London at this time. The aid of five additional and influential partners was enlisted to secure the charter.
All eight Proprietors of Carolina were men of position and influence in 1663, and all had looked with favor upon colonization schemes.
Such were the men who were granted the vast territory that was called “Carolina,” stretching along the Atlantic seaboard from the 31st to the 36th parallels from Virginia to Florida, and rolling westward to the “south seas.” All of these men had been, and were destined to continue, instrumental in the framing of imperial policy. Their names appear regularly as members of the Council for Trade and Plantations which became, in 1675, the powerful Lords of Trade.
The future policy for Carolina, insofar as the Proprietors were concerned, was both simple and elastic. They planned to operate as little more than a real estate office offering to supply the ever-present land hunger of the peoples of Europe. They envisioned profits through the payment of annual dues under the medieval practice of quitrents. In addition, they hoped, handsome gains could be realized through the production of such scarce and desirable commodities as sugar, ginger, indigo, cotton, wines and whale oil. Tobacco was already being cropped in the area, but no great expansion was foreseen, for the output from Virginia and Maryland was already beginning to glut the English market.
The West Indian Island of Barbados promised a possible source of manpower. There the heavy concentration of already limited land into huge sugar plantations had gradually shunted the small planter off to the edge of poverty. Sir John Colleton himself had experienced the octopus-like strength of the great planters during his stay in the islands. The Albemarle section seemed ideal for the plans of the Proprietors;
The Carolina Charter of 1663 endowed the Lords Proprietors with vast and extensive powers, in which lay the seeds of rebellion; yet these perquisites were not unique for grants of this era. The English reaction against republicanism and their willingness to rest awhile on the plateau of monarchism was not to make its way across the Atlantic, and within the next fifteen years a rash of little rebellions were to light up the southern colonies along the American seaboard.
Despite this negligence and apparent abandonment, the section known as the Albemarle was not without its attractions. It was, in the opinion of a London “Well-Willer” in 1649, no less than a veritable Eden, a cornucopia of “the naturall Commodities of the Country, which fall into your hands without labour or toyle, for in the obtaining of them you have a delightful recreation.” “The Soyle,” he went on to say, “you may trust it with anything,” and it would yield no less than two crops a year. Six years later Francis Yeardley was praising the pleasant climate of a place “unacquainted with our Virginia’s nipping frosts,” and thereby promising favorable harvests for those who ventured to engage in the production of silk, olives and wines for the London market.
In 1612, John Rolfe’s agricultural experiments with tobacco in Virginia had given the lie to Edward Sandys’ declaration, “You can’t build an empire on smoke.” Crossing the native weed, “poor and weak and of a biting taste,” with the milder South American varieties, Rolfe was able to produce a “Sweet-cented” variety that was pleasing to the taste of the pipe smokers of England. Within a short time, “Virginia” tobacco was outselling the Spanish variety that had dominated the London market for the past fifty years. Tobacco became the “gold” for which the early settlers had so diligently searched.
In 1663, however, the tumult of the restoration of King Charles II to England’s throne brought about many radical changes, which were reflected in England’s overseas colonial policies.
Carolina was to demonstrate best the changing outlook in colonial policy.
the prime movers behind colonization were no longer the merchants or religious groups. Now they were the gentility or nobility, the friends and political supporters of Charles II and his brother James, the Duke of York. For this group, there was not only the patriotic impulse to expand the limits of the empire, but also a dream of profits which made the venture into colonization more attractive.
Among those to whom he owed much were those influential characters who had been instrumental in restoring his sovereignty, powerful men who could make demands that the King could not refuse. And to this group, in 1663, was issued a new charter to Carolina, replacing the old Heath Charter of 1629. Sir Anthony Ashley-Cooper (to become the Earl of Shaftesbury in 1672), Chancellor of the Exchequer and known as “a man violent in his Passions,” seems to have been the originator of the scheme. A son of one of the members of the Virginia Company of London that had planted the colony at Jamestown, Ashley-Cooper had assumed an active interest in colonization and as early as 1646 had invested funds in West Indian projects. His original companions in the Carolina venture were Sir John Colleton and the Governor of Virginia, Sir William Berkeley, who was in London at this time. The aid of five additional and influential partners was enlisted to secure the charter.
All eight Proprietors of Carolina were men of position and influence in 1663, and all had looked with favor upon colonization schemes.
Such were the men who were granted the vast territory that was called “Carolina,” stretching along the Atlantic seaboard from the 31st to the 36th parallels from Virginia to Florida, and rolling westward to the “south seas.” All of these men had been, and were destined to continue, instrumental in the framing of imperial policy. Their names appear regularly as members of the Council for Trade and Plantations which became, in 1675, the powerful Lords of Trade.
The future policy for Carolina, insofar as the Proprietors were concerned, was both simple and elastic. They planned to operate as little more than a real estate office offering to supply the ever-present land hunger of the peoples of Europe. They envisioned profits through the payment of annual dues under the medieval practice of quitrents. In addition, they hoped, handsome gains could be realized through the production of such scarce and desirable commodities as sugar, ginger, indigo, cotton, wines and whale oil. Tobacco was already being cropped in the area, but no great expansion was foreseen, for the output from Virginia and Maryland was already beginning to glut the English market.
The West Indian Island of Barbados promised a possible source of manpower. There the heavy concentration of already limited land into huge sugar plantations had gradually shunted the small planter off to the edge of poverty. Sir John Colleton himself had experienced the octopus-like strength of the great planters during his stay in the islands. The Albemarle section seemed ideal for the plans of the Proprietors;
The Carolina Charter of 1663 endowed the Lords Proprietors with vast and extensive powers, in which lay the seeds of rebellion; yet these perquisites were not unique for grants of this era. The English reaction against republicanism and their willingness to rest awhile on the plateau of monarchism was not to make its way across the Atlantic, and within the next fifteen years a rash of little rebellions were to light up the southern colonies along the American seaboard.
