"Jamestown 2007" marked Virginia's quadricentennial year, celebrating
400 years since the establishment of the Jamestown Colony. The
celebrations highlighted contributions from
Native Americans, Africans, and Europeans, each of which had a significant part in shaping Virginia's history.
[60] Warfare, including among these groups, has also had an important role. Virginia was a focal point in conflicts from the
French and Indian War, the
American Revolution and the
Civil War, to the
Cold War and the
War on Terrorism.
[61] Stories about historic figures, such as those surrounding
Pocahontas and
John Smith,
George Washington's childhood, or the plantation elite in the slave society of the
antebellum period, have also created potent myths of state history, and have served as rationales for Virginia's ideology.
Colony
The first people are estimated to have arrived in Virginia over 12,000 years ago.
[63] By 5,000 years ago more permanent settlements emerged, and farming began by 900 AD. By 1500, the
Algonquian peoples had founded towns such as
Werowocomoco in the
Tidewater region, which they referred to as
Tsenacommacah. The other major language groups in the area were the
Siouan to the west, and the
Iroquoians, who included the
Nottoway and
Meherrin, to the north and south. After 1570, the Algonquians consolidated under
Chief Powhatan in response to threats from these other groups on their trade network. Powhatan controlled more than 30 smaller tribes and over 150 settlements, who shared a common
Virginia Algonquian language. In 1607, the native Tidewater population was between 13,000 and 14,000.
[65]
Several European expeditions, including a
group of Spanish Jesuits, explored the
Chesapeake Bay during the 16th century.
[66] In 1583, Queen
Elizabeth I of England granted
Walter Raleigh a charter to plant a colony north of
Spanish Florida. In 1584, Raleigh sent an expedition to the
Atlantic coast of North America.
The name "Virginia" may have been suggested then by Raleigh or
Elizabeth, perhaps noting her status as the "Virgin Queen," and may also
be related to a native phrase, "Wingandacoa," or name, "Wingina." Initially the name applied to the entire coastal region from South Carolina to Maine, plus the island of
Bermuda. Later, subsequent royal charters modified the Colony's boundaries. The
London Company was incorporated as a joint stock company by the proprietary
Charter of 1606, which granted land rights to this area. The company financed the first permanent English settlement in the "
New World",
Jamestown. Named for
King James I, it was founded in May 1607 by
Christopher Newport. In 1619, colonists took greater control with an elected legislature called the
House of Burgesses. With the bankruptcy of the London Company in 1624, the settlement was taken into royal authority as an English
crown colony.
Life in the colony was perilous, and many died during the
Starving Time in 1609 and the
Anglo-Powhatan Wars, including the
Indian massacre of 1622, which fostered the colonists' negative view of all tribes.
[73] By 1624, only 3,400 of the 6,000 early settlers had survived.
[74] However, European
demand for tobacco fueled the arrival of more settlers and servants. The
headright system tried to solve the labor shortage by providing colonists with land for each
indentured servant they transported to Virginia.
African workers were first imported to Jamestown in 1619 initially
under the rules of indentured servitude. The shift to a system of
African
slavery in Virginia was propelled by the legal cases of
John Punch, who was sentenced to lifetime slavery in 1640 for attempting to run away,
[77] and of
John Casor, who was claimed by
Anthony Johnson as his servant for life in 1655.
[78] Slavery first appears in Virginia statutes in 1661 and 1662, when a law made it hereditary based on the mother's status.
Tensions and the geographic differences between the working and ruling classes led to
Bacon's Rebellion in 1676, by which time current and former indentured servants made up as much as 80% of the population. Rebels, largely from the colony's frontier, were also opposed to the conciliatory policy towards
native tribes, and one result of the rebellion was the signing at
Middle Plantation of the
Treaty of 1677, which made the signatory tribes
tributary states and was part of a pattern of appropriating tribal land by force and treaty. Middle Plantation saw the founding of
The College of William & Mary in 1693 and was renamed
Williamsburg as it became the colonial capital in 1699. In 1747, a group of Virginian speculators formed the
Ohio Company, with the backing of the British crown, to start English settlement and trade in the
Ohio Country west of the
Appalachian Mountains.
[82] France, which claimed this area as part of their colony of
New France, viewed this as a threat, and the ensuing
French and Indian War became part of the
Seven Years' War (1756–1763). A militia from several British colonies, called the
Virginia Regiment, was led by then-Lieutenant Colonel
George Washington.
[83]
Statehood
The
British Parliament's efforts to levy new taxes following the
French and Indian War were deeply unpopular in the colonies. In the
House of Burgesses, opposition to
taxation without representation was led by
Patrick Henry and
Richard Henry Lee, among others.
[84] Virginians began to
coordinate their actions with other colonies in 1773, and sent delegates to the
Continental Congress the following year.
After the House of Burgesses was dissolved by the royal governor in
1774, Virginia's revolutionary leaders continued to govern via the
Virginia Conventions. On May 15, 1776, the Convention declared Virginia's independence from the British Empire and adopted
George Mason's
Virginia Declaration of Rights, which was then included in a new constitution. Another Virginian,
Thomas Jefferson, drew upon Mason's work in drafting the national
Declaration of Independence.
[87]
When the
American Revolutionary War began,
George Washington was selected to head the
colonial army. During the war, the capital was moved to
Richmond
at the urging of Governor Thomas Jefferson, who feared that
Williamsburg's coastal location would make it vulnerable to British
attack. In 1781, the combined action of
Continental and French land and naval forces trapped the British army on the
Virginia Peninsula, where troops under George Washington and
Comte de Rochambeau defeated British
General Cornwallis in the
Siege of Yorktown. His surrender on October 19, 1781 led to
peace negotiations in Paris and secured the independence of the colonies.
Virginians were instrumental in writing the
United States Constitution.
James Madison drafted the
Virginia Plan in 1787 and the
Bill of Rights in 1789.
[87] Virginia ratified the Constitution on June 25, 1788. The
three-fifths compromise ensured that Virginia, with its large number of slaves, initially had the largest bloc in the
House of Representatives. Together with the
Virginia dynasty
of presidents, this gave the Commonwealth national importance. In 1790,
both Virginia and Maryland ceded territory to form the new
District of Columbia, though the Virginian area was
retroceded in 1846. Virginia is called "Mother of States" because of its role in being carved into states like
Kentucky, which became the 15th state in 1792, and for the numbers of
American pioneers born in Virginia.
[91]
