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The influence of ‘legal habit’ on English–Indian relations in Jamestown, 1606–1612

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 January 2009

Finbarr McCarthy
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Continuity and Change , Volume 5 , Issue 1 , May 1990 , pp. 39 - 64
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Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1990

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References

ENDNOTES

1 Captain Smith, John in The generall historie of Virginia, New England, and the Summer Isles… (London, 1624)Google Scholar, in Barbour, Philip L., The Complete works of John Smith (3 vols) (Chapel Hill, 1986), 2, 140–2Google Scholar, states that the first planters numbered 100, of whom he names 82. Studley, Thomas in The proceedings of the English colony in Virginia… (Oxford, 1612)Google Scholar, in Barbour, , Works, 1, 207–9Google Scholar, states that the planters numbered 105, of whom he names 67.

2 The youngest brother of the ninth Earl of Northumberland, Henry Percy, George Percy served as president of the colony from August 1609 until mid-1610, and as deputy governor during the second charter.

3 Percy, George, Observations gathered out of a Discourse (1608)Google Scholar, in Barbour, Philip L. ed., The Jamestown voyages under the first charter 1606–1609 (2 vols) (Cambridge, 1969), 1, 129.Google Scholar

4 Ibid., at 1, 130.1 have retained the original spelling and punctuation in all quotations except to transpose ‘i’ and ‘j’ and ‘u’ and ‘v’ to correspond to modern usage. ‘And’ replaces the ampersand; ‘etc’ replaces ‘&c.’

5 Ibid.

6 Ibid.

7 Sir Thomas Gates, Sir George Somers, Richard Hakluyt, and Edward Maria Wingfield.

8 Barbour, , Jamestown, 1, 24.Google Scholar

9 Ibid., 1, 15.

10 Ibid., 1, 28.

11 Ibid., 1, 27. The ‘Letters patent’ state that the council in Virginia should have 13 councillors. Ibid., 1, 27. The ‘Articles, Instructions and Orders’ of 20 November 1606 state that the number of councillors ‘shal not be above thirteen’. Ibid., 1, 36. The Royal Council ultimately appointed seven councillors. See ibid., 2, 382. (This list of councillors does not include Christopher Newport who returned to England.)

12 Ibid., 1, 49–54.

13 Studley, , Proceedings, 1, 207.Google Scholar

14 Ibid., 1, 204.

15 ‘A letter of M. Gabriel Archar…’, in Barbour, , Jamestown, 2, 280.Google Scholar

16 ‘Instructions’, in Barbour, , Jamestown, 1, 51.Google Scholar

17 Writing over 150 years later, Blackstone stated that the King's right to abandoned ships was ‘grounded on the consideration of his guarding and protecting the seas from pirates and robbers’. Commentaries, 1, 290.Google Scholar

18 Rowse, A. L., The Elizabethans and America (London, 1959), 7.Google Scholar

19 Smith, , Generall historie, 2, 140–2.Google Scholar

20 This paper does not address the attitude towards law of the Spanish settlers in the Americas. The Spaniards who attacked Dominica may have been pirates. Most certainly they were not planters whose goal was to establish their country's first colony in the New World.

21 Reid, John Philip, Law for the elephant: property and social behavior on the overland trail (San Marino, 1980), 19.Google Scholar

22 Ibid., 8.

23 Ibid., 7.

24 Ibid., 19.

25 The first charter was issued on 10 April 1606, the second on 23 May 1609, the third on 12 March 1612.

26 Kingsbury, Susan Myra ed., The records of the Virginia Company of London (4 vols.) (Washington, 1906–1935), 1, 20.Google Scholar

27 Smith, John, A true relation… (1608)Google Scholar, in Barbour, , Works, 1, 3–117Google Scholar; Jamestown, 1, 165–208.Google Scholar

28 Barbour, , Works, 1, 119–90Google Scholar; Jamestown, 2, 321–74.Google Scholar

29 Barbour, , Works, 1, 191–289Google Scholar; Jamestown, 2, 375–464.Google Scholar Controversy surrounds the authorship of The proceedings, even though the authors are named. Smith may have coauthored some chapters. See Barbour, , Works, 1, 194–5.Google Scholar

30 Barbour, , Jamestown, 1, 213–34.Google Scholar Wingfield was president from early May until 10 September 1607.

31 Ibid., 1, 129–46.

32 Tyler's Quarterly Historical and Genealogical Magazine 3 (1921–1922), 259–82.Google Scholar

33 Wright, Louis B. ed., A voyage to Virginia in 1609: two narratives – Strachey's ‘True reportory’ and Jourdain's Discovery of the Bermudas (Charlottesville, 1964).Google Scholar

34 Wright, Louis B. ed., Historie of travell into Virginia Britania (1612) (London,.1953).Google Scholar

35 Brown, Alexander ed., The genesis of the United States (2 vols) (Boston, 1890), 1, 483–88.Google Scholar

36 Barbour, , The Jamestown voyages under the first charter 1606–1609 (2 vols.) (Cambridge, 1969).Google Scholar

37 Wright ed., Historie, xxv.Google Scholar

38 Map, 2, 373.Google Scholar

39 Ibid., 1, 3.

40 Rowse, , Elizabethans, 68.Google Scholar

41 Smith, , Map, 2, 374.Google Scholar

42 Smith, , Relation, I, 35.Google Scholar If, as Reid suggests, ‘[w]e may gauge the strength of legal habit by considering the strength of social habit’, (Law for the elephant, 19), then the settlers' clinging to class distinctions may suggest the strength of legal habit in Jamestown.

43 See, for instance, Elizabeth I's charter of 25 March 1584 to SirRaleigh, Walter in Commager, Henry Steele ed., Documents of American history (New York, 1944), 6.Google Scholar She granted Raleigh liberty to ‘discover… such remote, heathen and barbarous lands… not actually possessed by any Christian Prince’.

44 Pearce, Roy Harvey, The savages of America: a study of the Indian and the idea of civilization (rev. ed.) (Baltimore, 1965).Google Scholar

45 ‘They have no law, but nature.’ Johnson, Robert, Nova Brittania (London, 1609)Google Scholar, in Force, Peter, Tracts… (4 vols.) (Washington, D.C., 1836–1840), 1, No. 6, p. 11.Google Scholar

46 For a statement of this view, see Gray, Robert's ‘A good speed to Virginia’ (1609)Google Scholar, in W. F. Craven ed., (New York, 1937).

47 Barbour, , Jamestown, 1, 31.Google Scholar

48 Ibid., 1, 35–6.

49 Flaherty, David ed., For the colony in Virginea Britannia: lawes divine, morall, and martiall, etc. (Charlottesville, 1969), xiv.Google Scholar

50 Four prominent planters had been admitted to one of the Inns of Court: Wingfield, Percy, Gabriel Archer, and another of the seven original councillors, Bartholomew Gosnold. See Barbour, , Jamestown, 1, 3.Google Scholar

51 In response to American conditions, the Virginia Company gradually sanctioned sterner laws. Its instructions of 1609 to Sir Thomas Gates, first deputy-governor, and later to Lord De La Warr, the governor, granted considerable discretion in regulating life in Virginia. These instructions enabled Sir Thomas Dale, the high marshall and acting governor, to promulgate martial laws in 1611. Because the colonists were at once both planters and soldiers, they often fell within the scope of these laws.

52 Of approximately 500 colonists, ‘not past sixty’, survived the ‘starving time’ of the winter of 1609–1610. Smith, , Historie, 1, 204.Google Scholar

53 Wright ed., Strachey, 's Reportory, 43.Google Scholar

54 Rowse, , Elizabethans, 75.Google Scholar See also Flaherty, , Laws, xxixGoogle Scholar: ‘[T]he constant presence of death in early Virginia created a mental attitude on the part of the inhabitants that did not include too healthy a respect of established restrictions and constituted authorities and stimulated erratic behaviour.’

55 Smith, , Relation, 1, 33Google Scholar; Wingfield, , ‘Discourse’, 1, 217–23.Google Scholar

56 The first supply arrived on 2 January 1608, the second in September 1608, the third in August 1609. See Barbour, , Works, 1, 61, 127, 128.Google Scholar

57 ‘Advice’ in Barbour, Jamestown, 1, 52.Google Scholar

58 Jamestown, 2, 437 n.I.Google Scholar

59 Proceedings, 2, 425.Google Scholar

60 Smith, , Relation, 1, 39.Google Scholar‘If we had taken revenge, then by their losse we should have lost our selves!’ Proceedings, 2, 437.Google Scholar

61 Smith, , Relation, 1, 37.Google Scholar

62 Ibid.

63 Ibid., 37–9.

64 Ibid.

65 Ibid., 38.

66 Ibid., 37.

67 Ibid., 38.

68 Ibid.

69 Ibid., 39.

70 Proceedings, 2, 431.Google Scholar

71 Ibid., 416.

72 Neill, Edward D., History of the Virginia Company of London (Albany, 1869) repr. (New York, 1968), 50.Google Scholar

73 ‘Instructions’, 37.Google Scholar

74 Strachey, , Historie, 107.Google Scholar

75 Ibid.

76 Ibid.

77 Ibid.

78 ‘Instructions to Sir Thomas Gates’, in Barbour, , Jamestown, 2, 266.Google Scholar

79 Strachey, , Historie, 107.Google Scholar

80 ‘Instructions’, 40.Google Scholar

81 Ibid.

82 Ibid.

83 ‘Advice’, 51.Google Scholar

84 Ibid., 53.

85 Smith, Martin and Ratcliffe accused Wingfield of removing goods from the storehouse ‘without any noat of the partycularyties’ and of trading unaccounted goods to the Indians. Wingfield, , ‘Discourse’, 221.Google Scholar See also Proceedings, 2, 417Google Scholar for a list of items traded privately.

86 Smith, , Map, 2, 386.Google Scholar

87 Proceedings, 2, 417.Google Scholar

88 ‘Advice’, 1, 53.Google Scholar

89 Ibid.

90 Proceedings, 2, 390.Google Scholar

91 Ibid.

92 ‘Dale to Council’, in Brown, Genesis, I, 493.Google Scholar

93 Strachey, , ‘Reportory’, 72.Google Scholar

94 Ibid., 72–3.

95 Ibid., 73; The Proceedings, 2, 417–18, implies that the sailors should be punished.

96 Smith, , Relation, 1, 45.Google Scholar

97 I.e., mired in the wet mud of a river.

98 Smith, , Relation, 1, 73.Google Scholar

99 Ibid.

100 Ibid.

101 Ibid., 83.

102 Percy, , ‘Relacyon’, 271.Google Scholar

103 Smith, , Relation, 1, 57.Google Scholar

104 Ibid.

105 Baker, J. H., An introduction to English legal history (London, 1979), 263–90.Google Scholar

106 Ibid.

107 Smith, ‘had a customary schooling’ (Barbour, Works, 1, lvii).Google Scholar

108 Smith, , Relation, 65.Google Scholar

109 Ibid.

110 Ibid., 67. The presence of women obviously attracted the planters to the Indian camps.

111 Ibid.

112 ‘Patent’, 1, 25–7.Google Scholar

113 Ibid., 1, 25.

114 The second charter of 1609 increased the grant to over one million square miles. Brown, , Genesis, 1, 229.Google Scholar

115 ‘Patent’, 26.Google Scholar

116 Ibid.

117 Ibid., 33.

118 ‘Instructions’, 1, 37.Google Scholar

119 Strachey, , Historie, 25.Google Scholar

120 Ibid., 25.

121 Ibid., 25–6.

122 Smith, , Relation, 1, 81.Google Scholar

123 ‘The discription of the now discovered river and country of Virginia…(1607)Google Scholar, in Barbour, , Jamestown, 1, 101.Google Scholar

124 Proceedings, 2, 439.Google Scholar

125 Smith, , Map, 2, 337.Google Scholar

126 Winne, Peter, ‘Peter Winne to Sir John Egerton’ (1609)Google Scholar, in Barbour, , Jamestown, 1, 246.Google Scholar

127 Strachey, , Historie, 79–80.Google Scholar

128 Baker, , History, 322.Google Scholar

129 Birks, Peter and McLeod, Grant trans., Justinian's Institutes (London, 1897), 55.Google Scholar

130 Smith, , Relation, 1, 41.Google Scholar

131 Smith, , Map, 2, 357.Google Scholar

132 Ibid., 2, 360.

133 Ibid., 2, 342.

134 ‘Discription’, 1, 101.Google Scholar

135 Percy, , Discourse, 1, 141.Google Scholar

136 See, for example, ‘Spelman's Relation’, 1, 484Google Scholar; Proceedings, 2, 454Google Scholar; Strachey, , Historie, 56Google Scholar; Percy, , ‘Relacyon’, 262.Google Scholar

137 ‘Spelman's Relation’, 1, 484.Google Scholar

138 Proceedings, 2, 454.Google Scholar

139 Strachey, , Historie, 56.Google Scholar

140 Percy, , ‘Relacyon’, 262.Google Scholar

141 Strachey, , Historie, 26.Google Scholar

142 For the debate on individual Indian ownership rights in Puritan New England, see Vaughan, Alden T., New England frontier: Puritans and Indians, 1620–1675 (Boston, 1965), 106Google Scholar; W. Cronon, , Changes in the land: Indians, colonists and the ecology of New England (New York, 1983), 65Google Scholar; Kawashima, Yasuhida, Puritan justice and the Indians: white man's law in Massachusetts, 1630–1763, (Middleton, Conn., c. 1986), 3.Google Scholar Kathy Slocombe Austin, J. D. (Tulane), directed me to these sources.

143 Strachey, , Historie, 56.Google Scholar

144 Smith, , Map, 2, 371.Google Scholar

145 Ibid., 2, 369.

146 Ibid.

147 Ibid., 2, 371.

148 Strachey, , Historie, 63.Google Scholar

149 Proceedings, 2, 371.Google Scholar

150 Smith, , Map, 2, 355.Google Scholar

151 ‘Discription’, 1, 101.Google Scholar

152 Smith, , Map, 2, 356.Google Scholar

153 Strachey, , Historie, 79.Google Scholar

154 Smith, , Map, 2, 351.Google Scholar

155 Ibid., 2, 352.

156 Percy, , Discourse, 1, 85.Google Scholar

157 Ibid., 1, 93.

158 Smith, , Map, 2, 354.Google Scholar

159 Ibid., 2, 340.

160 Ibid., 2, 352.

161 Ibid., 2, 340.

162 Ibid., 2, 352–3.

163 The edible root of various, especially araceous, plants such as the peltandra undulata or virginica, the Arrow Arum, and orontium aquaticum, the Golden-Club. Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed. (Oxford, 1989).Google Scholar

164 Smith, , Map, 2, 347.Google Scholar

165 Proceedings, 2, 423.Google Scholar

166 Ibid.

167 Strachey, , Historie, 82.Google Scholar

168 Ibid.

169 Smith, , Map, 2, 359.Google Scholar

170 Strachey, , Historie, 82.Google Scholar

171 Ibid.

172 Wingfield, , ‘Discourse’, 1, 219–20.Google Scholar