Some time has been spent on the land acquisitions of Spotswood for two reasons. First, it shows where his priorities were. Second, it was to have an impact on the future homes of the Germans. The legislation passed by the House of Burgesses was approved in England and land in the new county of Spotsylvania was free of the head rights and quit rents (for seven years) on smaller tracts. Thus, when the time came for the second group of Germans to relocate to their own homes, they choose land in Spotsylvania County. The alternative might have been to go to the Northern Neck where the first Germans had already established their homes but this would have required a purchase from the proprietor of the Northern Neck, plus quit rents for the first years.
Spotswood did not fare as well, and his land acquisitions were questioned and held up in England. One of the advantages to us is that Spotswood wrote a letter in 1724 which outlined his history in Virginia up to that time. This letter and its attachments are a major historical documents of the period. Several quotations have already been made from it.
In this letter of 1724, Spotswood says there were about a hundred Germans living on the Spotsylvania tract. Initially, seventy-odd Germans had been settled there in 1717/1718 so there was an increase of about 33 percent. Part of this increase probably came from a greater number of births than deaths, but more Germans must have come to Virginia. In fact, other documents mentioned there were Germans scattering over Virginia as servants.
Some historians have written that there was a third group of Germans of about forty families who came in these early years. This would have been as many as the first and second groups combined. And, we do know some people who came in these years. But there is no evidence that they came as a group, and in fact they came in different years. Also, there is no evidence that there were forty additional German families. To say there was a third group of forty families is simply not correct, both for the implication that they came at one time, and that they numbered that many.
The original settlers on the Spotsylvania tract, the second group of Germans, were looking forward in 1724 to moving to land of their own. They looked at land to the west and very likely they had staked their claims there. They had to go a considerable distance to the west, right up against the Blue Ridge Mountains. This was a byproduct of the legislation creating Spotsylvania County, which had made the land very attractive to speculators. Also their own settlement on the Spotsylvania tract made the adjoining land attractive as Spotswood anticipated. Spotswood's land itself ran to the west for fifteen miles from the Germans' home. They had to jump over these lands and of the other speculators to find their own land.
While hope and optimism were running very high, the Germans were hit with a series of lawsuits which Spotswood filed against them. The amounts of money for which he was suing were astronomical.
We gratefully acknowledge the work of John Blankenbaker who published over 2,500 Germanna History Notes via the Germanna-L@rootsweb.com email list from 1997 to 2008. We are equally thankful to George Durman (Sgt. George) for hosting the list and republishing the notes via rootsweb.com.