Quite early in the history of the Virginia Colony, the crown assumed ownership of the land in the Colony. They (as in the Royal We ) did want the ownership to be widely distributed and they wanted people to move to Virginia. So they hit on the idea of head rights. For every person who entered Virginia, black or white, fifty acres of land could be claimed. For several decades, this was the only way to obtain land. The policy did not achieve its objective of widespread ownership among many small landowners. The people who had more assets bought slaves, and with the slaves came their head lights. Thus, large slave holdings went with large land holdings. Slaves or indentured servants were relatively expensive to buy or import and the price of land was relatively high. More people than not came as servants, who yielded up their head right in return for their transportation.
Very early in the eighteenth century, the system was changed. One could buy land for just five shillings per fifty acres. This policy was very effective in expanding Virginia, especially the area under cultivation. It fostered large estates and the western expansion of the colony.
In recent notes, I have discussed the Northern Neck which was the gift of millions of acres to a small group of men. These proprietors, especially Lord Fairfax when he was sole proprietor, sold this land to the public. Mostly it was sold as smaller farms though some large blocks were sold. Both the crown and the proprietors sold land for an initial payment and the annual payment forever of a quit-rent.
One difference between the crown and the Northern Neck proprietors was the proprietors would not honor head rights. Head rights amounted to giving the land away and the proprietors were not about to do that; however, the law of Virginia said that anyone who came into Virginia could claim a head right. But one could not use them in the Northern Neck.
Several writers have said that the reason the First Germanna Colony went to court to obtain their head rights was so they could buy land from the proprietors. Of course, that is false because the head right was worthless in the Northern Neck, where the First Colony bought the initial land. Its only value was when it was sold for use outside the Northern Neck. One head right could be used to purchase fifty acres of land from the crown. Five shillings would do the same thing. So the value of a head right, when sold for use outside the Northern Neck, was just under five shillings, and in some periods much less. The First Colony members sold some of their headrights to people in the Robinson River Valley. Most of the First Colony headrights went unused though. We are greatful that they did obtain these headrights because the act of going to court and having the proceedings recorded in the court minutes has preserved for us the names of many individuals who came in the First Colony. We would wish that they all had done so.
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.