When the Second Germanna Colony got over their initial shock at finding themselves in Virginia, not Pennsylvania, they probably wondered what to think about this turn of events. One wonders if what they heard from the agents for Alexander Spotswood was as satisfying as they expected to find in Pennsylvania. They probably landed at Jamestown, where Capt. Tarbett would have expected to find Spotswood, whom Tarbett knew wanted German labor. Then, they would have made a trip by ship up the Rappahannock River, to just below the future site of Fredericksburg (as far as a ship could go because of the falls in the river). Then, it was a trip over the roads built by the First Germanna Colony up to Fort Germanna. To find Germans here in the wilderness was probably a surprise.
Spotswood and his partners wanted the Germans settled on farm-sized acreages along the north shore of the Rapidan River, i.e., across the river from Germanna, and up the river a few miles. It appears the houses were to be laid out at half-mile separations along the river, with another row paralleling these, but about a half-mile back from the river. Since there were twenty odd houses, this would have extended about five miles up the river. The western extremity might have been about Potato Run.
It has to be assumed the Germans built the houses, but they needed instructions on the style of construction to be used. Probably, the English supervisors showed the Germans how to build one house, and then they were left to build the rest of them. Probably no boundaries were laid out for the farms. The supervisors probably specified the home sites, and the Germans probably chose from among the sites to satisfy, as best they could, the desires of families to remain together.
So what were they to do with this land? The first objective would be to clear some of it so they could grow food. Spotswood and his partners supplied them with cattle on a partnership basis. The Germans would have to return the equivalent of the original cattle, plus one half of the increase. They could keep one half of the increase for themselves.
Then, the Germans were given a conflicting series of tasks to perform. Primarily, they were to make naval stores, a task in which they or the Virginians were not particularly well versed. Parliament had published some instructions on how to raise naval stores, and these were tried. But, as Spotswood noted later, these instructions were not applicable to the conditions in Virginia. To remedy this situation, Spotswood imported people from Finland to act as instructors, apparently at his own expense.
Why the emphasis on naval stores? England was beginning to realize that she no longer had the resources to produce naval stores, and she was having to import them from the Baltic nations. It became important to have the ability in the colonies. Spotswood understood that this was a good product to produce because of the desire in England to become self-sufficient. This would be the justification for taking up 40,000 acres of land, which would be used to produce naval stores. He could tell the King, "That is what you wanted, wasn't it? To satisfy your wishes, I had to take up 40,000 acres."
(18 Apr 01)
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.