At Keswick in the Lake Country, Thomas Perry, Duke of Northumberland, and Elizabeth, the Queen of England, were in an argument in the late 1500s concerning who owned the mineral rights. Apparently the fact was not well established in law, and the case went to trial, where Queen Elizabeth, on behalf of the Crown, won. I do not have the details, but apparently the crown owned 100% of the minerals. There was no mention of a royalty payment, even to the land owner.
Let us fast forward more than a hundred years to Virginia, where Lt. Gov. Spotswood had become interested in silver and gold. He purchased, in May of 1713, a one-quarter interest in a tract which was thought to contain silver. Spotswood read the laws to see who owned the silver should it be found. What he found was that the division between the discoverer (presumably the land owner) and the crown was not defined. Whether he was acquainted with the case of The Crown vs. Perry is unknown, but he came to the decision that no work was to be done on the purported silver mine until the question was settled. He was afraid that if silver were discovered, the Crown might claim it all.
Starting in 1713, about the time he paid his money for his part of the silver mine, Spotswood starting writing letters to Col. Nathaniel Blakiston, in London, who was the agent for Virginia. Spotswood explained the situation and asked him to have this question settled. Before long, the Board of Trade, Lord Orkney (the nominal Governor of Virginia), and even Queen Anne, were involved. Whether the Queen actually heard the details is not clear, but at least a petition was sent to the Queen to have the question settled.
Spotswood made it clear that the question, in his mind, was not academic but real, as he believed that lands with silver had been discovered. The petition to the Queen makes this clear. So Blakiston became acquainted with the fact that Spotswood had a serious interest in a silver mine.
Shortly thereafter, a group of miners who had been recruited in Germany from near Siegen appeared in London. They did NOT come at the invitation of Spotswood. They came because they thought they were going to mine silver for George Ritter and Company, whose agent in America was Christoph Graffenried, and in Germany was Johann Justus Albrecht. But once they were in London, they found out that this operation was bankrupt and could not finance the venture.
At the same time that the miners were in London, Graffenried appeared there also on his way back to Switzerland. After listening to the plight of the Germans, he recommended that they go home.
(04 Oct 02)
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.