[Continuing with Bruce's " Economic History of Virginia in the Seventeenth Century ".]
“It is interesting to find that this spot [Falling Creek on the James River] as a place for iron-making had already been regarded with great enthusiasm by George Sandys, who declared that if Nature had intentionally prepared it with a view to this special manufacture, the advantages for that purpose which it possessed could not have been more remarkable. In expressing this opinion, he had in mind the circumstances that there were present in proximity here not only ore and water, but wood, and stones with which to construct the furnace. A mine was opened and a successful effort made to work it. The cost of putting up the iron works was in 1621 calculated by Sir Edwin Sandys to be four thousand pounds, but it stated by other authorities to have been as much as five thousand. [. . .] it was confidently anticipated in 1622 that in three months [the furnace] would be in a position to forward large quantities of raw iron to England. Very soon, however, the massacre by the Indians brought destruction to the little settlement on Falling Creek. The tools were destroyed or thrown into the river by the savages, and the workmen, with the exception of a boy and a girl, were killed.”
"The attack upon the iron works at Falling Creek and its results, disheartening as they were, did not at the moment diminish the interest in that undertaking felt both by the Company in England and by the colonial authorities. [The revocation of the charter of the Company upset the plans for restoration of the furnace.] Five years after the massacre, William Capps was sent by the King to Virginia with a general commission to establish a number of industries, including the manufacture of iron. The Governor and the Council expressed their utmost readiness to give Capps all the assistance in their power, but he became involved in trouble very soon and was forced to leave the country. In 1628 the Governor and the Council stated they had sent ore to England, presumably from Falling Creek, while declaring that the cost of restoring the works and importing operatives was too great to be assumed by the Colony.”
“In 1630, Governor Harvey made a journey to the site of the old iron works on Falling Creek, with a view to discovering whether they could be restored. He wrote to the authorities in England that all of the conditions of the locality were favorable to the reestablishment of the works; he sent over at the same time two specimens of ore from the vicinity. A few years later, Sir John Zouch and his son seem to have taken steps to establish iron works in Virginia, but the project collapsed on account of the failure of their partners to come to their assistance. The cost of reviving the manufacture of iron in the Colony was so great that practical interest in it died out for a period of many years.”
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.