The Wealth of Jamestown

The history of Virginia reflects the character and goals of the people who lived there, including the women who often ran the plantations and made the deals that became the foundation of the wealth and the basis of the laws. William Roscoe, young Virginia planter and sheriff, and Sarah Harrison, daughter of one of Virginia’s wealthiest planters, are engaged and in love, but Sarah is forced by her father for business reasons to break the engagement and marry James Blair, Commissary of the Church of England. She retains her dowry and wealth, and while Blair goes to England to lobby for a college of which he’d be President, she continues her relationship with William. She has a baby to be raised by her brother as Benjamin Harrison IV, and continues accumulating property. She and William come to own two sailing ships, and William begins trade with pirates in the new city of Charles Towne.  Blair returns to Virginia and raises disputes with Governor Andros and his council. Blair goes back to London and accuses Andros of various offenses before an ecclesiastical court there. With the war with France finished, Andros decides to retire and return to England. Blair takes credit for removing the governor and selecting the new governor. He returns to a colony that is bursting with wealth and growth and excitement, over which he wants to exercise power, but which he doesn’t understand.