Hoyt: Life Writing

The Headright System in Early Virginia

The establishment of the headright system by the Virginia Company of London, transported Europe’s long history of servitude and serfdom to the new world in order to satisfy the financial expectations of their investors. The voices of indentured servants can be found in early American life writing, such as James Revel’s poem, “The Poor Unhappy Transported Felon” and Ebeneezer Cooke’s satirical poem, “The Sot-Weed Factor.” As both poems attest, the financial rewards provided by the tobacco crop produced a system of coercive labor than benefitted the landowning class at the expense of the poor and disenfranchised. The establishment of the headright system, which reduced indentured servants to mere property that could be bought and sold, laid the legal foundation for chattel slavery in the new world.

The British colony in Virginia possessed a wealth of available land, but a dearth of labor to work that land. To solve this problem, The Virginia Company of London transported indentured servants across the Atlantic and sold or leased them to tobacco planters. The Virginia Company of London received a charter to establish an English colony in the new world in 1606 (The English Crown). When the Virginia Company faced financial difficulties in 1616, they established the headright system in which investors could pay for an indentured servants passage across the Atlantic in exchange for their labor and fifty acres of land (Gentry). The system is outlined in the document, “Instructions to George Yeardley” by the Virginia Company of London, written November 18, 1618 (Virginia Company of London). The document reads,

for all such Planters as were brought thither at the Companies Charge to inhabit there before the coming away of the said S^r Thomas Dale after the time of their Service to the

Company on the common Land agreed shall be expired there be set out One hundred Acres of Land for each of their person Adventurers to be held by them their heirs and Assigns for ever.

Since a headright was simply a commodity, the owner of the headright was not necessarily the immigrant who came to the new world, but a wealthy investor in Virginia that wanted their labor and the land that came with it. The headright could be bought and sold with no regard for the indentured servant’s preferences.

The establishment of the headright system produced the legal mechanisms for state-sanctioned chattel slavery in the United States. Both slaves and indentured servants under the headright system were condemned to mere property, only as valuable as the labor they produce. The connection between servants and slaves is inscribed in the laws of the Virginia Assembly, notably in "An act concerning Servants and Slaves" (General Assembly) which relegated both slaves and servants to the bottom rung of colonial society. Ultimately, The Virginia Company’s establishment of the headright system paved the way for state-sanctioned chattel slavery by reducing human labor to a commodity.

Works Cited

The English Crown. “First Charter of Virginia.” 1606. Encyclopedia Virginia, Virginia Humanities, Sept. 30, 2011. https://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/First_Charter_of_Virginia_1606. Accessed 12 Oct. 2020.

Gentry, Daphne. “Headrights (VA-Notes).” Library of Virginia, Commonwealth of Virginia. https://www.lva.virginia.gov/public/guides/va4_headrights.htm. Accessed 12 Oct. 2020.

Virginia Company of London. "Instructions to George Yeardley." 1618. Encyclopedia Virginia, Virginia Humanities, Mar. 18, 2013. https://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/_Instructions_to_George_Yeardley_by_the_Virgi nia_Company_of_London_November_18_1618. Accessed Oct. 12, 2020.

General Assembly. “An act concerning Servants and Slaves.” 1705. Encyclopedia Virginia, Virginia Humanities, Sept. 30, 2011. https://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/_an_act_concerning_servants_and_slaves_1705. Accessed Oct. 12, 2020.