THE GRAPES OF XEW YORK. 9 



Germans from the Rhine and settled them in Spottsylvania County on the 

 Rapidan river. The site of their village on this river is now marked by a 

 ford, Germania Ford, a name which is a record of the settlement. That 

 they grew grapes and made wine is certain, for the Governor's " red and 

 white Rapidan, made by his Spottsylvania Germans " is several times 

 mentioned in the published journals and letters of the time. But the venture 

 did not make a deep nor lasting impress on the agriculture of the colony.' 



Several early attempts were made in the Carolinas and Georgia to 

 grow the Vinifera grape. It was thought, in particular, that the French 

 Huguenots who settled in these states in large numbers toward the close of 

 the seventeenth century would succeed in grape-growing but even these 

 skilled vine-growers failed. Their failures are recorded by Alexander 

 Hewitt in 1779 as follows: " European grapes have been transplanted, and 

 several attempts made to raise wine; but so overshaded are the vines 

 planted in the woods, and so foggy is the season of the year when they 

 ripen, that they seldom come to maturity, but as excellent grapes have been 

 raised in gardens where they are exposed to the sun, we are apt to believe 

 that proper methods have not been taken for encouraging that branch of 

 agriculture, considering its great importance in a national view." In 

 Georgia, Abraham De Lyon, encouraged by the authorities of the colony, 

 imported vines from Portugal and planted them at Savannah early in the 

 eighteenth century but his attempt, though carried out on a small scale 

 in a garden, soon failed. 



In Maryland, if the records are correct, a greater degree of success 

 was attained than in the states to the south. Lord Charles Baltimore, 

 son of the grantee of the territory, in 1662 planted three hundred acres of 

 land in St. Mary's to vines. It is certain that he made and sold wine in 

 considerable quantities and the old chroniclers report that it was as good 

 as the best Burgundy. Efforts to grow the European grape in Maryland 

 continued until as late as 1828 when the Maryland Society for Promoting 

 the Culture of the Vine was incorporated by the State Legislature.^ The 

 object of the Society was to " carry on experiments in the cultivation of 

 both the European and native grapes and to collect and disseminate all 



' Fiske, John. Old Virf^inia and Her Neighbors. Vol. 11:372, 385. 

 ^American Farmer, Baltimore. 11:35. 1829-30. lb., 12:396. 1830-31. 



