218 TOBACCO PRODUCTION IN THE UNITED STATES. 



which is the impost on 36,314 hogsheads at 2s. per hogshead. Computing the hogshead at the prevailing weighty 

 500 pounds, the export was 18,157,000 pounds, (a) 



In October, 1686, tobacco hogsheads were required to be branded with the weight contained, as well as with the 

 initials of the owner. (Z>) In April, 1695, their size was fixed, the staves to be 48 inches in length, " and noe more," 

 and the diameter of head to be 30 inches, (c) The receipts of Receiver- General Byrd between April 25 and October 

 25, 1704, were : 



s. d. 



Upper district of James river 666 4 



Lower district of Jan.es river 4a8 14 



York district 1,297 11 6 



Rappahannock district ' . 754 2 4 



Potomac district... 442 11 9 



3,659 3 7 



which is the impost on 36,590 hogsheads, which, at 500 pounds each, would be 18,295,000 pounds, (d) 



An act passed by the general assembly, October. 1705, provided " that if any tobacco hereafter in any wise 

 whatsoever shall be imported or brought from Carolina, or other parts without the capes, into this Colony and 

 Dominion, in order to be here laid on shore, sold or shipped, the same shall thereby be forfeited and lost", one-half 

 to go to the crown, the remainder to the informer. A further duty of Is. 3d. English money per ton burden, according 

 to gauge, was imposed to maintain the cost of the postal service, (e) but both this tax and that of 2s. per hogshead 

 (now made for hogshead, or 500 pounds of bulk tobacco) were remitted to Virginia owners. (/) The abuse of the 

 tobacco trade by smuggling, which the act above was intended to reach, was complained of also in the instructions 

 from the president and masters of William and Mary College, dated August 10, 1723, to John Randolph, then about 

 to depart for England. For the support of the college, their majesties, William and Mary, had in 1 692 (O. S.) provided 

 a revenue from a tax of Id. per pound on all tobacco exported from Virginia and Maryland to other plantations. 

 This, it was complained, had been reduced one-half from several causes, among which it was recited that the officers 

 in the lower counties of Pennsylvania and ]S"orth Carolina, instead of exacting good money, had taken currency of the 

 country, that of North Carolina being little above one-fourth and that of Pennsylvania one half of the value of good 

 money, as to the relative nominal values, which occasioned a greater export from those places. (17) It was also stated 

 that there was no longer, as formerly, an officer maintained in Elizabeth river ('! from which is the greater part of the 

 exportation of tobacco to the plantations"), nor a searcher at Hampton, " both offices being sunk;" and that "vast 

 frauds" were perpetrated, it being a common practice to carry out tobacco in barrels entered as beef or pork, to 

 conceal it under corn, and to mark the hogshead with less than the real weight. (k) The average annual export of 

 tobacco from Virginia and Maryland during the ten years ending in 1709 was 28,858,666 pounds, of which England 

 consumed on an average 11,260,659 and the rest of Europe 17,598,007 pounds, (i) The authorities teem with 

 accounts of the distress of the inhabitants of the colonies, of both Virginia and Maryland, at this period from the 

 low price of tobacco, which had been occasioned by overproduction, and planters were unable, from lack of 

 means, to clothe themselves, the practice having been to import their clothing from England and to pay for them 

 with the proceeds of their sales. This is detailed by Governor Alexander Spots wood, together with a beneficial 

 result, who wrote, in 1710, to the lords commissioners of the council of trade, London, as follows: 



The great number of negroes imported here (so long as there remained any money or credit in the Colony to buy them), and solely 

 employed in making tobacco, hath produced, for some years, an increase of the commodity far disproportionate to the consumption that 

 could be made of it in all markets wch the war had left open, and, by a natural consequence, lowered the price to a great degree. This 

 was first felt in those parts of the country whose tobacco is reputed mean, and the people being disappointed of the necessary stipplys of 

 clothing for their familys in return of their tobacco, (j) found themselves under the necessity of attempting to cloath themselves with 

 their own Manufactures. And the market for tobacco still declining and few stores of goods brought in other parts of the country, 

 through the like necessity have been forced in the same humour of planting cotton and sewing flax and by making the first with their wool, 

 to supply the want of course clothing and Linneu. This is now become so universal that even in oue of the best countys for tobacco I'm. 

 credibly informed that there has been made this last year above 4,000 yards of divers sorts of Woolen, Cotton and Lumen Cloth, (k) 



a Virginia Historical Register, iii, pp. 187-188. 



6 Heiiing, iii, p. 135. 



c Ibid. 



d Virginia Historical Register, iii, p. 188. 



e Governor Alexander Spotswood, in his letters of the period, makes frequent mention of the opposition of the planters to a tax for 

 the postal service, which was quite as obnoxious to them as was the fateful stamp act afterward; which is interesting, as showing the 

 early drift of political sentiment. MS. Letter-Books of Governor Spottswood in the Collections of the Virginia Historical Society. 



f Hening, iii, p. 553. 



g This inequality of money values in the several American colonies or states continued during the eighteenth century, and is a constant 

 source of complaint on the part of travelers. 



h Paper* Relating to the Histoi-y of the CliurcTi in Virginia, A. D. 1680-1776. Ed. by Rt. Rev. Win. Stevens Perry, D. D., p. 550. 



t In Ili97 the crop in Maryland was unusually small, and it was reported to the general assembly that the tobacco lands were worn out 

 (Scharf'sffis/on/o/ Mart/land, ii,p. 198). In 1708 fines due in tobacco were commutable in the provi uceof Mary laud at 10s. per hundred-weight. 



_;' "They have their clothing of all sorts from England, as Linen, Woolen, Silk, Hats and Leather." Beverley's History (if Virginia. 

 Ed. 1722, p. 255. 



k MS. Letter-Book of Alexander Spotswood in the Collections of the Virginia Historical Society. 



