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The Great Charter of 1619 or more accurately Instructions to George Yeardley was a document drafted by the Virginia Company of London...
November 18, 1618: The Virginia Company of London issues its "Instructions to George Yeardley," which includes the abolishment of martial law (Dale's Code) and establishment of the ancient planter/headright system. Part of the purpose was to encourage settlers to emigrate to Virginia, which included building a college. These instructions come to be known as the Great Charter.[1]
The Company had not solved the problem of profitability, nor that of settlers' morale. Edwin Sandys became Company Treasurer and embarked on a series of reforms. He believed that the manufacturing enterprises the Company had begun were failing due to want of manpower. He embarked on a policy of granting sub-patents to land, which encouraged groups and wealthier individuals to go to Virginia. He sought to reward investors and so distributed 100 acres of land to each adventurer. He also distributed 50 acres to each person who paid his or her own way and 50 acres more for each additional person they brought along. This was known as the Virginia headright system.[2]
The Company's instructions to the Colony's new governor, George Yeardley, recognize tobacco as a medium of exchange.
This year, Virginia Company officials in London discover that rather than yielding a profit, the original investment of seventy-five thousand pounds has been almost entirely lost.
This year begins what is called the "Great Migration," which by 1623 brings the population of the Virginia colony to forty-five hundred.
On November 18, 1618, the Virginia Company of London’s two top officers, Sir Thomas Smythe and Sir Edwin Sandys, drafted a set of instructions to the colony’s newly appointed governor, Sir George Yeardley. This document, often referred to as the Great Charter, concerned itself—like the three royal charters before it—with finance and, at least where the colony was concerned, governance.
Rather than seek to sell shares or depend entirely on lotteries, the company proposed to fund itself through a resource it already had in abundance: land. By 1618, the company’s debt had swelled to about £9,000, and officials hoped to find a way to entice settlers to pay their own way to Virginia, thus relieving the company of one of its chief expenses. They found it in the headright system, through which the company promised fifty acres of land for each person who paid his or her own passage or any other person’s passage to Virginia.
The settler then agreed to pay the company a quit-rent of one shilling per year for every 50 acres. The company also used land to defray another big cost: funding the government. Rather than tax colonists, the company granted its officers in Virginia land and tenants, including slaves and indentured servants, to work the land (tobacco and other farming). The governor, for instance, received 3,000 acres and 100 tenants; the treasurer, 1,500 acres and 50 tenants.
The company had struggled to convince some people that Virginia was an acceptable place for an Englishman to live. Tales of an exceedingly strict regime under the Dale's Code were hurting the company’s reputation. As a partial response to this, the Virginia Company authorized the creation of of Council of State and General Assembly. The former’s appointed advisors and the latter’s elected burgesses would more widely distribute power in the colony, providing investor-colonists a greater stake in the enterprise for which they risked their lives.
At about the same time, Virginia Company officials also sought to restore investor confidence through a series of reforms in London. The treasurer, elected by company members at the Easter-season quarter court, could now serve a maximum of just three one-year terms. In addition, the treasurer could no longer simultaneously lead another company, as Smythe had led the East India Company. (The Somers Isles Company was excepted from this rule.) To improve record keeping and to make the company’s inner workings more transparent for investors, new provisions added a secretary, a bookkeeper, a husband (accountant), and a bedel (messenger). The company also authorized a sixteen-man council to assist the deputy treasurer in running the company from day to day. Finally, an auditor’s office was created. It consisted of seven members, two of whom were required to be councilors. The office was charged with reviewing both current and, in what turned out to be a significant development, past accounts.
"VIRGINIA COMPANY. INSTRUCTIONS TO GEORGE YEARDLEY (Sometimes called "The Great Charter")
November 18, 1618
"There is no authority in these Instructions for the Governor to establish a General Assembly. There is, however, evidence in the Instructions to Wyatt (p. 123) that a "Commission" was given to Yeardley which granted this authority."
"...we require you, Captain Yeardley, that immediately upon your arrival you take unto you the guard assigned to Captain Argal at his going Deputy Governor, or sithence by him assumed, to be of your guard [for the better defence][22] of your Government; and that as well the said guard as also fifty other persons, now sent and transported with you, you place as tennants on the said Governors Land and that all other persons heretofore transported at the common charge of the Company since the coming away of Sir Thomas Dale, Knight, late Deputy Governor, be placed as tennants on the said Companies Lands. And we will and ordain that all the said tennants on the Governors and Companies Lands shall occupy the same to the half part of the profits of the said lands, so as the one half to be and belong to the said tennants themselves and the other half respectively to the said Governor and to us, the said Treasurer and Company and our successors."
"whereof we shall speak afterwards, be reduced into four cities or burroughs, namely: the cheif city called James town, Charles City, Henrico, and the Burrough of Kiccowtan. And that in all these foresaid cities or burroughs and ancient adventurers and planters which [were] transported thither, with intent to inhabit at their own costs and charges, before the coming away of Sir Thomas Dale, Knight, and have so continued during the space of three years, shall have upon a first division, to be afterward by us augmented, one hundred acres of land for their personal adventure and as much for every single share of twelve pound ten shillings paid [for such share], allotted and set out to be held by them, their heirs and assigns, forever. And that for all such planters as were brought thither at the Companies charge to inhabit there, before the coming away of the said Sir 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 personal adventurers to be held by them, their heirs and assigns, for ever; paying for every fifty acres the yearly free rent of one shilling to the said Treasurer and Company and their successors, at one entire payment on the feast day of St Michael the Archangel, for ever. And in regard that by the singular industry and virtue of the said Sir Thomas Dale the former difficulties and dangers were in greatest part overcome to the great ease and security of such as have been since that time transported thither, we do, therefore, hereby ordain that all such persons as sithence the coming away of the said Sir Thomas Dale have at their own charges been transported thither to inhabit, and so continued as aforesaid, there be allotted and set out upon a first division fifty acres of land to them and their heirs, for ever, for their personal adventure, paying a free rent of one shilling yearly in manner aforesaid."
