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c h a p t e r f i v e “Ladys Here All Go to Market to Supply Their Pantry” Alcohol for Sale, 1760 to 1776 After the middle of the eighteenth century, Chesapeake colonists found an increasing variety of places where they could buy alcoholic beverages. They were no longer limited to producing alcohol at home, buying it from the surplus of large planters, or purchasing it from taverns favored by large planters. Especially after 1760, colonists could purchase all sorts of alcoholic drinks at markets, Scottish factor stores, or other shops in small towns. Among the new choices was one alcoholic drink that had long been inaccessible to most Chesapeake colonists: rum. As colonists flocked to the new places to buy alcoholic beverages, large planters desperately endeavored to retain their old command over small planters and laborers by expanding their operations and experimenting with new kinds of drink. Because of declining crop prices and financial crises during the latter half of the eighteenth century, large planters needed the income that selling alcohol provided more than ever. However, almost all of their efforts failed. Colonists preferred to shop in the new venues and enjoyed their increasing independence from large planters. It was not until the latter half of the eighteenth century that Chesapeake colonists began to build marketplaces where they could purchase goods such as alcoholic beverages. In the eighteenth-century Chesapeake, marketplaces were large open-air buildings divided into rental stalls, providing space where goods were guaranteed to be for sale. Although marketplaces were highly useful, their development was delayed by Chesapeake colonists’ focus on the tobacco crop. Tobacco was so labor-intensive, and separated colonists so widely, that colonists refrained from building markets or marketing networks. County governing bodies tried to promote town development, but until the middle of the eighteenth century , their efforts were unsuccessful. For example, when Governor Argall returned to Virginia in May of 1617, he found that the land that he had set aside for a marketplace in Jamestown had been planted with tobacco. In 1649, the privilege of creating a weekly market was offered to Jamestown (then James City), but the townspeople lacked interest and the marketplace went unbuilt. In 1699, a student of the College of William and Mary asked Governor Nicholson and the Assembly to establish a marketplace in Williamsburg for the ease of the students and the College, but again there was little interest. In 1705, the Assembly voted to create weekly markets in Williamsburg without results. In 1736, Norfolk merchant John Taylor spent £46 to build a market house, but he could not find anyone to rent space from him.1 Chesapeake colonists finally began to establish marketplaces in the 1750s. Colonists in Fairfax County, Virginia, raised money to build a marketplace in 1751. Annapolis colonists took bids for their marketplace in 1752. In 1757, plans were finally implemented in Williamsburg for a market house. Norfolk expanded its marketplace in 1764, and Baltimore rented out a marketplace for the first time in 1765. Portsmouth established a marketplace in 1783, Petersburg in 1784, and Yorktown in 1786. Once built, the marketplaces were popular. Most held one or two market days per week. By the late eighteenth century, some marketplaces, such as Norfolk’s, were open every day. Colonists found pork, lamb, mutton, poultry, livestock , eggs, milk, butter, cheese, and alcoholic drinks available for purchase. Fishermen sold fish and shellfish. Bread and grains were often available as well. By 1770, as Mary Ambler commented in Baltimore, “ladys here all go to market to supply their pantry.”2 Williamsburg established an especially large marketplace, and the activities that took place reduced the dependence of small planters on large planters. In 1769, regional merchants advertised a plan to hold four merchant meetings a year in Williamsburg. Ship captains, insurers, agents, and customers all descended upon Williamsburg during the quarterly meetings to buy and sell. The routinization of the merchant meetings made it easier for small planters to order goods from European agents directly, begin to purchase shipping insurance, set crop prices, and trade with others. As Governor Fauquier wrote, the meetings brought “persons engaged in business of any kind” to the capital in order “to expedite the mode and shorten the expense of doing business.”3 Much as the building of marketplaces and the formalization of the merchant meetings in Williamsburg gave small planters autonomy, so too did the legislatures ’ passage of the 1730 Tobacco Inspection Act, however unintentionally. The...

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