The Planters of Colonial Virginia

The author traces settlement and social development in colonial Virginia, examining motivations for migration, land and labor dynamics, and the rise and decline of a prosperous yeoman class. He outlines systems of indentured servitude and wage labor, the economics of tobacco cultivation, and how the growing reliance on enslaved labor reshaped property patterns, politics, and social hierarchy. Chapters analyze relations with indigenous peoples, trade networks, the Restoration period, and the transformation of smallholders into slaveholders or impoverished migrants. The narrative combines economic, political, and social perspectives to show how labor regimes and world markets determined the colony's institutions and class structure.