I agree that in the 17th century, tobacco was the most significant force shaping
Jamestown. This is shown in several ways, including the Virginia slave code, the flourishing
state of slavery, and its booming state as a crop. Without tobacco, it is hard to imagine what
Jamestown would have been like.
First, I believe that Jamestown was shaped in the 17th century by tobacco because of the
Virginia slave code. Although, the slave code itself was not enacted until 1705, some of the
things in it lead me to believe that tobacco had a large impact in the years before that. In the
slave code in section XXIII, it says that if a runaway slave is caught in ten miles, the reward is
two hundred pounds of tobacco. If it is between five and ten miles, the reward is one hundred
pounds of tobacco (Virginia Slave Code, XXIII). This leads me to believe that tobacco was a
huge part of shaping Jamestown because just a few years after the turn of the century, it is being
used like cash. Without this resource, Jamestown would have been too poor to give away
rewards for runaway slaves. This could have possibly lead to more slaves successfully running
away from Jamestown, leaving the workforce in the town significantly lowered. This then could
have left Jamestown behind in the growing state of the country.
In the early 17th century, around 1618, the demand and price of tobacco went through the
roof. This would have brought a lot of money into Jamestown, allowing it to grow and prosper.
Without this boom, Jamestown may not have been able to do this, and may never have been
shaped into what it was. Although this boom in tobacco demand died down significantly in 1629,
the eleven years that it lasted was what really mattered because it have given Jamestown what it
needed to grow during that time.
