EARLY FEDERAL PERIOD
From the close of the Revolution to the War of 1812, there were at least four outstanding movements in Loudoun: the restoration of the fertility of her soil, the disestablishment of the church, the loss of a substantial part of her area which returned to Fairfax and the erection of large country mansions. The great project of Washington's Potomac Company, involving the extensive improvement of that river for navigation, was not, of course a Loudoun enterprise, although the welfare of her people was greatly affected and such Loudoun men as Joseph Janney, Benjamin Shreve, John Hough, Benjamin Dulaney, William Brown, John Harper, William Ellzey, and Leven Powell were at one time or another, as directors or stockholders, interested in the undertaking.
In the settlement of county, the Virginians from Tidewater had brought with them their improvident methods of farming. From the earliest days, when land was more available than labor, scant attention had been given by the Virginia planter or farmer to the conservation or restoration of the fertility of his soil. A field was planted and replanted to heavy-feeding crops, with perhaps an occasional fallow year intervening; and when the inevitable result registered itself in the falling off of production to a point where the planting of that field became unprofitable, it was abandoned and new ground broken up to be put through the same disastrous course. Rotation of crops and the manuring of the land were seldom, if ever, practiced outside perhaps the Quaker and German Settlements. Toward the end of the eighteenth century, so far had this reckless agriculture gone, that even the fertile lands of the Piedmont were recording the result in no uncertain manner. The yield of corn and wheat to the acre had been steadily declining, followed by an emigration of many of the Loudoun people to Kentucky and elsewhere. It was then that there arose in the county a farmer and leader who, measured by the results of his work, may be considered as the most valuable man to her own interests that Loudoun has thus far produced. John Alexander Binns was the son of Charles Binns, the first clerk of Loudoun and of his wife, Ann Alexander, a daughter of "John Alexander the Eldest of Stafford County. Gent." as he is described in a deed to his daughter in 1760. The son was born probably about 1761, although the exact date seems uncertain. In March, 1781, he was, as we have seen, recommended by the County Court of Loudoun to the governor for appointment as a first lieutenant in the Virginia forces and at the same time his brother, Charles Binns, Jr., later to succeed his father as county clerk, was recommended for a commission as second lieutenant. After the war, John Binns turned his attention to farming and grappled with the problem of restoring the fertility of the soil. He had learned of the use of land plaster (gypsum) and clover for that purpose in the Philadelphia neighborhood, whence it is said the system had been brought from Leipsic in Saxony. As early as 1780 he began his experiments, using not only the land plaster and clover but practicing deeper ploughing and rotating crops. At first he was, of course, ridiculed by his farmer neighbors, for the reluctance of the husbandman to change his methods is an old, old story. But Binns persisted. As he improved one farm and his profits rose, he purchased other worn-out lands from their discouraged owners and in time was profiting handsomely from his intelligence and industry. At length, in 1803, his labors crowned with success and the agricultural wealth of his home county rapidly rising as a result of his long and patient work, he sat himself down to write the story of what he had accomplished. His little book was printed in a very small edition, due probably to the high price and scarcity of paper, and was offered for sale at fifty cents, under the comprehensive title "A Treatise on Practical Farming, embracing particularly the following subjects, viz. The Use of Plaster of Paris, with Directions for Using it; and General Observations on the Use of Other Manures. On Deep Ploughing; thick Sowing of Grain; Method of Preventing Fruit Trees from Decaying and Farming in General. By John A. Binns Of Loudoun County, Virginia, Farmer." It was published at "Frederick-Town, Maryland," and "Printed by John B. Colvin, Editor of the Republican Advocate, 1803." "The little book" writes Rodney H. True "is now hard to find and the first edition, but for the copy preserved by Jefferson and now treasured among the great man's books in the Library of Congress, would well-nigh be lost."
Thomas Jefferson, with his restless intelligence, was one of the first to acquire the book. Having studied it and being impressed with Binns' success, he wrote to Sir John Sinclair, the head of the English Board of Agriculture, a letter dated the 30th June, 1803, sending with it
"the enclosed pamphlet on the use of gypsum by a Mr. Binns, a plain farmer, who understands handling his plough better than his pen. he is certainly something of an enthusiast in the use of this manure; but he has a right to be so. the result of his husbandry prooves his confidence in it well found for from being poor, it has made him rich. the county of Loudoun in which he live(s) exhausted & wasted by bad husbandry, has, from his example, become the most productive one in Virginia: and its lands, from being the lowest, sell at the highest prices. these facts speak more strongly for his pamphlet than a better arrangement & more polished phrases would have done. were I now a farmer I should surely adopt the gypsum...."
On the same day, in a letter to Mr. William Strictland, another member of the English Board of Agriculture, Jefferson wrote
"You will discover that Mr. Binns is an enthusiast for the use of gypsum, but there are two facts which prove that he has a right to be so 1. he began poor and has made himself tollerably rich by his farming alone. 2. the county of Loudoun, in which he lives, had been so exhausted & wasted by bad husbandry, that it began to depopulate, the inhabitants going Southwardly in quest of better lands. Binns' success has stopped that immigration. it is now becoming on(e) of the most productive counties of the state of Virginia, and the price given for the lands is multiplied manifold."
Sir John Sinclair in his reply to Mr. Jefferson, whom he addresses as "His Highness, Thomas Jefferson" wrote from Edinburgh under date of the 1st January 1804:
"On various accounts I received with much pleasure, your obliging letter of the 30th June last, which only reached me, at the place, on the 19th November. I certainly feel highly indebted to Mr. Binns, both for the information contained in the pamphlet he has drawn up; and also, for his having been the means of inducing you to recommence our correspondence together, for the purpose of transmitting a paper which does credit to the practical farmers of America.
"As to the Plaster of Paris, which Mr. Binns so strongly recommends, it is singularly, that whilst it proves such a source of fertility to you, it is of little avail in any part of the British Islands, Kent alone excepted. I am thence inclined to conjecture, that its great advantage must arise from its attracting moisture from the atmosphere, of which we have in great abundance in these Kingdoms...."