Since there is no evidence that stoneware was being made at this time in Virginia, other than at Yorktown, it is reasonable to suppose that the "poor potter's" heirs shipped stoneware all the way to New England and that they were paid in hard cash, as distinct from tobacco credits, which would have been the case with local customers. However this may be, the Rogers enterprise, even if its products were confined to Virginia, appears to have been extensive, wealth-producing, and quite the opposite of Governor Gooch's appraisal of it in his reports to the Board of Trade.
As to the location of his kilns, we know that Rogers owned two lots, where he apparently lived, at the northern boundary of the town. He also owned a warehouse by the riverside and other lots on which he was building dwellings when he died. He owned land at "Tarripin Point" and two lots in Williamsburg. Governor Gooch repeatedly located the pottery in Yorktown: "We have here at York Town upon York River one poor Potter's Work ...," or, "the Potter continues his Business (at York Town in this Colony)." This is rather good evidence that the kilns were within the town limits rather than at some outside location, such as "Tarripin Point." A waterfront location would have been desirable for many reasons, but, since a potter's kiln would have been a fire hazard not to only Rogers' but to other warehouses, it is questionable whether nearby kilns would have been tolerated. English practice was usually to locate potter's kilns at the far edges of towns or outside their limits. Nevertheless, there were many exceptions, and kilns sometimes were located near the water, especially when practical reasons of convenience in loading ships outweighed the dangers. The North Devon potteries were heavily committed to water transportation, and at least two of the kilns at Bideford in North Devon in the 17th century, for example, were located near the water in what were then densely settled areas.[228] The North Walk Pottery in nearby Barnstaple was also on the water's edge, close to a thickly populated area;[229] in 17th-century America we find a parallel in the pottery of William Vincent, located at the harbor's edge in Gloucester, Massachusetts, where it was easy for him to ship his wares along the coast.[230] The 18th-century potteries of Charlestown, Massachusetts, which also had wide markets, were clustered along the harbor shore amid a welter of wharves and warehouses.[231] It is conceivable, therefore, that the Yorktown waterfront may have been similarly exposed to the dangers of a potter's kiln, since Rogers transported his wares by water.
More logical from the standpoint of safety, however, would be the pair of lots on the western edge of the town where Rogers apparently dwelt after they were granted to him in 1711. Although it is not conclusive, his inventory, which includes the lists of earthenwares and stonewares mentioned above, appears to have been taken in a sequence beginning with the house and followed by one outbuilding after another. Presumably these were located close together. Things pertaining to the kitchen and perhaps to the quarters follow the contents of the house (in which the "work room" is mentioned), then the distilling apparatus followed by the brewing equipment. Next come the pottery items, then a miscellany of laundry, garden, and cooking gear, and finally stable fixtures and a horse. It is not until the end of the inventory that the boats and their rigging and equipment, doubtless located at the waterside, are mentioned. These speculations are offered for what they are worth in suggesting possibilities for future archeological discovery of the kiln site.
The question of William Rogers' own role in the pottery enterprise perhaps will never be solved conclusively, although, as Mr. Noël Hume points out, there is no evidence that he himself was a potter. His beginnings almost surely were humble ones, humble enough for a potter. We know that his brother George was a maker of horse collars—a worthy occupation, but not one to be equated with the role of an 18th-century gentleman—in Braintree, Essex County, England. There were many potters in Essex in the 17th and early 18th centuries, and one wonders if William Rogers was trained by one of them. But the Essex Records do not reveal a William Rogers whose dates or circumstances fit ours. We do find that a George Rogers died at Braintree in 1750.[232]
Whatever may have been William's early training, it is apparent that he knew the art of brewing and that he engaged in it at Yorktown. To be sure, nearly every farmer and yeoman in the colonies knew how to brew. Furthermore, commercial brewing was probably accepted as an honorable industry by the Crown authorities, since the colonial demand for beers and ales must have always been in excess of the exportable supply. It is possible, we may speculate, that Rogers was trained as a potter but practiced brewing and preferred to be known publicly as a brewer. In any case, he was essentially a businessman whose establishment made ale as well as pottery for public consumption, and it is clear that by 1725 he was conducting a potter's business on a considerable scale. To have done so he must have employed potters and apprentices, yet in cursory searches of the York County records, we have been unable to discover any reference either to potteries or potters, reinforcing the suspicion that every effort—including Gooch's apologetic references—was being made to conduct the pottery in a clandestine manner.
Thus, the only thing we know with certainty is that William Rogers was a very successful entrepreneur who carried on more than one kind of business. We also can deduce from what is disclosed in the records that he ascended high in the social scale in Virginia and that the rate of this ascent was, not surprisingly, in proportion to the increase of his wealth. Whether or not he was a trained potter, one thing is certain: he was not a "poor potter."
As to the role of his son-in-law and successor, Thomas Reynolds, we know with certainty that Reynolds was not a potter. For at least five years and perhaps longer, however, he evidently ran the pottery, which means that there were trained hands to produce stonewares and earthenwares. Who they were or where they came from are not revealed in the records. If, however, we can prove that the wares about to be discussed were made by them, it becomes clear that they were a remarkably competent lot, often able to equal if not to excel their English peers.
The persistence of the pottery for at least 20 and perhaps more than 34 years was owing in part, no doubt, to Governor Gooch's apologetic treatment of it in his reports to the Lords of the Board of Trade and to his leniency toward colonial manufacturers in general. Basically, however, it was a response to public need and to a growing independence and a socio-economic situation distinct from the mother country's. The Virginians had a will and direction which impelled them beyond the restrictions imposed upon them to grow tobacco and do little else. The "poor potter" is significant because he exemplified the impulse to break these restrictions and to move the colony toward a craft-oriented economy. Because his wares were skillfully made and sometimes were scarcely distinguishable from those of his English competitors, he was able to hold his position economically and at the same time to become personally wealthy and influential. The scope of his enterprise—more clearly demonstrated in the archeological section of this presentation—should lead to a reappraisal of Governor Gooch's attitudes toward the endeavors of the colonists. His reports to the Board of Trade are shown to have been dissimulations instead of statements of fact. They evidence a daring and suggest a wisdom and a degree of pragmatism on the part of the Governor that might well have been continued by the Crown and its authorities. This entire episode illustrates a remarkably fluid phase of Virginia's history in which the opportunity for an energetic man to rise from obscurity to wealth and position foretold a pattern that became legendary in American society.
Governor Gooch undoubtedly sensed these internal pressures, as much psychological as economic, to seek the rewards of industry and enterprise. That the pottery later ceased to function and Virginia's manufactures in general failed to develop may reflect the differences in attitudes between Governor Gooch and his successors and the stubborn impositions by the Crown that eventually led to the American Revolution.
There seems little doubt that the "poor potter," William Rogers, and the maker of the pottery so liberally dispersed around Yorktown and elsewhere in Virginia are one and the same. Further archeological investigation and discovery of a kiln or kiln dump should provide the evidence needed for proof.