Making Barrels in the Seventeenth Century
The engraving, made in 1685, shows two coopers making a barrel. A cooper's shop at Jamestown may have been somewhat similar to the one shown.
From Orbis Sensualium Pictus by Johann Comenius (London, 1685).
POTASH AND SOAP-ASHES
Soap-ashes and potash were among the first commodities produced by the English in America. Potash was made from soap-ashes (wood ashes, especially those obtained from burning ash and elm) and was used at Jamestown for making both soap and glass. Soap-ashes were exported to England as early as 1608, and throughout the remainder of the century it appears that both potash and soap-ashes were shipped to the mother country, As early as 1621 soap-ashes were selling for six shillings to eight shillings per hundred weight, whereas potash was bringing between thirty-five shillings and forty shillings per hundred weight.
Although few contemporary records are available which mention the profit made from the sale of soap-ashes and potash by the Virginia planters, it is known that some small returns were made from time to time throughout the seventeenth century. While tobacco was the important money-making crop, the part played in the economy of the Jamestown settlement and environs by other commodities—including soap-ashes and potash—should not be overlooked.
In the conjectural picture Jamestown settlers are shown making potash. Five steps were necessary: