Each county was to send to these schools two "poor children," about seven or eight years old, who were to work at carding, knitting and spinning. For their maintenance the county authorities were to supply each of their children when they were admitted with: "6 barrels of Indian corn, a pig, 2 hens, clothing, shoes, a bed, rug, blanket, 2 coverlets, a wooden tray, and 2 pewter dishes or cups."
This plan was not very successful and it probably failed before the counties of the Northern Neck had advanced far enough to send children to the spinning-schools.
To encourage manufacture in early Virginia, prizes in tobacco were given for every pound of flax raised, for every skein of yarn, and for every yard of linen produced.
In 1697, Tobias Hall of Lancaster County, claimed the reward for the production of linen. Inventories of Lancaster disclose woolen-wheels and wool cards. A loom was owned by Charles Kelly. Flannel, and even blankets, were manufactured on these looms.
Between 1660 and 1702 there were at least two tailors in Lancaster County. Daniel Harrison, of the same county, must have manufactured quite a lot of shoes, for the time and place. He employed three shoemakers, and his personal estate included: "122 sides of leather, 72 pairs of shoes, 37 awls, 26 paring knives, 12 dozen lasts and numerous curriers' and tanners' tools."
A reward of fifty pounds of tobacco was offered for any sea-going vessel built in Virginia. There was no lack of Virginia-built small vessels, such as barges, shallops and sloops.
Rural life was not favorable to manufacture, although each plantation manufactured those articles necessary to its needs. William Fitzhugh, a wealthy landowner of the upper Neck, wrote to his London agent in 1692 and requested him to send to his plantations several shoemakers, "with lasts, awls and knives, together with half a hundred shoemaker's thread, some 20 or 30 gallons of train oil and proper colorings for leather." He had set up a tan-house and wished to convert the product into shoes on his own plantation.
Later on, in the eighteenth century, Robert Carter of Nomini Hall, a grandson of King Carter, manufactured on quite a large scale.
THE POTOMAC RANGERS
The Potomac rangers were appointed by the governor for frontier duty. The county lieutenant, in command of the county militia, was given the power to impress men who lived in the region for this service.