The grapes of New York

by U. P. Hedrick

The references given are sufficient to show that the value of the native grapes as a source of food and for wine was recognized by the first settlers in practically all of the colonies and that their possibilities as cultivated plants were considered by some of the colonizers. Yet for two hundred years there were no zealous efforts made to cultivate American grapes. Indeed, there are far fewer references to the wild grapes of the country in the eighteenth century than in the seventeenth. The reasons for this neglect of a plant which could so easily have been improved by cultivation, and this must have been apparent, are several. During all of this period the European grape was being tried and all hopes for viticulture were centered about it. Again, fruit of any kind was not a common article of diet with Americans until even so recently as a generation ago, and native grapes are dessert fruits, not wine fruits, and wine was the purpose for which all grapes were grown until the Catawba, the Concord and the Delaware whetted the appetites of fruit eaters for a dessert grape.

In the history of the amelioration of the American grapes we can skip the period from the early settlement of the country, a period represented by the above quotations, to the first years of the United States as a lapse of time in which there were no steps forward and in which even information concerning grapes was scarcely increased. The evolution of American grapes began with the opening of the nineteenth century, about the only accounts of grapes during the eighteenth century worthy of note being those of John Lawson, 1714; Robert Beverly, 1722; Col. Robert Bolling, 1765; Edward Antill, 1769; and Peter Legaux, 1800. All of these writers excepting Lawson were concerned with European grapes, and their relations to grape-growing were therefore discussed in the chapter on the Old World grape. It remains, however, to call attention to such statements as were made by them of American grapes.

John Lawson, a Scotch engineer, spent eight years, beginning in 1700, exploring and surveying North Carolina. A part of this time he was Surveyor General for the State and through natural desire and vocation he became familiar with the flora of North Carolina. In his history of that State, written in 1714, he gives an account of its natural resources in which the grapes of the region are several times described. He distinguishes six kinds, three of which he mentions as having been removed to the gardens. His fullest account runs as follows:[55]

“Among the natural fruits, the vine takes first place, of which I find six sorts, very well known. The first is the black bunch grapes which yield a crimson juice. These grow common and bear plentifully, they are of a good relish, though not large, yet well knit in the clusters. They have a thickish skin and large stone, which makes them not yield much juice. There is another sort of black grapes like the former in all respects, save that their juice is of a light flesh color, inclining to a white. I once saw a spontaneous white bunch grape in Carolina; but the cattle browzing on the sprouts thereof in the spring, it died. Of those which we call fox grapes, we have four sorts; two whereof are called summer grapes, because ripe in July; the other two winter fruits, because not ripe till September or October. The summer fox grapes grow not in clusters or great bunches, but are about five or six in a bunch, about the bigness of a damson or larger. The black sort are frequent, the white not so commonly found. They always grow in swamps and low, moist lands, running sometimes very high and being shady, and therefore proper for arbours. They afford the largest leaf I ever saw to my remembrance, the back of which is of a white horse flesh color. This fruit always ripens in the shade. I have transplanted them into my orchard and find they thrive well, if manured. A neighbor of mine has done the same; mine were by slips, his from the roots, which thrive to admiration, and bear fruit, though not so juicy as the European grape, but of a glutinous nature. However it is pleasant enough to eat.

“The other winter fox grapes are much of the same bigness. These refuse no ground, swampy or dry, but grow plentifully on the sand hills along the sea coast and elsewhere, and are great bearers. I have seen near twelve bushels upon one vine of the black sort. Some of these, when thoroughly ripe, have a very pretty vinous taste and eat very well, yet are glutinous. The white sort are clear and transparent, and indifferent small stones. Being removed by the slip or root, they thrive well in our gardens, and make pleasant shades.”

In another part of his history, Lawson says that in 1708 the French Huguenots on Trent River, North Carolina, were cultivating European grapes for wine-making.[56] Again he devotes several pages to the subject of grape-growing in North Carolina.[57] He held that this “noble vegetable” could be brought to the same perfection as in similar latitudes in Europe. He states that Nathaniel Johnson had rejected all exotic vines and was cultivating native sorts from which he was making excellent wine. Lawson admonishes his readers that in a new country the settlers are under the necessity of making use of the natural products of the soil of which, in Carolina, the wild grape is most worthy of notice. He calls attention to the fact that conditions are so different in America that European methods of cultivation and care cannot be followed. Lastly he states that he had planted seeds from the white grapes of Madeira from which he hoped to raise a vineyard. Lawson is deserving of esteem as an energetic pioneer, an accurate historian, as one of the first American naturalists, and as an early vineyardist and horticulturist, for he experimented with other fruits than the grape. Poor Lawson was burned to death by the Indians in the prime of his career, cutting short experiments which might have materially hastened the establishment of viticulture in America.

The best account of the grapes of Virginia given in the later colonial times is that of the historian Robert Beverly who is very explicit in his description of the sorts growing wild in that State. He describes them as follows:[58] “Grapes grow there [Virginia] in an incredible plenty, and variety; some of which are very sweet and pleasant to the taste, others rough and harsh, and perhaps fitter for wine or brandy. I have seen great trees covered with single vines, and those vines almost hid with the grapes. Of these wild grapes, besides those large ones in the mountains, mentioned by Batt in his discovery, I have observed four very different kinds, viz:

“One of the sorts grows among the sand banks, upon the edges of the low grounds, and islands next the bay, and sea, and also in the swamps and breaches of the uplands. They grow thin in small bunches, and upon very low vines. These are noble grapes; and though they are wild in the woods, are as large as the Dutch gooseberry. One species of them is white, others purple, blue and black, but all much alike in flavor; and some long, some round.

“A second kind is produced throughout the whole country, in the swamps and sides of hills. These also grow upon small vines, and in small bunches; but are themselves the largest grapes as big as the English bullace, and of a rank taste when ripe, resembling the smell of a fox, from whence they are called fox grapes. Both these sorts make admirable tarts, being of a fleshly substance, and perhaps, if rightly managed, might make good raisins.