University of Virginia Library

COLONIAL AND DOMESTIC STATE PAPERS

The other large group of Virginia records, consisting of over one hundred
and twenty separate documents, is found among the colonial and domestic papers
deposited in the Public Record Office. The source of this collection is uncertain.
Much of it came from the Plantation Office, and perhaps from the Privy Council
Office. The consolidation of depositories took place in 1578, but the efforts of
Dr. Thomas Wilson, the first clerk of the papers, to force the previous and
incumbent magistrates to hand over all documents to the State, were evidently
often unavailing, and hence it was that the creation of a State Paper Office was
not really accomplished until the period of the company. After Sir Thomas
Wilson succeeded his uncle during the reign of James I the aid of the King was
much relied upon, and, though partially successful, the recent revelation of quasi-
public documents in private collections shows that not only earlier but later
officials considered papers of record private property.[143] Thus some of the Salis-

bury papers, which Wilson failed to secure, are now at Hatfield House; and others
have passed with the Lansdowne collection into the British Museum, where they
are known as the Burghley papers. Similarly, the Cottonian papers in the Museum
originally belonged to Sir Robert Cotton in the time of James I.

Among the State Papers deposited in the Record Office are the letters to
John Ferrar, dated from Virginia in April, 1623, which may have been seized by
the commission appointed on May 9, 1623, to investigate the affairs of the com-
pany. There, too, are found the attested copies of letters and records in the
colony which concern the Harvey Commission, sent to the commission in England
by Edward Sharpless. A few of these papers seem to have belonged to the
company, such as the documents pertaining to the Walloons and dated 1621;
Pory's report from Virginia, in the same year; and two copies of documents by
Collingwood, dated the latter part of 1623.[144] All of these facts lead to the con-
clusion that a part of the records of the commissions, and a part of the confis-
cated records of the company are here deposited. If so, where are the remainder
of these most valuable documents?[145]

The colonial papers and the domestic correspondence include about forty-eight
which are records, and about nineteen which are documentary in character.
The first group contains, among other papers, many of the petitions and letters
addressed to the King and to the Privy Council, and many others of the council. It
is thus apparent that the royal correspondence of the Privy Council and the Privy
Council papers which should accompany the register are in this collection. To the
second group belong those papers which contain projects presented by individuals and
answers to such propositions, lists of adventures for the company, and also lists
of men sent to the colony and of lands granted in Virginia. Among these papers
are seven letters from colonists, in addition to about fifty which may be consid-
ered subsidiary correspondence in that they refer incidentally to the affairs of
the company. Such are the Mandeville-Conway, Middlesex-Conway, Chamberlain-
Carleton, Conway-Calvert, and Nethersole-Carleton letters.