Alexander Spotswood

Alexander Spotswood (c. 1676 – 6 June 1740) was a Lieutenant-Colonel in the British Army and a noted Lieutenant Governor of Virginia. He is noted in Virginia and American history for a number of his projects as Governor, including his exploring beyond the Blue Ridge Mountains, his establishing what was perhaps the first colonial iron works, and his negotiating the Treaty of Albany with the Iroquois Nations of New York.

Family

Alexander Spotswood was born in the Colony of Tangier, Morocco, Africa, about 1676 to Catharine (née Maxwell, c. 1638 - December 1709) and her second husband, Dr Robert Spottiswoode (17 September 1637 - 1680), the Chirurgeon (surgeon) to the Tangier Garrison.

Through his father, Alexander was a grandson of Judge Robert Spottiswoode (1596–1646), a great-grandson of Archbishop John Spottiswoode (1565–1639), and a descendant of King Robert II of Scotland through the 2nd Earls of Crawford ^[1]. Alexander's older half-brother (by his mother's first marriage to George Elliott) was Roger Elliott (c. 1655 - 15 May 1714), who became one of the first Governors of Gibraltar. Following the death of Robert Spotswood, his mother married thirdly, Reverend Dr. George Mercer, the Garrison's Schoolmaster.

Military life

On 20 May 1693, Alexander became an Ensign in the Earl of Bath's Regiment of Foot. He was commissioned in 1698, and promoted to Lieutenant-Colonel in 1703. He was appointed Quartermaster-General of the Duke of Marlborough's army the same year, and was wounded at the Battle of Blenheim the following year.

Colonial Life

In 1710, Alexander was appointed Lieutenant Governor of Virginia, under the nominal governorship of George Hamilton, 1st Earl of Orkney. He was the first to occupy the new Governors Mansion, which many citizens thought overly extravagant (its 20th-century reconstruction is now one of the principal landmarks in Colonial Williamsburg). A Tobacco Act requiring the inspection of all tobacco intended for export or for use as legal tender was passed in 1713. The next year, he founded the First Germanna Colony, and regulated trade with native Americans at another of his pet projects, Fort Christanna. In 1715, he bought 3229 acres (13 km²) at Germanna.

In 1716 he led the Knights of the Golden Horseshoe Expedition up the Rappahannock River valley and across the Blue Ridge Mountains at Swift Run Gap into the Shenandoah Valley to expedite settlement. The following year saw the foundation of the Second Germanna Colony and the Repeal of regulation of trade with native Americans. A Third Germanna Colony followed in 1719, and Germanna was made the seat of Spotsylvania County the following year.

Between 1716 and 1720, Spotswood built the Tubal Works. It had a cold blast-charcoal blast furnace which produced pig iron, and probably a finery forge. (It is the site of the 19th-century Scotts Ironworks). It operated for about 40 years and was possibly the first successful ironworks in the colonies (although Tinton Falls, NJ- late 17th century is another candidate). Pig iron from Tubal is in the collections of the Fredericksburg Area Museum and the NPS (Spotsylvania Courthouse). Tubal Works iron was exported to England by 1723.^[2] In May of the same year, Gov. Drysdale reported to the Lords of Trade that Spotswood was selling "backs and frames for Chumnies, Potts, doggs, frying, stewing, and backing panns" at auction in Williamsburg.

Around 1732 at Massaponax, Spotswood built what may have been the first purpose-built foundry in the British North American Colonies. This was a double-air furnace (usually used to make cannon) and was used to recast pig iron produced at Tubal into final shapes (kettles, andirons, firebacks, etc. and possibly cannon). Neither of Spotswood's iron operations were at Germanna. Spotswood was not, as is commonly believed, involved in the Fredericksville Furnace.^[3]

In the fall of 1718, Spotswood engaged in a clandestine expedition by privately hiring two sloops, Jane and Ranger, and a number of Royal Navy men to seek out the pirate Blackbeard (Edward Teach). On 18 November 1718, Lt. Robert Maynard sailed from Hampton, Virginia to Ocracoke Inlet, North Carolina. On 22 November 1718, Maynard and his men defeated Blackbeard and the pirates. On 24 November 1718, two days after Blackbeard's death, Spotswood issued a proclamation at the Assembly in Williamsburg offering reward for any who brought Teach and the other pirates to justice.

Spotswood worked to make a Treaty with the Iroquois through their meeting in Albany, New York during 1721. It was an attempt to end the raids between the Iroquois and Catawba that endangered settlers in the Shenandoah Valley. The Iroquois agreed to stay north of the Potomac and west of the Blue Ridge Mountains. The agreement was renewed the next year.

Spotswood completed the Governor's palace in 1722, when he was recalled from the lieutenant governorship and replaced by Hugh Drysdale. Throughout his career, Spotswood had maintained an adversarial relationship with the Virginia Council, especially its most prominent member, James Blair. As the Bishop of London's representative in the colony, the President of the College of William and Mary, and a councilman in Virginia's highest legislative body, Blair was arguably the most powerful man in the colony. He successfully orchestrated the recall of three royally appointed governors, including Alexander Spotswood. The latter entered private life with 80,000 acres (324 km²) in Spotsylvania and three iron furnaces.

Returning to London, Spotswood married Butler Brayne in 1724, but was back at the 'Enchanted Castle', Germanna, by 1729. He served as Deputy Postmaster General from 1730 to 1739, and died on 7 June 1740 at Annapolis, Maryland.

Family

In 1724, Alexander married Butler Brayne (known as Butler Brayne) in London and had four children by her:

1. John M. Spotswood (1725 - 6 May 1756), who married in 1745 Mary West Dandridge (a cousin of Martha Washington), daughter of William Dandridge, Esq., of Elson Green, King William Co., Va, a Captain in the British Navy. Colonel John Spotswood is buried in the Memorial Garden adjoining the Germanna Foundation Visitor Center. His son Brig. Gen. Alexander Spotswood of the 2nd Virginia Regiment married to Elizabeth Washington - a daughter of Augustine Washington, Jr, President George Washington's older half-brother - a niece of George Washington.
2. Anne Catherine Spotswood (1728 - c. 1802), who married Col. Bernard Moore, Esq., of Chelsea, King William Co., Va, a gentleman seventh in descent from Sir Thomas More, of Chelsea, England, the author of Utopia, and became an ancestor of Robert E. Lee ^[1] and Helen Keller.
3. Dorothea Spotswood (c. 1729 - 23 Sep 1773), who married in 1747 Col. Nathaniel West Dandridge. He was Mary Dandridge's brother and a son of William Dandridge, Esq., of Elson Green, King William Co., Va. Their daughter, Dorothea Spottswood Dandridge, married Patrick Henry, and they had 11 children. Their son, Nathaniel West Dandridge II married Sallie Watson, and their daughter Martha Hale Dandridge married her cousin William Winston Fontaine, grandson of Patrick Henry.^[4]
4. Robert Spotswood (c. 1732 - 1758), who was a subaltern officer under Washington. In 1758, while with a scouting party, he was killed near Fort du Quesne.

References

• Will PRO - PROB 1/13;
• Official Letters (ed. by R. A. Brock, 2 vol., 1882–85);
• "CARRIED ON AT A VERY GREAT EXPENSE AND NEVER PRODUCED ANY PROFIT" THE ALBEMARLE IRON WORKS (1770–72) by James H. Brothers IV (2002) unpublished MA for the Anthropology Department of The College of William and Mary.
• Biographies by Walter Havighurst (1968) and L. Dodson (1932, repr. 1969).

External links

• Memorial Foundation of the Germanna Colonies in Virginia, Inc.

Further reading

For additional information on the early US Iron Industry see American Iron 1607-1900 by Robert Gordon, The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore and London.