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Time Period
1623 to 1763
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The colony prospered. Tobacco—grown by indentured servants and enslaved Africans—sustained the economy. The first popularly elected legislative body in the New World was established. Following the failed Indian uprising in 1622 and on orders from London, the native peoples were “removed” and reduced in number to 3,000 by a “War of Extermination.” During the next hundred years, the remainder of Virginia’s population expanded a hundred fold. Social inequalities, however, and frontier conflicts with the French and with Indians made this distant dominion increasingly difficult to govern from London.
Time Period
1764 to 1824
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British taxation—introduced to pay for a British military presence in America—was unexpected by the Virginia gentry and resented. Those Americans began to view British policy as a plot against their liberty. They played leading roles in the Continental Congresses that debated independence, in the fighting of the American Revolution, and in the conception and implementation of a new government. Virginia also provided four of the new nation’s first five presidents. Virginia leaders advocated equality for all but they never considered extending it to women and African Americans.
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Getting the Message Out: Presidential Campaign Memorabilia from the Collection of Allen A. Frey
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Buttons and banners, ribbons and posters, coffee mugs and whiskey flasks, match books and mouse pads. For nearly 200 years, presidential candidates and their supporters have used almost every means available to attract votes.
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Great things are expected from the Virginians
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Capt. John Chilton of the 3rd Virginia Infantry described his experiences in New York and New Jersey in 1776–77 in letters home to family and friends. Located in the society's manuscripts collection, Chilton's letters offer a fascinating glimpse of one Virginian's thoughts and experiences during a pivotal time in the Revolutionary War.
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Virginia's Colonial Dynasties
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In the colonial period, portraiture proved to be a particularly useful tool in establishing and preserving family status. This exhibit presents twenty-four portraits from the Virginia Historical Society's collection. Early Virginia portraits reveal much about the families that commissioned them, as well as how these Virginians valued how they were perceived by others.