Dolphin, it appeared, belonged to James Underwood, who had a considerable estate in Norfolk County; in 1662, an attachment was laid against his property because his vessel had on three different occasions taken in tobacco in Virginia without obtaining a license to trade or paying the duties laid down in Acts of Assembly.[1] A few years before, the ship of a prominent merchant of Boston had been seized with its cargo of goods at Nominy by the collector of the district on the ground of having violated the law.[2]
In the interval between 1656 and 1664, there were recorded a number of powers of attorney from merchants in New England, including among many others such men as John Saffin, Timothy Prout, and John Giffard of Boston, William Payne of Ipswich, William Browne of Salem, and John Holland of Dorchester.[3] A duty of ten shillings had, previous to 1665, been imposed upon every hogshead exported from Virginia to New England, but in this year, the Assembly having reason to believe that this tax diverted from the Colony an important part of the trade of the Northern provinces, repealed it, thus placing all ships from that quarter upon the same footing as the vessels arriving from England.[4]
As soon as hostilities broke out between England and Holland in 1672, the ships employed in the trade with New England were in special danger, since, being princi-
- ↑ Records of Lower Norfolk County, original vol. 1656-1666, p. 350.
- ↑ Neill’s Virginia Carolorum, Appx., 418.
- ↑ See Records of Northampton and Rappahannock Counties. Saffin was very actively engaged in the trade between New England and Virginia, either on his own account or as the agent of others. See Records of Rappahannock County, vol. 1668-1672, p. 117, Va. State Library, for an instance in which he was the representative of John Pinchon of New England.
- ↑ Hening’s Statutes, vol. II, p. 218.
