potswood "doubted; the parliament of
England would soon forbid us that improvement, lest after that we should
go farther, and manufacture our bars into all sorts of ironware, as they
already do in New England and Pennsylvania. Nay, he questioned whether
we should be suffered to cast any iron which they can do themselves at
their furnaces."

The whole expense was computed at two pounds per ton of sow, (or pig
iron,) and it sold for five or six pounds in England, leaving a nett
profit of three pounds or more on a ton. It was estimated that a furnace
would cost seven hundred pounds. One hundred negroes were requisite, but
on good land these, besides the furnace-work, would raise corn and
provisions sufficient for themselves and the cattle. The people to be
hired were a founder, a mine-raiser, a collier, a stock-taker, a clerk,
a smith, a carpenter, a wheelwright, and some carters, these altogether
involving an annual charge of five hundred pounds.

At Massaponux, a plantation on the Rappahannock, belonging to Governor
Spotswood, he had in operation an air-furnace for casting chimney-backs,
andirons, fenders, plates for hearths, pots, mortars, rollers for
gardeners, skillets, boxes for cart-wheels. These were sold at twenty
shillings a ton and delivered at the purchaser's home, and being cast
from the sow iron were much better than the English, which were made,
for the most part, immediately from the ore.

In 1732, besides Colonel Willis, the principal person of the place,
there were at Fredericksburg only one merchant, a tailor, a blacksmith,
and an ordinary keeper.

The following advertisement is found in the "Virginia Gazette" for 1739:
"Colonel Spotswood, intending next year to leave Virginia with his
family, hereby gives notice that he shall, in April next, dispose of a
quantity of choice household furniture, together with a coach, chariot,
chaise, coach-horses, house-slaves, etc. And that the rich lands in
Orange County, which he has hitherto reserved for his own seating, he
now leases out for lives renewable till Christmas, 1775, admitting every
tenant to the choice of his tenement, according to the priority of
entry. He further gives notice that he is ready to treat with any person
of good credit for farming out, for twenty-one years, Germanna and its
contiguous lands, with the stock thereon, and some slaves. As also for
farming out, for the like term of years, an extraordinary grist-mill and
bolting-mill, latel