1770 Virginia Tobacco Trade Account – Seventeen Hogsheads Sold at Auction in Demerara
An exceptional original colonial-era mercantile manuscript documenting seventeen hogsheads of Virginia tobacco sold at public auction in Demerara, dated December 28, 1770.
The document is prominently headed:
“Demerara Dec. 28th 1770—Account of 17 Hhds. Virginia Tobacco Sold at Vendue.”
In 18th-century commercial terminology, “hhd.” represented a hogshead—the large wooden cask customarily used for packing and exporting tobacco—while “vendue” meant a public auction.
The sheet records the tobacco by numbered hogshead, with weights, deductions, net calculations and the names of purchasers or commercial recipients. Names appearing in the account include Albernas or Albernus, Chambers, Sandheuvel, Overbrook, Culpeper, Daley and Macrae. The calculations appear to represent more than 11,000 pounds of Virginia tobacco.
The reverse contains additional accounts headed “Account of 6 Hhds. Virginia Tobacco,” together with further calculations and a separate accounting of tobacco sold at vendue to various purchasers.
Demerara, now part of the nation of Guyana, was a Dutch colony on the northern coast of South America in 1770. Its plantations and Atlantic ports participated in a far-reaching commercial system linking Europe, North America, the Caribbean and South America. This manuscript demonstrates that Virginia tobacco was being exported and auctioned within that international market several years before the American Revolution.
Tobacco was colonial Virginia’s dominant export commodity and played an enormous role in Atlantic commerce. Its cultivation also depended heavily upon the labor of enslaved Africans and African Americans. This document is therefore a significant primary source for the study of colonial Virginia, plantation agriculture, maritime commerce and the broader Atlantic economy.
Date: December 28, 1770
Place: Demerara, now Guyana
Commodity: Virginia tobacco
Quantity: Seventeen hogsheads in the principal account, with an additional six-hogshead account on the reverse
Transaction: Sold at public auction or “vendue”
Condition: Good for a working commercial manuscript more than 250 years old. Original folds, general toning, scattered stains, ink offsets, handling wear and minor edge losses. Writing remains largely dark and legible on both sides. The numerous contemporary calculations and corrections are evidence of its active use as a mercantile account.
A remarkably detailed artifact of the colonial Virginia tobacco trade and the 18th-century Atlantic economy.
An exceptional original colonial-era mercantile manuscript documenting seventeen hogsheads of Virginia tobacco sold at public auction in Demerara, dated December 28, 1770.
The document is prominently headed:
“Demerara Dec. 28th 1770—Account of 17 Hhds. Virginia Tobacco Sold at Vendue.”
In 18th-century commercial terminology, “hhd.” represented a hogshead—the large wooden cask customarily used for packing and exporting tobacco—while “vendue” meant a public auction.
The sheet records the tobacco by numbered hogshead, with weights, deductions, net calculations and the names of purchasers or commercial recipients. Names appearing in the account include Albernas or Albernus, Chambers, Sandheuvel, Overbrook, Culpeper, Daley and Macrae. The calculations appear to represent more than 11,000 pounds of Virginia tobacco.
The reverse contains additional accounts headed “Account of 6 Hhds. Virginia Tobacco,” together with further calculations and a separate accounting of tobacco sold at vendue to various purchasers.
Demerara, now part of the nation of Guyana, was a Dutch colony on the northern coast of South America in 1770. Its plantations and Atlantic ports participated in a far-reaching commercial system linking Europe, North America, the Caribbean and South America. This manuscript demonstrates that Virginia tobacco was being exported and auctioned within that international market several years before the American Revolution.
Tobacco was colonial Virginia’s dominant export commodity and played an enormous role in Atlantic commerce. Its cultivation also depended heavily upon the labor of enslaved Africans and African Americans. This document is therefore a significant primary source for the study of colonial Virginia, plantation agriculture, maritime commerce and the broader Atlantic economy.
Date: December 28, 1770
Place: Demerara, now Guyana
Commodity: Virginia tobacco
Quantity: Seventeen hogsheads in the principal account, with an additional six-hogshead account on the reverse
Transaction: Sold at public auction or “vendue”
Condition: Good for a working commercial manuscript more than 250 years old. Original folds, general toning, scattered stains, ink offsets, handling wear and minor edge losses. Writing remains largely dark and legible on both sides. The numerous contemporary calculations and corrections are evidence of its active use as a mercantile account.
A remarkably detailed artifact of the colonial Virginia tobacco trade and the 18th-century Atlantic economy.
