<P> The History of Virginia begins with documentation by the first Spanish explorers to reach the area in the 1500s , when it was occupied chiefly by Algonquian , Iroquoian , and Siouan peoples . After a failed English attempt to settle Virginia in the 1580s by Walter Raleigh , permanent English settlement began in Virginia with Jamestown , Virginia , in 1607 . The Virginia Company colony was looking for gold but failed and the colonists could barely feed themselves . The famine during the harsh winter of 1609 forced the colonists to eat leather from their clothes and boots and resort to cannibalism . The colony nearly failed until tobacco emerged as a profitable export . It was grown on plantations , using primarily indentured servants for the intensive hand labor involved . After 1662 , the colony turned black slavery into a hereditary racial caste . By 1750 , the primary cultivators of the cash crop were West African slaves . While the plantations thrived because of the high demand for tobacco , most white settlers raised their families on subsistence farms . Warfare with the Virginia Indian nations had been a factor in the 17th century ; after 1700 there was continued conflict with natives east of the Alleghenies , especially in the French and Indian War ( 1754 - 1763 ) , when the tribes were allied with the French . The westernmost counties including Wise and Washington only became safe with the death of Bob Benge in 1794 . </P>
<P> The History of Virginia begins with documentation by the first Spanish explorers to reach the area in the 1500s , when it was occupied chiefly by Algonquian , Iroquoian , and Siouan peoples . After a failed English attempt to settle Virginia in the 1580s by Walter Raleigh , permanent English settlement began in Virginia with Jamestown , Virginia , in 1607 . The Virginia Company colony was looking for gold but failed and the colonists could barely feed themselves . The famine during the harsh winter of 1609 forced the colonists to eat leather from their clothes and boots and resort to cannibalism . The colony nearly failed until tobacco emerged as a profitable export . It was grown on plantations , using primarily indentured servants for the intensive hand labor involved . After 1662 , the colony turned black slavery into a hereditary racial caste . By 1750 , the primary cultivators of the cash crop were West African slaves . While the plantations thrived because of the high demand for tobacco , most white settlers raised their families on subsistence farms . Warfare with the Virginia Indian nations had been a factor in the 17th century ; after 1700 there was continued conflict with natives east of the Alleghenies , especially in the French and Indian War ( 1754 - 1763 ) , when the tribes were allied with the French . The westernmost counties including Wise and Washington only became safe with the death of Bob Benge in 1794 . </P>
where was the first post explorer settlement located in virginia
where was the first post explorer settlement located in virginia
Jamestown
Jamestown