WI:Virginia does not plant tobacco

What is the impact on Virginia and the rest of OTL United States if John Rolfe never plants any tobacco in Jamestown?
 

Riain

Banned
Virginia needed a cash crop to make it worthwhile to invest in the colony. It's like asking about Australia without wool.
 

Pangur

Donor
Virginia needed a cash crop to make it worthwhile to invest in the colony. It's like asking about Australia without wool.

When I posted the OP I had not even considered the possibility of making a colony either fail or not even happen.
 

GeographyDude

Gone Fishin'
okay, so the initial handful of English colonies would be more about self-sufficiency and religious freedom.

And if you really want to run the table, it gives English and Native Americans more time to get used to each other and gives the natives more time to get used to imported diseases. Furthermore, less need for indentured servants. Part of this we need to see if tobacco is a particularly labor-intensive crop. If it slows down indentured servitude, there's less need and it's less 'economical' to move to full-time slaves. Might decide not to go in this direction.
 
okay, so the initial handful of English colonies would be more about self-sufficiency and religious freedom.

And if you really want to run the table, it gives English and Native Americans more time to get used to each other and gives the natives more time to get used to imported diseases. Furthermore, less need for indentured servants. Part of this we need to see if tobacco is a particularly labor-intensive crop. If it slows down indentured servitude, there's less need and it's less 'economical' to move to full-time slaves. Might decide not to go in this direction.

Depends there are still other things that could be grown there like rice or indigo which could be enough to justify invesment those are more for colonies like South Carolina but i think they could be grown in Virgina not to sure. Large amounts of labor are required for those crops as well.

The natives were still dying off from diseases introduced into the 1850s so even with more time they will still have problems with disease. Also settlers will still move there because it is easy to get almost free land by just moving west and establishing a homestead.
 

birdboy2000

Banned
Probably no more Virginia. Too high a death rate from malaria and war, not enough opportunity to make it worth the risk. The early colonists dropped like flies and I'd think it probable the Virginia Company packs it up or goes bankrupt instead of sending ten more years shipping Englishmen to their deaths.
 
Top