Peninsula Enterprise, January 3, 1891

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Sea -- Shellfish - Oystering : BaysideSea -- Shellfish - Oystering : LegislationWatermen -- Watermen's organizations

A meeting of the Oyster Planters Association, held at Mearsville, December 30th, 1890, presided over by Capt. Wm. J. Somers, was well attended. The members were practically unanimous on the opinion that a "cull law" should be enacted by he Legislature, prohibiting the taking of small oysters from their beds.

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Sea -- Shellfish - Oystering : BaysideSea -- Shellfish - Oystering : Law enforcement

John Taylor and John Kilmon, tried at present term of county court for felonious dredging in Pocomoke sound, were convicted and sentenced each to one hour in jail and to pay a fine of $10 and costs of prosecution. They paid their fines and costs of prosecution, served their terms in jail and were discharged.

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Forests -- Shipping : Water

Mr. Thomas W. Taylor recently lost a raft of timber, which was being towed from Pungoteague to Onancock creek, valued at several hundred dollars.

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Farmers -- Farmers' organizations

The farmers of Mearsville and vicinity, will meet tonight, January 3d., in school house, at that place for the purpose of organizing a sub Alliance. The public generally is invited to be in attendance.

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Architecture -- Jails

The cells of county jail are being placed in position by the agent of contractors furnishing them.

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Moral -- Murder

Samuel Lewis, tried at this term of court for the murder of Geo. A. Twyford, was convicted of murder in the second degree, the term of his imprisonment in penitentiary being fixed by jury at ten years. A new trial has been granted him.

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Disease

In the last ten days, four of the six children of Mr. Samuel Brimer, living near Oak Hall, this county, have died of typhoid fever and another one of them is quite ill with the disease and not expected to recover. Two of them, William and Samuel Brimer, were 22 and 20 years old respectively, one was a child 6 years old and the other victim was Mrs. Lloyd Thomas, their sister. Two of them died one night and were buried the following day.

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Infrastructure -- Commercial - Residential constructionInfrastructure -- Commercial - Hotels

Belle Haven.

Mr. A. N. H. Mapp has moved to our town and occupies new dwelling of Mr. John R. Floyd, on Fitz Lee St.

Mr. G. L. Doughty has moved into the Kellam hotel, and in his present elegant quarters, it is safe to assert, there will be no better country hotel in Virginia. He was offered recently the management of hotel at Waynesboro, Va., at a good round figure.

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Sea -- Shellfish - Oystering : SeasideSea -- Shellfish - Oystering : PricesSea -- Fish factoriesTourists and sportsmen -- Other recreation - HolidaysLaborers -- FisheriesLaborers -- WagesTransportation -- Water - SteamboatsAfrican-Americans -- Other

Chincoteague.

Our shippers are sending to market daily from 300 to 400 bushels of oysters and primes are selling at $4.50 per barrel, culls $3.50.

Mr. Leander Wilcox of Mystic, Connecticut, spent several days here with us last week and organized while here a stock company, to re-open his fish factory. The work of rebuilding will commence in a few days.

Some eight or ten boats from Norfolk are being loaded in our channel with oysters.

The pleasures that prosperity brings made this Christmas a very delightful one to most of our people. Church entertainments, midnight watch meetings, sociables, weddings, sleighing, &c., contributed "to the feast of reason," and none of the delicacies were wanting which "the inner man" required. The scatterers and the gatherers in of the "filthy lucre" each had the pleasures which it brings. Our merchants say, that their Christmas sales were the largest in the history of the Island, and that such was the case, was a matter of surprise to no one, for in addition to the various sources through which money is obtained here, some 300 oystermen had returned home after an absence of four months with the receipts of their labor during that time of $2 to $3 daily.

Our new steamer arrived here last Monday. She is an elegant craft, but drawing too much water for our bay, does not give the satisfaction anticipated.

Wilson Branson, colored, died on the 25th ult., aged 80 years. His father was one of the first negroes that moved to the Island, and the first owner of real estate here of his race.

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Farmers -- Farmers' organizationsInfrastructure -- Commercial - Real estate

Leemont.

Out townsman, Mr. D. F. White, an officer of the Farmers' Alliance, instituted a lodge of that Order at Mappsville, last Saturday, with a membership of nineteen.

Mr. Parker W. Parks has sold a portion of the Blackstone farm to Geo. A. and Edward M. Colonna for the sum of $2,245.

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Infrastructure -- Commercial - Real estateMigrationMoral -- Other violent crimeMoral -- Firearms

Parksley.

Mr. E. C. Pate has purchased two lots here of Mr. Samuel T. Jones and proposes to build a handsome dwelling thereon in the Spring.

Capt. I. T. Johnson and Mr. A. F. Barnes moved their families from Leemont to Parksley during Xmas, and are now citizens of our town.

A party of noisy young men going home from a Sunday school entertainment at Crowsontown, last Tuesday night, was fired upon while passing a certain dwelling, the occupants of which had been annoyed several times of late by unbecoming and indecent language, and five of them shot, but none seriously.

John O. Taylor, 14 years of age, son of Mr. A. J. Taylor, Masonville had the index finger of his left hand shot off accidentally here last Wednesday. An unloaded gun as usual was discharged down the barrel of which he had pushed the finger thoughtlessly.

Our Oyster Beds.

reprinted from Richmond Dispatch, December 21.Sea -- Shellfish - Oystering : LegislationSea -- Shellfish - Oystering : Planting

How to Make Them Yield More Abundantly.

I saw in the columns of your paper not long since a letter from President Lyon G. Tyler, of William and Mary College, in which he suggested that the State give to that college 10,000 acres of ground under salt water to enable them to ascertain for the State and oystermen the best methods to increase the supply of oysters, and to establish a chair of biology in the college at Williamsburg. I ask for some space in your valuable paper to place before the people of the State what I consider the best for this, now nearly dead, interest of the State. We must first look back and see what our experience had been and what we can learn from it and that of others. Some thirty years ago the oyster fundum was brought to the attention of the people above salt water Virginia as a subject for taxation, which made it a matter of financial interest to those not directly interested, and just after the close of the war in 1865 the legislature levied a tax on this industry, expecting to derive an enormous revenue from it --enough to pay the State debt. This effort was commenced at the most favorable period -- just after the war, when the beds had had five years' rest and were covered with fine oysters. Oysters were therefore abundant, the prices good, because at that time the Chesapeake bay furnished nine tenths of all the oysters in the markets of the United States. The people north and east of Sandy Hook had not learned to proagate and grow them as they are now doing. Under those conditions, with a fleet of steamer vessels to execute the law, some money was collected and paid into the Treasury -- about $100,000 in six years. But the most part of it was paid during the first part of that period. The last year nothing was paid. Then it was that the State sold the oyster navy at a sacrifice after six years of trial to get money from oyster beds. This was in the year 1874. In 1883 the Legislature put on another fleet to raise revenue and protect the oyster interest. We have had, therefore, a second trial of six years to obtain revenue from the oyster fundum. The results are that no revenue has been collected. It is doubtful, in fact, if the navy has been self-sustaining, and the oyster-beds are depleted.

OUR SYSTEM.

To sum up, the State has had twenty-five years' experience raising revenue and protecting the oyster-beds of the State, and both have been a decided failure. The oyster interest has dwindled in Virginia until it is almost worthless. The people of the North, principally on Long Island sound, who bought all their seed-oysters from us twenty years ago, have learned to grow and cultivate them, until they have more oysters than Virginia. And this state of affairs is likely to continue and grow worse for us unless an intelligent remedy is applied. What shall it be? The progressive and experienced oystermen have watched the development of the oyster ground elsewhere; they know the results -- the work is easily done -- and they are anxious to do it. Now, what stops them? The laws on the State. Nothing else. The law allows a precarious title of bottom to any one who desires to plant oysters by applying to an inspector and paying the tax on the same. He is allowed to hold the grounds for the purpose of planting oysters. The lessee of these grounds, under this the only title the State grants, plants seed oysters at an expense of from $50 to $100 per acre. Nothing is said while all this is going on. The planter holds this title from the State -- a right that has been duly assigned him by qualified officers of the State to whom he paid the price. All goes well until the expenditure is made and the crop grown.

THE OYSTER ANARCHIST.

Then the oyster anarchist in the business claims that at one time a natural oyster-bed existed on the ground so planted. Whether this be true or not, the State renders all aid in her power to deprive the planter of the right she granted him and for which he paid his money. Last week the third trial of the Commonwealth against Rowe occupied the Court in Gloucester county, with the legal talent of that county and Middlesex engaged in the case. Rowe had planted about 15,000 bushels of oyster shells to form a base of an oyster-bed at an expense of $700, besides the price charged by the State. He has now to fight the State to hold what she previously granted him, and after two trials a hung jury was the result -- eleven jurors for Rowe and one negro juror opposed. He may now hold his ground awhile longer, fight it through the courts and finally lose it, at a greater expense, and his outlay for it will not pay to remove the shells. Oyster culture is by such means practically forbidden in Virginia. This will be a lesson for the next oysterman who wants to plant, cultivate and grow them. Hence the oyster industry is fast dwindling. The natural beds are nearly exhausted and the cultivation is forbidden by the laws of the State. Now for the remedy, I suggest to give to the practical and intelligent oystermen an opportunity to grow oysters. How? Mark off, stake out, survey, and record the plats of the natural oyster beds in the respective counties in which they are located (here will be some work for the oyster navy), then grant to oystermen the bare grounds under the water at the same price and on the same terms that all the other lands of the Commonwealth have been granted.

THE "OYSTER CHAIRS."

The oyster interest cannot wait and live until the subject is understood by the colleges. There is no necessity, in my judgement, for any delay. The people know what to do; they only want an opportunity to put their knowledge into practice. I do not object to a grant of 10,000 acres of bare grounds (the State grants nothing else) to William and Mary College to be used as an experiment ground and to endow a chair of Biology as suggested by Mr. Tyler. I favor it because the probabilities are we would derive some scientific knowledge from the work, for oyster culture, like everything else of value, at this time must be progressive; and no doubt trained thinkers at work on this subject would learn faster than practical oyster people and teach them in the future. Just now, however, the oystermen know how to start the work and carry it to success. It is only in the future, when new conditions may arise and we need more knowledge that we will look to William and Mary. But at this time we want an undisturbed right to the bottom to make oyster-beds, and not college talk. It is opportune now to sow the seed that the harvest may come; and though some of the ground may be as variable as that described in the Bible but when we do sow on good ground and the harvest is ready we do not want the State to say that others shall gather it. The talk about deriving an income by taxing oysters had as well stop; it is a complete failure. Twenty-five years say so, and that ought to satisfy any one. The question is now to build up Saltwater Virginia by allowing her people freedom of action -- and they will do it if the State will give us her right, as she did the lands above the water, and stand aside.

Yours respectfully, ORRIS A. BROWNE.

Annual Meeting of The Mutual Fire Insurance Company.

Infrastructure -- Commercial - Insurance companies

The first annual meeting of the members of The Mutual Fire Insurance Company, of Eastern Virginia, will be held on the 7th of January, 1891 at 1 o'clock, p.m., at Accomac C. H., for the election of three managers for the company, to hold office for three years. All members should attend.

Thos. B. Quinby, Sec'y.

Church Dedication.

The Sykes' Island Methodist Episcopal Church, South, will be dedicated Sunday, January 18th, 1891 at 11 o'clock a.m., by Rev. George H. Ray, a former Presiding Elder of the Eastern Shore District.

Bro. Ray will also address the Sykes' Island Sunday school at 3 o'clock, p.m., of the same day, and preach again 7.30, p.m.

Former pastors of the Atlantic charge are cordially invited to be present and participate in the dedication exercises.

The public are also earnestly invited to attend, and we can certainly bespeak them a good sermon from Bro. Ray and a large share of the hospitality of our good people of the Island, whose generosity and hospitality are still in keeping with their old time reputation.

Jno. S. Wallace pastor.