Unfree Labor in Virginia’s Early Nail Industry: White Prisoners, Black Enslaved Workers, and the Virginia State Penitentiary, 1800–20

After the Revolutionary War, Virginians with capital (like Thomas Jefferson, most famously) founded small naileries and smith shops to capitalize upon domestic manufacturing opportunities in the growing city of Richmond. But in 1800, firm owners suddenly found themselves in competition with the brand new Virginia State Penitentiary. The Virginia State Penitentiary aimed to morally reform prisoners through making them work to produce cheap goods for Richmond's taxpayers to buy. This paper examines how Thomas Jefferson, Kate Flood McCall (a rare woman owner of a Richmond nailry), and other Virginian nailry owners tried to remain competitive in Richmond's nail-making market, which depended on competing forms of unfree labor (white prisoner labor at the VSP and Black enslaved labor at firms). While the government of the new United States promised its citizens individual freedom to conduct business with limited government intervention, the Penitentiary’s entrance into Virginia’s nail industry calls into question the ability of private enterprise to flourish in the new Republic.