Jamestown Brides
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Jamestown brides (also known as tobacco brides) were young, single women transported from England to the Jamestown Colony of Virginia between 1620-1624 CE to be married to colonists already established there. These women were provided with dowries by the Virginia Company of London, which had funded the expedition that established Jamestown in 1607 CE. Many of the men who had traveled there afterwards had made whatever sum seemed sufficient to them and then returned to England to marry while others had died and still others had married Native American brides and gone to live with their tribes. One of the founders of the Virginia Company, Sir Edwin Sandys (pronounced Sands, l. 1561-1629 CE) established the program of sending women-as-brides in 1619 CE in order to stop men from deserting the colony and provide stability, harmony, and a sense of community and so the Jamestown Brides program was initiated.