An attempt was made to cultivate the European grape in Virginia early in the eighteenth century on an extensive scale. Soon after taking office as governor in 1710, Alexander Spotswood brought over a colony of Germans from the Rhine and settled them in Spottsylvania County on the Rapidan river. The site of their village on this river is now marked by a ford, Germania Ford, a name which is a record of the settlement. That they grew grapes and made wine is certain, for the Governor's "red and white Rapidan, made by his Spottsylvania Germans" is several times mentioned in the published journals and letters of the time. But the venture did not make a deep nor lasting impress on the agriculture of the colony.[11]
Several early attempts were made in the Carolinas and Georgia to grow the Vinifera grape. It was thought, in particular, that the French Huguenots who settled in these states in large numbers toward the close of the seventeenth century would succeed in grape-growing but even these skilled vine-growers failed. Their failures are recorded by Alexander Hewitt in 1779 as follows: "European grapes have been transplanted, and several attempts made to raise wine; but so overshaded are the vines planted in the woods, and so foggy is the season of the year when they ripen, that they seldom come to maturity, but as excellent grapes have been raised in gardens where they are exposed to the sun, we are apt to believe that proper methods have not been taken for encouraging that branch of agriculture, considering its great importance in a national view." In Georgia, Abraham De Lyon, encouraged by the authorities of the colony, imported vines from Portugal and planted them at Savannah early in the eighteenth century but his attempt, though carried out on a small scale in a garden, soon failed.
In Maryland, if the records are correct, a greater degree of success was attained than in the states to the south. Lord Charles Baltimore, son of the grantee of the territory, in 1662 planted three hundred acres of land in St. Mary's to vines. It is certain that he made and sold wine in considerable quantities and the old chroniclers report that it was as good as the best Burgundy. Efforts to grow the European grape in Maryland continued until as late as 1828 when the _Maryland Society for Promoting the Culture of the Vine_ was incorporated by the State Legislature.[12] The object of the Society was to "carry on experiments in the cultivation of both the European and native grapes and to collect and disseminate all possible information upon this interesting subject." The organization was in existence for several years and through its exertions practically all of the native sorts were tried in or about Baltimore as well as many seedlings. Besides the achievements of the Society as a body, their Secretary reports in 1831 that, through the individual efforts of its members, there were then under cultivation near the city of Baltimore several vineyards of from three to ten acres each and a great number of smaller ones. This was several years after the introduction of the Catawba and Isabella for which grape-growers in other parts of the United States had largely given up the Vinifera sorts. Seemingly in every part of the Union the grape of the Old World was tried, not once only, but time and again before its culture could be given up.