You wrote in part: I have a question for all you well-informed, helpful individuals out there. I have come across a record in a court order book for PE County for the Jan. Court of 1770.  It references bounding out an individual, who was an apprentice, from St. Patrick's Parish.  I do happen to know that this particular family has many blacksmith's in it.  Now whether this individual was a blacksmith or not, I don't know. My question is how old might this individual, who was apparently already an apprentice, be?  Any rough ideas???  (Come on, Paul...I know you know this!) Response: Yes, I'm sure Paul will know. For those who are interested in the whole subject of indentured servants (as most of us with Virginia roots well should be), W. Preston Haynie has compiled Records of Indentured Servants and of Certificates for Land Northumberland County, Virginia 1650-1795 [Bowie, MD: Heritage Books, Inc., 1996]. In his preface, he gives much background to the system of servitude. Over 300 pages of Haynie are devoted to excerpts of court records pertaining to indentures and certificates of land for transporting people. Apparently the early indentures were determined by the county court by the age of the *servant*. Always the court order refers to the Act [of the Assembly]. I venture to say that as the act changed, so did the period of servitude, but also on determination of the court. According to these abstracts, these court records of indenture went on to as late as 1795 and perhaps longer. Most poor orphans were indentured. As the streets of the cities of England were emptied, many children seem to have come to Virginia. The county court would judge the age of the servant and then determine the length of servitude. Sometimes the master would sell the services of the servant to another, says Haynie. Haynie reminds us, Court records in themselves would not necessarily reveal that a person had been a convict. Haynie quotes Richard Hofstadter (America at 1750): Indentured servants were put to arduous field labor by owners whose goal it was to get a maximum yield of labor in the four or five years contrcted for. The chief temptation to the master was to drive the servant beyond his powers in the effort to get as much as possible out of him during limited years of service. As one reads Haynie and other compilers of similar records, one learns that if a woman produced a bastard, her servitude was extended or in some cases she would receive lashes. Here's an excerpt from one dated * 21 July 1686: Whereas Christian Rich, servt to Mr Anthony Lynton, hath had a base child by a negroe in ye time of her service, it's ordered yt she serve her sd master for her said Default according to act & that ye sherr: take her into Custody and give her twenty stripes on her bare back untill ye blood come. OB [Order book] 1678-98, Part 1, 348. [On the same page of the Order Book is an entry stating that Christian Rich escaped before she received her punishment.]* As tobacco increased in value, of course, barrels [hogsheads] were needed to ship the tobacco. Coopers were needed. Blacksmiths and their apprentices were needed for all kinds of manufacture. So there was a need for skilled craftsmen, and those indentures/apprenticeships may have been different. Cordwainers made shoes, tailors (many apprenticeships for tailors) were needed to make clothing, etc. However, England controlled how much manufactury could be done in this country. This whole topic is a subject of many books, although the language in the title is sometimes couched so that one cannot tell the contents of the book. I believe Daniel Boorstein, formerly Librarian at the Library of Congress, has written such a book. However, there is nothing like reading the court order books (of any colony or state) themselves to learn the customs of the particular time. As an aside: In Pennsylvania, in the 1750s, my PA German was apprenticed to a sadler as a result of being an orphan; he chose the sadler himself, as he was over age 14. According to tradition, he ran away from the sadler in or around Berks Co., PA and joined with others in the New River Country (VA & NC), where he is said to have met Daniel Boone. Thereafter, until Boone went his own way, my ancestor was his sidekick, according to the Draper Mss. My ancestor seemed to settle down and acquire land in Kentucky, whereas Boone's land claims seemed to be null and void--or else, he just liked to keep wandering--to Missouri. Happy hunting! I hope you learn more about your apprentice. E.W.Wallace E.W.Wallace I believe each case is different.