Page 127 - The Ancestry of Francis Bryan (1770-1863)

PART C: THE BINDING OF ORPHANS FOR APPRENTICESHIP
It was a common practice in Virginia in the 18th Century to bind children who had become orphaned to another family. Children were considered orphaned if the father died, even if the mother was living. Adoption was not common, even if both parents died. Sometimes children did go to live with relatives and were assimilated into the new family as a family member. I have not seen evidence of many legal adoptions.
Children of wealthy families were assigned guardians and usually continued to live with their mother and siblings on the family estate. Children of more modest means were usually apprenticed, or bound, to a family, after they reached a certain age. Technically the apprenticeship was a form of indentured servitude. From what I have read, it was rarely a form of punishment for a child, but closer to sending a child off to boarding school.
The apprenticeship ensured that the child would be raised with a male head of household. The child would be educated and learn a trade and would work for room and board. It was not uncommon for a boy, over the age of 13 to 14 years, to request to be bound out in order to learn a trade. Francis Bryan himself was bound out to Thomas Blair and learned the trade of running a forge. It does not appear that he ever continued in that trade, becoming a farmer, instead.
The following is an excerpt from a transcript of a talk, "What Genealogists should know about 18th Century Virginia Law" presented November 17, 1999 at the Library of Virginia by Mr. John P. Alcock, President, Friends of the Virginia State Archives. The full text can be found at http:// freepages.rootsweb.com/~jcat2/genealogy/18centvalaw.html
A child whose father had died was an orphan in that era, even if her mother was living. The father in his will could name a guardian or guardians for his infant children (infant was the legal term for under age) to manage their estates and arrange for their education. If he did not do so or if he died intestate, the court could name the guardian unless the child was 14 or older, in which case he or she could choose one. However, "where the estate of the orphan be so small value that no person will educate and maintain him for the profits thereof, such orphan shall be bound apprentice, every male to some tradesman, merchant, mariner, or other person approved by the court until the age of 21." Females were similarly bound but to age 18. The master or mistress of every servant was to provide "diet, clothes, lodgings and accommodations and teach him to read and write and at the expiration of his apprenticeship to give him the same allowance appointed for servants of indenture”.
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