[3] In 1635, Warner may have completed the terms of his indenture, and definitely made his first land acquisition, patenting 250 acres (1 million m2) in New Poquoson in Elizabeth City County.

[3] Beginning in 1654, Warner used the land patents he acquired by paying for English people to emigrate to the booming Virginia colony to acquire land across the York River in Gloucester County (previously reserved for Native Americans, but released pursuant to a treaty negotiated by Governor William Berkeley during the Anglo-Powhatan Wars and formed from York County in 1651).

[4] Warner initially settled on the Pianketank Creek on land once held by Chiskiack people (members of the Powhatan Confederacy), but later moved to the new county's Severn River area.

Continuing an upper-class pattern of 17th-century success in colonial Virginia as a merchant, landowner, and politician, Warner rose through the class hierarchy.

[8] In 1672, when the Virginia General Assembly decided to build a bridge across Dragon Run, Lt. Col. John Carter II and Robert Beckingham of Lancaster County met at Warner's home to finalize contracts.

The younger Austin Warner had received an English education in London and at Cambridge University, and during this man's life by 1666 had emulated his father's political career path by winning election to the House of Burgesses.