Thomas/ine Hall was born in England around 1603/1604, and raised as a girl in Newcastle. As an adult, Hall presented variously, serving in the British military as a man in the 1627 Siege of Saint-Martin-de-Ré in France. Hall then returned to their homeland and worked as a woman bone lacemaker in Plymouth. 

Hall left for the then-new colony of Virginia, settling near Jamestown. They worked as a servant and initially presented as a man, but their employer at times also declared that they were a woman. 

Hall was said to have engaged sexually with a servant named Great Besse. Suspicions arose about their identity and body. When questioned by one local, Hall said they they were both a man and a woman. Women and men alike in the community forcibly examined Hall’s genitals, with varying conclusions as to if they were a man or a woman. 

The issue of Hall’s gender was taken to court, where community members testified as to Hall’s "true nature." The court ordered ordered that Hall “shall goe Clothed in mans apparell, only his head to bee attired in a Coyfe and Croscloth wth an Apron before him,” and that their nature, neither male nor female, be published locally. 

As part of his final project following his participation in the Freeman Fellows Program at the College of William & Mary, Aubrey recreated this apparel using clothing from the theatre department’s colonial-era recreations. He wore them for a site-specific piece in old Jamestown. While the building of Thomas/ine’s trial is no longer standing, he went to the rebuilt church near the site of the original.