01/24/2007

Jamestown – 400
The seeds are sown
By Tom Range, Sr.

The year 1607 marks the establishment of the first successful colony of English origins on the North American continent.  As compared to the Spanish, the subjects of England's King James I, for whom the colony Jamestown was named, were late arrivals along the Atlantic seaboard.  King Philip II's Spain had established St. Augustine, Florida in 1565 and had, since Columbus's time, been exploiting the natives of the New World.  Treasure ships filled with precious metals had been making the trans-Atlantic voyage since the early 1500s, falling prey to English privateers during periods of war between the two empires.

A failed attempt at settlement by the English occurred in 1586 with Sir Walter Raleigh's colony at Roanoke Island in the region named by the explorer "Virginia," in honor of Elizabeth I, the "virgin queen."  Roanoke Island is now a part of the state of North Carolina.  A provisioning ship arriving in 1590 sought the colony of English men and women that had been established four years before.  The colonists had disappeared, leaving only a message "CROATOAN" carved on a post that had been part of the colony's fort.  There was a Croatoan Island near Roanoke, inhabited by friendly Indians ruled by a chief named Manteo.  One theory explaining the disappearance of the colony is that the white English were absorbed into Manteo's tribe.  Unlike the 1607 expedition that founded Jamestown, the Roanoke Island colony included women.  On August 18, 1587, Eleanor Dare, the daughter of the colony's governor and wife of the colonist Ananias Dare, gave birth to a daughter.  The infant was christened Virginia in recognition of the child being the first Christian born in Virginia.

The defeat of the Spanish Armada in 1588 had given England new stature in the world order, greater safety on the seas, and a desire to expand its influence in the New World.  A private venture was formed in London on April 10, 1606 by the sale of what effectively were shares of stock.  The venture named the Virginia Company leased ships, enrolled settlers and provisioned their three leased ships named the Susan Constant (measuring 79 feet at the waterline), the Godspeed (50 feet) and the Discovery (39 feet).  The flotilla commanded by Captain Christopher Newport sailed from London on December 20, 1606.  The 104 settlers and 40 seamen on board survived the five-month voyage to land on the Virginia shore on May 13, 1607.  The site chosen for the settlement, about fifty miles from the coast, was a peninsula jutting into the James River with a narrow land bridge to the riverbank.

Mindful of the uncertain fate of the Roanoke Island colony, the first chore, as described by colonist George Percy, was to "set to work about the fortification, some others some to watch and ward as it was convenient."  Another colonist William Strachey reported that the fortification conformed to the topography of the peninsula upon which it was constructed by being "cast almost into the form of a triangle, and so palisaded."  At each end of the three angles, log bastions were constructed to further fortify the position.

About one third of the settlers were "gentlemen," and included a handful of men with military experience like Captain John Smith.  There were represented a dozen skilled craftsmen and artisans, a blacksmith, a mason, two bricklayers, four carpenters, a tailor, two barbers and a surgeon.  The rest of the company was made up of unskilled workers including common seamen, laborers and boys.  The profit motive drove them all, the shareholders expecting a return on their investment, the settlers the hope of discovering and sharing in the supposed riches of the New World.  A crop of wheat was sown.

The 20 years between the disappearance of the Roanoke Island colony with its cryptic "Croatoan" message and the establishment of Jamestown were spent by the British crown in consolidating its position in Europe by building up its naval forces to combat both Spain and France.  Further colonization efforts of the New World had to wait.  But the emergence of England as the major colonial power in North America began with Jamestown in 1607. 



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