England in America, 1580-1652 Part 4

[Footnote 12: Strachey, _Travaile into Virginia_, 162-180; Brown, _Genesis of the United States_, I., 190-194.]

[Footnote 13: Neill, _Virginia Company_, 4-8.]

[Footnote 14: Ibid., 8-14.]

[Footnote 15: Purchas, _Pilgrimes_, II., 1365.]

[Footnote 16: On the American Indians, Farrand, _Basis of American History_, chaps, vi.-xiv.]

[Footnote 17: For accounts of aboriginal Virginia, see Strachey, _Travaile into Virginia_; Spelman, in Brown, _Genesis of the United States_, I., 483-488; Smith, _Works_ (Arber's ed.), 47-84.]

[Footnote 18: Smith, _Works_ (Arber's ed.), 400.]

[Footnote 19: Cases of rescue and adoption are numerous. See the case of Conture, in Parkman, _Jesuits_, 223; Fiske, _Old Virginia and Her Neighbors_, I., 113.]

[Footnote 20: Smith, _Works_ (Arber's ed.), 436.]

[Footnote 21: Percy, _Discourse_, in Smith, _Works_ (Arber's ed.), lvii.-lxx.]

[Footnote 22: Percy, _Discourse_, in Smith, _Works_ (Arber's ed.), lxx.]

[Footnote 23: _Breife Declaration_, in Virginia State Senate _Doc.u.ment_, 1874.]

[Footnote 24: Percy, _Discourse_, in Smith, _Works_ (Arber's ed.), lxxiii.]

[Footnote 25: Wingfield, _Discourse_, in Smith, _Works_ (Arber's ed.), lxxiv.-xci.]

[Footnote 26: Wingfield, _Discourse_, in Smith, _Works_ (Arber's ed.), lx.x.xvi.]

[Footnote 27: Brown, _Genesis of the United States_, I., 175.]

[Footnote 28: Wingfield, _Discourse_, in Smith, _Works_ (Arber's ed.), lx.x.xvii.]

[Footnote 29: _Breife Declaration_.]

[Footnote 30: Smith, _Works_ (Arber's ed.), 104.]

[Footnote 31: _Breife Declaration_.]

[Footnote 32: Smith, _Works_ (Arber's ed.), 109-120.]

CHAPTER IV

GLOOM IN VIRGINIA

(1608-1617)

When Newport arrived with the "Second Supply," September 29, 1608, he brought little relief. His seventy pa.s.sengers, added to the number that survived the summer, raised the population at Jamestown to about one hundred and twenty. Among the new-comers were Richard Waldo, Peter Wynne (both added to the council), Francis West, a brother of Lord Delaware; eight Poles and Germans, sent over to begin the making of pitch and soap ashes; a gentlewoman, Mrs. Forrest, and her maid, Anne Burras, who were the first of their s.e.x to settle at Jamestown. About two months later there was a marriage in the church at Jamestown between John Laydon and Anne Burras,[1] and a year later was born Virginia Laydon, the first white child in the colony.[2]

The instructions brought by Newport expressed the dissatisfaction of the council with the paltry returns made to the company for their outlay, and required President Smith to aid Newport to do three things[3]--viz., crown Powhatan; discover a gold-mine and a pa.s.sage to the South Sea; and find Raleigh's lost colony. Smith tells us that he was wholly opposed to all these projects, but submitted as best he might.

The coronation of Powhatan was a formality borrowed from Sir Walter Raleigh's peerage for Manteo, and duly took place at Werowocomoco.

Powhatan was presented with a basin, ewer, bed, bed-cover, and a scarlet cloak, but showed great unwillingness to kneel to receive the crown. At last three of the party, by bearing hard upon his shoulders, got him to stoop a little, and while he was in that position they clapped it upon his head. Powhatan innocently turned the whole proceeding into ridicule by taking his old shoes and cloak of racc.o.o.n skin and giving them to Newport.

To seek gold-mines and the South Sea, Newport, taking all the strong and healthy men at the fort, visited the country of the Monacans beyond the falls of the James. In this march they discovered the vein of gold that runs through the present counties of Louisa, Goochland, Fluvanna, and Buckingham; but as the ore was not easily extracted from the quartz they returned to Jamestown tired and disheartened. The search for Raleigh's lost colony was undertaken with much less expense--several small parties were sent southward but learned nothing important.

In December, 1608, Newport returned to England, taking with him a cargo of pitch, tar, iron ore, and other articles provided at great labor by the overworked colonists. Smith availed himself of the opportunity to send by Newport an account of his summer explorations, a map of Chesapeake Bay and tributary rivers, and a letter in answer to the complaints signified to him in the instructions of the home council. Smith's reply was querulous and insubordinate, and spiteful enough against Ratcliffe, Archer, and Newport, but contained many sound truths. He ridiculed the policy of the company, and told them that "it were better to give 500 a ton for pitch, tar, and the like in the settled countries of Russia, Sweden, and Denmark than send for them hither till more necessary things be provided"; "for," said he, "in overtaxing our weake and unskillful bodies, to satisfie this desire of present profit, we can scarce ever recover ourselves from one supply to another." Ratcliffe returned to England with Newport, after whose departure Smith was a.s.sisted for a short time by a council consisting of Matthew Scrivener, Richard Waldo, and Peter Wynne. The two former were drowned during January, 1609, and the last died not long after. Smith was left sole ruler, and, contrary to the intention of the king, he made no attempt to fill the council.[4]

The "Second Supply" had brought provisions, which lasted only two months,[5] and most of Smith's time during the winter 1608-1609 was occupied in trading for corn with the Indians on York River. In the spring much useful work was done by the colonists under Smith's directions. They dug a well for water, which till then had been obtained from the river, erected some twenty cabins, s.h.i.+ngled the church, cleared and planted forty acres of land with Indian-corn, built a house for the Poles to make gla.s.s in, and erected two block-houses.

Smith started to build a fort "for a retreat" on Gray's Creek, opposite to Jamestown (the place is still called "Smith's Fort"), but a remarkable circ.u.mstance, not at all creditable to Smith's vigilance or circ.u.mspection, stopped the work and put the colonists at their wits' end to escape starvation. On an examination of the casks in which their corn was stored it was found that the rats had devoured most of the contents, and that the remainder was too rotten to eat.[6]

To avoid starvation, President Smith, like Lane at Roanoke Island, in May, 1609, dispersed the whole colony in three parties, sending one to live with the savages, another to Point Comfort to try for fish, and another, the largest party, twenty miles down the river to the oyster-banks, where at the end of nine weeks the oyster diet caused their skins "to peale off from head to foote as if they had been flead."[7]

While the colony was in this desperate condition there arrived from England, July 14, 1609, a small bark, commanded by Samuel Argall, with a supply of bread and wine, enough to last the colonists one month. He had been sent out by the London Company to try for sturgeon in James River and to find a shorter route to Virginia. He brought news that the old charter had been repealed, that a new one abolis.h.i.+ng the council in Virginia had been granted, and that Lord Delaware was coming, at the head of a large supply of men and provisions, as sole and absolute governor of Virginia.[8]

The calamities in the history of the colony as thus far outlined have been attributed to the great preponderance of "gentlemen" among these early immigrants; but afterwards when the company sent over mechanics and laborers the story of misfortune was not much changed. The preceding narrative shows that other causes, purposely underestimated at the time, had far more to do with the matter. Imported diseases and a climate singularly fatal to the new-comers, the faction-breeding charter, the communism of labor, Indian attack, and the unreasonable desire of the company for immediate profit afford explanations more than sufficient. Despite the presence of some unworthy characters, these "gentlemen" were largely composed of the "restless, pus.h.i.+ng material of which the pathfinders of the world have ever been made."

The s.h.i.+ps returning from the "Second Supply" reached England in January, 1609, and the account that they brought of the dissensions at Jamestown convinced the officers of the London Company that the government in Virginia needed correction. It was deemed expedient to admit stockholders into some share of the government, and something like a "boom" was started. Broadsides were issued by the managers, pamphlets praising the country were published, and sermons were delivered by eminent preachers like Rev. William Simonds and Rev.

Daniel Price. Zuniga, the Spanish minister, was greatly disturbed, and urgently advised his master, Philip III., to give orders to have "these insolent people in Virginia quickly annihilated." But King Philip was afraid of England, and contented himself with instructing Zuniga to keep on the watch; and thus the preparations of the London Company went on without interruption.[9]

May 23, 1609, a new charter was granted to the company, const.i.tuting it a corporation entirely independent of the North Virginia or Plymouth Company. The stockholders, seven hundred and sixty-five in number, came from every rank, profession, or trade in England, and even included the merchant guilds in London.[10] The charter increased the company's bounds to a tract fronting on the Atlantic Ocean, "from the point of land called Cape, or Point, Comfort all along the sea-coast to the northward two hundred miles, and from the point of Cape Comfort all along the sea-coast to the southward two hundred miles," and extending "up into the land, throughout from sea to sea, west and northwest,"[11] a clause which subsequently caused much dispute.

The governing power was still far from taking a popular form, being centred in a treasurer and council, vacancies in which the company had the right to fill. For the colonists it meant nothing more than change of one tyranny for another, since the local government in Virginia was made the rule of an absolute governor. For this office the council selected one of the peers of the realm, Thomas West, Lord Delaware, but as he could not go out at once they commissioned Sir Thomas Gates as first governor of Virginia,[12] arming him with a code of martial law which fixed the penalty of death for many offences.

All things being in readiness, the "Third Supply" left Falmouth, June 8, 1609, in nine s.h.i.+ps, carrying about six hundred men, women, and children, and in one of the s.h.i.+ps called the _Sea Venture_ sailed the governor, Sir Thomas Gates, and the two officers next in command, Sir George Somers and Captain Christopher Newport.

When within one hundred and fifty leagues of the West Indies they were caught in the tail of a hurricane, which scattered the fleet and sank one of the s.h.i.+ps. To keep the _Sea Venture_ from sinking, the men bailed for three days without intermission, standing up to their middle in water. Through this great danger they were preserved by Somers, who acted as pilot, without taking food or sleep for three days and nights, and kept the s.h.i.+p steady in the waves till she stranded, July 29, 1609, on one of the Bermuda Islands, where the company, one hundred and fifty in number, landed in safety. They found the island a beautiful place, full of wild hogs, which furnished them an abundance of meat, to which they added turtles, wild fowl, and various fruits. How to get away was the question, and though they had not a nail they started promptly to build two small s.h.i.+ps, the _Patience_ and _Deliverance_, out of the cedar which covered the country-side. May 10, 1610, they were ready to sail with the whole party for Jamestown, which they reached without accident May 23.[13]

At Jamestown a sad sight met their view. The place looked like "some ancient fortification" all in ruins; the palisades were down, the gates were off their hinges, and the church and houses were in a state of utter neglect and desolation. Out of the ruins tottered some sixty wretches, looking more like ghosts than human beings, and they told a story of suffering having hardly a parallel.[14]

The energetic Captain Argall, whose arrival at Jamestown has been already noticed, temporarily relieved the dest.i.tution there, first by supplies which he brought from England and afterwards by sturgeon which he caught in the river.[15] August 11, 1609, four of the storm-tossed s.h.i.+ps of Gates's fleet entered Hampton Roads, and not long after three others joined them. They set on land at Jamestown about four hundred pa.s.sengers, many of them ill with the London plague; and as it was the sickly season in Virginia, and most of their provisions were spoiled by rain and sea-water, their arrival simply aggravated the situation.

To these troubles, grave enough of themselves, were added dissensions among the chief men. Ratcliffe, Martin, and Archer returned at this time, and President Smith showed little disposition to make friends with them or with the new-comers, and insisted upon his authority under the old commission until Gates could be heard from. In the wrangles that ensued, nearly all the gentlemen opposed Smith, while the mariners on the s.h.i.+ps took his side, and it was finally decided that Smith should continue in the presidency till September 10, when his term expired.[16]

Thus having temporarily settled their differences, the leaders divided the immigrants into three parties, retaining one under Smith at Jamestown, and sending another under John Martin to Nansemond, and a third under Francis West to the falls of the James River. The Indians so fiercely a.s.sailed the two latter companies that both Martin and West soon returned. Smith was suspected of instigating these attacks, and thus fresh quarrels broke out. About the time of the expiration of his presidency Smith was injured by an explosion of gunpowder, and in this condition, exasperated against Martin, Archer, and Ratcliffe of the former council, he would neither give up the royal commission nor lay down his office; whereupon they deposed him and elected George Percy president.[17] When the s.h.i.+ps departed in October, 1609, Smith took pa.s.sage for England, and thus the colony lost its strongest character. Whatever qualifications must be made in his prejudiced account of the colony, the positions of trust which he enjoyed after reaching home prove that his merit does not rest solely upon his own opinions.

Under Percy the colony went from bad to worse. Sickness soon incapacitated him, and his advisers, Martin, Archer, Ratcliffe, and West, were not men of ability. Probably no one could have accomplished much good under the conditions; and though it became fas.h.i.+onable afterwards in England to abuse the emigrants as a "lewd company" and "gallants packed thither by their friends to escape worse destinies at home," the broadsides issued by the company show that the emigrants of the "Third Supply" were chiefly artisans of all sorts.[18] The Rev.

William Croshaw perhaps stated the case fairly in a sermon which he preached in 1610,[19] when he said that "those who were sent over at the company's expense were, for aught he could see, like those that were left behind, even of all sorts, better and worse," and that the gentlemen "who went on their own account" were "as good as the scoffers at home, and, it may be, many degrees better."

The colonists at first made various efforts to obtain supplies; and at President Percy's command John Ratcliffe, in October, 1609, established a fort called Algernourne and a fishery at Point Comfort, and in the winter of 1609-1610[20] went in a pinnace to trade with Powhatan in York River; but was taken off his guard and slain by the Indians with twenty-seven of his men.[21] Captain West tried to trade also, but failing in the attempt, sailed off to England.[22] Matters reached a crisis when the Indians killed and carried off the hogs, drove away the deer, and laid ambushes all around the fort at Jamestown.[23]

Finally came a period long remembered as the "Starving Time," when corn and even roots from the swamps failed. The starving settlers killed and ate the dogs and horses and then the mice and snakes found about the fort. Some turned cannibals, and an Indian who had been slain was dug out of the ground and devoured. Others crazed with hunger dogged the footsteps of their comrades; and one man cut his wife into pieces and ate her up, for which barbarous act he was executed. Even religion failed to afford any consolation, and a man threw his Bible into the fire and cried out in the market-place, "There is no G.o.d in heaven."

Only Daniel Tucker, afterwards governor of Bermuda, seemed able to take any thought. He built a boat and caught fish in the river, and "this small relief did keep us from killing one another to eat," says Percy. Out of more than five hundred colonists in Virginia in the summer of 1609 there remained about the latter part of May, 1610, not above sixty persons--men, women, and children--and even these were so reduced by famine and disease that had help been delayed ten days longer all would have perished.[24]