Author Note

John Smith (1580-1631) was president of Jamestown’s council from September 1608 to September 1609. He is credited with providing the leadership that helped the colony survive the difficult year between 1608-1609. John Smith had spent his early years traveling around Europe and participated in battles as a soldier in the French, Dutch, and finally the Transylvanian army. The Virginia Company made Smith a member of the council that would govern the colony but Smith threatened more prominent members of the expedition and was accused of mutiny and shackled during the voyage to the Americas and for three weeks after the party landed. Smith was captured by Native Americans in December 1607 but was saved by Powhatan’s daughter Pocahontas. He traded with the Native Americans who lived along the James River and his efforts provided much of the food for the colony until a ship carrying supplies arrived on January, 8 1608. His life was threatened when the council of Jamestown ordered that he be hung, but Captain Christopher Newport intervened after he returned from England in 1608 and saved Smith’s life.

Jamestown Settlement, 1607-1625

In 1606, the London Company received a royal charter from King James I to organize an expedition and establish colonies in North America. The Plymouth Company would establish the short-lived colony in Maine (see AJ-042). The Virginia Company set up England’s first permanent colony in Jamestown, Virginia. Their primary goal was profit; investors hoped settlers would find valuable natural resources, such as lumber, herbs, pitch, and even gold, to send back to England. However, the English government also wanted to resist the Spanish colonization of North America (see AJ-077 for a Spaniard’s account of the Jamestown colony). One hundred and four men and boys came ashore in May 1607-no women arrived until the following year. Over the next three years almost eight hundred settlers would arrive to colonize the Virginia coasts-six hundred of them arriving in 1609. Unfortunately, Jamestown was not an ideal spot for a colony. The low marshy land was not healthy, and clean water could be difficult to find. Attacks by the Powhatan Indians began shortly after the English colonists built their first fort at the Jamestown site. Fighting between the English and Indians continued, despite the settlers’ reliance on the Indians for corn during the difficult winters. In addition, many of the settlers were hardly qualified to farm and survive in this difficult setting. During the first years, mortality was very high through disease, starvation, and accident.

Captain John Smith was elected president in September 1608 (see also AJ-074). By enforcing strict discipline and requiring all settlers to farm, he increased the food supply. However, a serious injury in 1609 forced his return to England. George Percy was president of the Virginia’s council during the winter of 1609 and 1610, called the “starving time” when only sixty settlers survived (see AJ-073). In June 1610, they decided to abandon the town, but the arrival of the new governor, Lord de La Ware (see AJ-076), and his supply ships brought the colonists back to the fort. In 1612, the settlers began to grow tobacco on their plantations-over time, this successful crop transformed the colony into a successful venture. John Rolfe, who married Pocahontas (see AJ-079), is credited with first planting a marketable tobacco in Virginia. In 1619, the same year Africans were brought into the colony as slaves, the first representative assembly in North America was set up-the Virginia Assembly (see AJ-080). In 1624, the Virginia Company dissolved and Virginia became a royal colony under the governance of the English Crown.

Document Note

In his Map of Virginia, Smith lists some translations of words and phrases he had learned from his encounters with Native American tribes, provides many details about the landscape and waterways he explored, describes the animals, plants and vegetation that flourished in and around Jamestown. Smith’s extensive travel and trading expeditions put him in contact with many Native American’s in the colony and he writes extensively of the nature of these interactions.

Fellow colonists and friends of John Smith wrote the second document, The Proceedings of the English Colony in Virginia. They describe the settlement of Jamestown and highlight the major leaders and accomplishments of the colony. The document includes descriptions of the idea to colonize Virginia by Bartholomew Gosnold, the trip to the New World, hardships of establishing a fort and maintaining supplies, and the interactions of the colonists with Native American tribes. The authors focused on the efforts of Captain John Smith, whom they credit with keeping the colony from folding in spite of the attempts of other leaders to discredit and remove Smith from leadership. Important information is also given about the Jamestown Fire of 1608 and the rebuilding of the fort, explorations of the major waterways on the Virginia coast and the transition of the management of the colony from the Council to Governor De-La-Ware. The Proceedings of the English Colonies in Virginia were first published in Oxford in 1612.

Smith’s Description of Virginia and Proceedings of the Colonie was sent to England for publication in 1608. T. Abbay published the tract in 1612. A revised portion of the tract was published in Samual Purchas’ His Pilgrimes, Vol. II in 1625. The document shown here is from Tyler, Lyon Gardiner (editor), Narratives of Early Virginia, 1606-1625. (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1907).

Other Internet and Reference Sources

The Jamestown Rediscovery archeology project website at http://www.apva.org/jr.html contains historical summaries, a timeline, biographies, and description of the archeological findings made at Jamestown.

At the Virtual Jamestown website, you can find other first-hand accounts of the Jamestown settlement (see http://www.iath.virginia.edu/vcdh/jamestown/fhaccounts_date.html.

The Public Broadcasting Station website on the history of Africans in America presents a narrative of the early years of Virginia’s history and explores the settlers’ difficult relationship with the Native Americans and the introduction of black slavery at http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part1/title.html

The Library of Congress website, “America’s Story” at http://www.americasstory.com/cgi-bin/page.cgi/jb/colonial/smith_1 contains a short biography of Smith and discusses his importance in the English colony.