History of Jamestown

1. The Jamestown Settlement
Created by Carl J. Greer
EME 6053 Internet in Education

3. King James I
• Was king of Scotland beginning in 1567
• Becomes king of England and Ireland in 1603
• Son of Mary, Queen of Scots
• James believed that colonies could prove
profitable to the Crown
• Viewed North America as the most likely place
for settlements
• Only one problem…

5. Virginia Company
• Collection of businessmen and investors
• Granted a charter by King James I in 1606
• Charter was for 6 million acres (Vermont: 5.9
million square acres, Massachusetts: 5 million)
• Purpose: To establish colonies in North
America that would prove financially
beneficial to the Crown
• London and Plymouth Companies

7. Plymouth Company
• Colony is placed at the mouth of Kennebec
River in Maine, near present day Bath
• Survives for one year before being abandoned
• Area is ignored as a colonization target until
1620

8. Jamestown Settlement
• First colonists arrive April 1607
• 104 men and boys
• Combination of gentry, military men,
craftsmen/artisans, unskilled laborers
• Upon arrival, secret orders from the Virginia
Company listing who was in charge were
opened. Mix of gentry and military men.

10. Jamestown: After the Arrival
• Attacked by Algonquian Indians, led by Powhatan,
on first night
• Sought refuge onboard ships
• Construction of a fort begins after a month
• Algonquian attack exposes vulnerabilities, leads
to construction of a second, stronger fort
• Why Jamestown location?
1. Water depth
2. Defendable

12. Jamestown: After the Arrival (cont.)
• Captain Newport returns to England for
supplies one week after fort is finished
• Colony starts to slide towards extinction
• Why?

13. Problems at Jamestown
• Famine
• Less than 50% of population was still alive less
than six months later
• Lack of farmers
• Lack of proper equipment
• Disease
1. Typhoid
2. Dysentery
• Indian attacks

14. Divine Intervention…or Pure Dumb
Luck?
• Powhatan intervenes
• January 1687: Captain Newport returns
• Brings supplies AND 120 colonists
• Only 38 members from the original group are
still alive (36.5%)
• Colonists accidentally burn fort, spend winter
months living in the ruins
• High death rate continues for decades

15. Jamestown (non)Survivability Rate
• First colonists: 38 of 104
• 1609: Population declines from 600 to 60 in
SIX MONTHS.
• 1619-1622: Virginia Company sends 3570
people to Jamestown to join 700 already
there. 3000 die.
• 1607-1625: Virginia Company sends 6000
people to Virginia. By 1625, only 1200 remain.

17. John Smith: Savior of Jamestown
• Adventurer (aka: mercenary)
• Captured and sold as slave to Turkish
nobleman
• Escapes, returns to England. Joins Jamestown
expedition
• Clashes with shipmates, clapped in irons,
threatened with execution
• Named by Virginia Company to Jamestown
Council

18. James Smith (cont.)
• Explores and maps Virginia
• Captured by Algonquians during exploring trip
• Disappearance allows Captain Newport and
another colonist to assume control of colony
• Summer 1608: Leaves settlement to further
explore Virginia
• Reelected to the colony council in September

19. John Smith (cont.)
• Captain Newport returns to England (Fall 1608)
• Colony still struggling to survive
• Smith emerges as leader of the settlement
• Pressures Powhatan
• No work, on eat
• Newport returns in 1609 with supplies and
colonists
• Smith loses power struggle, departs colony
October 1609, dies in 1631

20. John Rolfe
• Departed England for Jamestown in May 1609
• Onboard is his pregnant wife, Sara
• Sea Venture was captained by Captain
Newport.
• John Smith’s angry letter to the Virginia
Company leads them to make their third
supply mission their biggest and best
equipped

21. “When you send againe I entreat you rather
send but thirty Carpenters, husbandmen,
gardiners, fishermen, blacksmiths, masons and
diggers up of trees, roots, well provided; than a
thousand of such as wee have: for except wee
be able both to lodge them and feed them, the
most will consume with want of necessaries
before they can be made good for anything.”
-John Smith

22. John Rolfe (cont.)
• Rolfe and other survivors are shipwrecked for
9 months
• Using the remains of the Sea Venture, the
survivors build two ships, Deliverance and
Patience in May 1610
• Rolfe’s wife and infant daughter die in
Bermuda

23. John Rolfe (cont.)
• Does not begin growing tobacco until 1611
• By 1617, Virginia colony produces 20,000
pounds of tobacco annually
• In 1618, tobacco exports jump to 40,000
pounds
• Rolfe marries Pocahontas in 1614

24. End of the Virginia Company
• Rolfe’s marriage to Pocahontas results in
uneasy peace between Algonquian and the
English settlers
• Death of Powhatan in 1618 ends peace
• 1622: Slaughter of settlers by Indians. Loss of
more than 25% of the settlers results
• Investigation by Crown places blame for
deaths of colonists on mismanagement

25. End of the Virginia Company(cont.)
• Charter is revoked
• Virginia colony survives. Why?

27. Year
Colonial Tobacco Imports
to England
(includes Virginia from 1612
and Bermuda from 1615)
European Tobacco
Imports to England
1616 2,300 52,673
1617 19,388 50,906
1618 41,728 42,871
1623 134,607 66,877
1624 202,962 63,497

28. A Counterblaste to Tobacco
• King James hates the use of tobacco by
subjects. Forbids use of it in his presence.
• Issues a treatise in 1604
“A custome lothsome to the eye, hatefull to the
Nose, harmefull to the braine, dangerous to the
Lungs, and in the blacke stinking fume thereof,
neerest resembling the horrible Stigian smoke of
the pit that is bottomelesse.”

29. 1620: Women Arrive in Jamestown