John Smith played a pivotal role in founding the Jamestown colony and promoting the colonies of Virginia and New England. As a member of the royal council for Virginia, he helped establish the colony through his leadership, work ethic in which he took on the largest tasks himself, and ability to motivate others. Smith authored several works that documented his explorations and provided descriptions intended to promote settlement in New England. His writings utilized several genres including travel narratives, theater, epic poetry, and romance to engage readers and portray the colonies in an idealized fashion.

1. Captain John Smith
The General History of Virginia, New
England, and the Summer Isles (1624)
A Description of New England (1616)

2. The History and Founding of Virginia
✤ Before founding of Jamestown, all English colonies had
failed
✤ Early 1600s saw a shift to a more corporate model of
settlement
✤ Joint stock companies (forerunner of modern corp.)
✤ King James I – split Virginia into parts. Southern part
settled by charter members from London; Northern part
(New England) fell to members in towns of Bristol,
Plymouth, Exeter

3. John Smith
✤ Named to royal council of the
Virginia colony
✤ Military background; stubborn
and self-reliant
✤ Explorer, colonizer, self-
promoter, celebrity
✤ Helped to found and promote
Virginia & New England more
than anyone
✤ Pilgrim leaders didn’t want his
help

7. John Smith, Map of New England, 1616

9. “Here nature and liberty affords us that freely, which in England
we want, or it costeth us dearly. What pleasure can be more, than
(being tired with any occasion a-shore, in planting vines, fruits, or
herbs, in contriving their own grounds, to the pleasure of their own
minds, their fields, gardens, orchards, buildings, ships, and other
works, &c.) to recreate themselves before their own doors; in their
own boats upon the sea; where man, woman and child, with a small
hook and line, by angling, may take diverse sorts of excellent fish, at
their pleasures? And is it not pretty sport, to pull up two pence, six
pence, and twelve pence, as fast as you can haul and veer a line?”
(71)
John Smith, from A Description of New England

10. “Yet what he carefully provided the rest carelessly spent” (62)
“...committed the managing of all things abroad to
Captain Smith: who by his own examples, good words,
and fair promises, set some to mow, others to bind
thatch, some to build houses, others to thatch them,
himself always bearing the greatest task for his own
share, so that in short time, he provided most of them
lodgings, neglecting any for himself” (61)
John Smith, from The General History of Virginia...

11. “Map of Old Virginia,” by Robert Vaughan, from John Smith, The
Generall History of Virginia, the Somer Islands, and New England, 1624

12. Genres and popular forms
deployed by Smith
✤ Travel narrative and exploration accounts
✤ Theater and theatrical staging
✤ Epic poetry
✤ Romance, adventure, and codes of chivalry

13. Genre of the Romance
1. A long medieval narrative in prose or verse that tells of the
adventures and heroic exploits of chivalric heroes (e.g., an
Arthurian romance)
2. A long fictitious tale of heroes and extraordinary events,
usually set in a distance time or place
3. (more contemporary) An artistic work that deals with sexual
love, usually in an idealized form
✤ Three definitions:

14. Pocahontas, baptized as Rebecca

15. Chapman, John Gadsby. "Pocahontas
Saving the Life of Captain John Smith."
1836.
Sinclair, Thomas. "Captain Smith
Rescued by Pocahontas." 1841.

16. “King Powhatan Comands
C. Smith to be Slayne."
John Smith, The generall
historie of Virginia, New-
England, and the Summer Isles.
London, 1624.