The Death of Jamestown George sat on a old wooden chair, mouth parched. It’s the “Starving Time,” He sees as his 73 year old father fall dead. He takes one look at him and begins to cry, but his cry is drowned out by the roar of the indians. He looks up to see a spear hurtling towards him. This fiction story was set in 1610 Jamestown. The residents of Jamestown did not have very good associations with the indians. The starving time was a period of time where the residents of Jamestown ran out of food and water. The number one question of this essay though is “Why did so many colonists die?” One reason Jamestown colonists died is because they ran out of food. A colonists named Francis West traded/forced the indians to give him grain ,it states, Francis West “headed out in the Atlantic Ocean (with the grain) leaving the colonists to the indians and God.”(Hume 61) Another phenomenal reason they died is because “47 gentlemen.” (Smith 59) This is bad because gentlemen were people who didn't want to work and came to Jamestown to get more land. There were 110 colonists and that means that gentle men were 42% of the population of Jamestown. Gentle men were men who didn’t want to work. This made it so there was less food and more mouths. The lack of food was horrendous. …show more content…
These were the main problems because about 21 out of every 27 colonists died from them. Others may say that execution was but there was only one, “Capt. George Kendall is executed for mutiny.”(Fausz, 63) Another reason some colonists died is because the colonists were focused on riches like gold and silver instead of survival. The question ,”Jamestown: Why did so Many Colonists Die?,” (Roden 49) is important because if we didn’t ask ourselves that question we would repeat our mistakes of the past. In conclusion we need to keep a record of the past and present to better our
Nathaniel Philbrick opens his book by drawing a direct line from the early Pilgrim’s arrival on Plymouth rock to the building of America. He goes on to say, “Instead of the story we already know, it becomes the story we need to know.” Many of us growing up, myself included romanticize about the pilgrims in the light of the first Thanksgiving and we think about the Indians sitting down with the Pilgrims to take part of the Thanksgiving meal. Next, we believe the myth that everyone lived happily ever after.
In her work, Apathy and Death in Early Jamestown, Karen Ordahl Kupperman argues that the “high mortality rate” of Jamestown was caused by apathy, which formed from “a combination of psychological and physical factors” of disease, malnutrition, and despair. She supports her argument by making parallel connections between the source of death of those at Jamestown to the deaths of American prisoners of war in World War II and the Korean War. Although her claims are interesting to read due to the engaging comparisons she makes to the death rates in Jamestown, her analogy between prisoners of war and colonists is weak due to the two vastly different situation that the people of both times went through.
In sum, many colonists were killed for various reasons. These reasons include sickness and disease, lack of resources, and where Jamestown was chosen to be built. This analysis was important because it included most of the main reasons why many Jamestown colonists
Everyone knows the story of how the Pilgrims came to America on the Mayflower and started a new life. But what about before the Pilgrims? On May 14th, 1607, 104 English settlers stepped off the crowded boat and started a colony in modern-day Virginia. These people are referred to as the “early Jamestown settlers”. Now, it’s important to know that when we say “early”, we mean the first 544. However, they didn’t actually ever have 544 people there at once. The most they ever had at one time was 381 people, and the least amount was 40. This is because a lot of them died. Why did they die? That’s a good question. Their deaths can be attributed to multiple things, including the climate, disease, and a lack of money. However, those things are mere
Have you ever heard of “Early Jamestown?” The year was 1607, roughly, 110 English men arrived on the coast of Virginia, to search for gold, which the Spaniards also had begun a search for and found an abundance of gold. It is the first permanent English colony in what is now the United States. ‘Early’ Jamestown entails the first five years of settlement in the Americas. The question is ‘Why did so many colonist die?’ Colonist died in early Jamestown because of three problems. These problems were the environmental issues, the relationships with the Native Americans, and the lack of skills the colonist brought with them to Jamestown.
Another reason why so many colonists died was because of their relations with the Native Americans. If they did not cut people’s heads of (Document D) because they didn’t want to trade, maybe they could of got some food. They also went through a series of 3 wars with the Powhatan Natives. The first war lasted from 1610-1614 (4 years) which really affected the colonists during the Starving time. If they did not massacre the Natives, maybe they could've traded for
Starting with the Jamestown and others in the Chesapeake region, one immediately notices that those who established Jamestown were not prepared to settle down. The Jamestown colony was started for one main purpose, to make money. The Virginia Company founded Jamestown. The “Elizabeth” was the ship that took over those looking to settle to the Chesapeake Bay area. On the ship were 114 passengers and of those, 72 of them were males. These males were
As a young child many of us are raised to be familiar with the Pocahontas and John Smith story. Whether it was in a Disney movie or at a school play that one first learned of Jamestown, students want to believe that this romantic relationship really did occur. As one ages, one becomes aware of the dichotomy between fact and fiction. This is brilliantly explained in David A. Price's, Love and Hate in Jamestown. Price describes a more robust account of events that really did take place in the poorly run, miserable, yet evolving settlement of Jamestown, Virginia; and engulfs and edifies the story marketed by Disney and others for young audiences. Price reveals countless facts from original documents about the history of Jamestown and other fledgling colonies, John Smith, and Smith's relationship with Pocahontas. He develops a more compelling read than does the typical high school text book and writes intriguingly which propels the reader, to continue on to the successive chapters in the early history of Virginia.
Throughout history, humankind has done just about everything wrong; from slavery to bowl cuts. We are creatures of habit, greed, and want. We all believe in hope that eventually history won’t repeat, but we creatures of habit are doing very little to stop it. Our habitual patterns cause chaos and disrupt in war most of the time, so the fact that the colonies usually failed and died isn’t surprising. Jamestown was the first “successful” colony but all the people in the colony mainly died. We love to look the other way and say that they died because they didn’t know the land or because the natives were evil but the truth is; the Jamestown colonists died because of their stupidity, mistrust, and greed (a.k.a human nature).
In Jamestown, while at sea they were stranded for weeks off the British coast, and they had dwindled food supply. Several of them died because of the poor food supply. Also, as soon as the settlers of Jamestown were spotted, they were immediately surrounded by attacks from Algonquian natives, uncontrolled diseases, and internal political strife. More than half of the colonists that were on the ship died from famine and illness in their first winter. Their Captain, John Smith tried making peace with the natives before returning to England, however the following winter, another disaster struck Jamestown and it was the period of the “starving time.” Unfortunately, only 60 out of 500 colonists survived. They were not only in need of food supply, but they had been in drought for a very long time. They tried hard to survive everything they went through, but many of them couldn’t survive. Like Jamestown, Plymouth also went through so much to survive. Plymouth had a very important event happen while on their journey. The Mayflower Compact occurred at the same time. During the Mayflower Compact, women had by far the hardest time out of all groups of passengers. Of eighteen women that went with their husbands, no single woman came on the Mayflower. Sadly, all but 5 of them died. Their death rate was 72%, which was above the 58% for men. 25% for boys, and 18% for girls. Plymouth colonists struggled from a lot of the same things the Jamestown colonists did. In Plymouth, their voyage over sea was too long with no proper food supply, except on good weather days, which were hardly ever. They also, experienced internal political struggles, and sickness. Something new they experienced was weather problems. On the Mayflower, death usually came at a young age. All their horrible experiences also caused many deaths, but they never gave up on trying everything and anything
The first years of settlement at Jamestown was tragedy struck for English settlers. In May 1607, 110 English settlers arrived in Virginia to start a colony. They wanted to find resources and become rich. By 1612 however, almost of the settlers who had arrived at Jamestown were dead. So why is the reason why so many people died? There are three factors to consider including the environment, settler skills, and their relations with native Americans.
“Quantie’s weak body shuddered from a blast of cold wind. Still, the proud wife of the Cherokee chief John Ross wrapped a woolen blanket around her shoulders and grabbed the reins.” Leading the final group of Cherokee Indians from their home lands, Chief John Ross thought of an old story that was told by the chiefs before him, of a place where the earth and sky met in the west, this was the place where death awaits. He could not help but fear that this place of death was where his beloved people were being taken after years of persecution and injustice at the hands of white Americans, the proud Indian people were being forced to vacate their lands, leaving behind their homes, businesses and almost everything they owned while traveling to an unknown place and an uncertain future. The Cherokee Indians suffered terrible indignities, sickness and death while being removed to the Indian territories west of the Mississippi, even though they maintained their culture and traditions, rebuilt their numbers and improved their living conditions by developing their own government, economy and social structure, they were never able to return to their previous greatness or escape the injustices of the American people.
Mary Rowlandson’s “A Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson” and Benjamin Franklin’s “Remarks Concerning the Savages of North America” are two different perspectives based on unique experiences the narrators had with “savages.” Benjamin Franklin’s “Remarks Concerning the Savages…” is a comparison between the ways of the Indians and the ways of the Englishmen along with Franklin’s reason why the Indians should not be defined as savages. “A Narrative of the Captivity…” is a written test of faith about a brutally traumatic experience that a woman faced alone while being held captive by Indians. Mary Rowlandson views the Indians in a negative light due to the traumatizing and inhumane experiences she went through namely, their actions and the way in which they lived went against the religious code to which she is used; contrastingly, Benjamin Franklin sees the Indians as everything but savages-- he believes that they are perfect due to their educated ways and virtuous conduct.
In Thomas King’s novel, The Inconvenient Indian, the story of North America’s history is discussed from his original viewpoint and perspective. In his first chapter, “Forgetting Columbus,” he voices his opinion about how he feel towards the way white people have told America’s history and portraying it as an adventurous tale of triumph, strength and freedom. King hunts down the evidence needed to reveal more facts on the controversial relationship between the whites and natives and how it has affected the culture of Americans. Mainly untangling the confusion between the idea of Native Americans being savages and whites constantly reigning in glory. He exposes the truth about how Native Americans were treated and how their actual stories were
In this documentary by The National Geographic, The New World: Nightmare in Jamestown captures what it must have been like for the settlers of Jamestown. It takes place in an archeological site which is owned by the APVA where they found remains of the original men who first arrived to the New World and who set up the colony at Jamestown. They were sent by the Virginia Company in hopes of being able to bring home gold and other riches that the Spanish had already been taking advantage of. Unfortunately, in the process, they faced disease, death, hunger, and hostility from the Indians.