“The next morning with the light horsman & one Canoa taking 25 with the Colonel of the Chesepians, and the Sergeant major, I went to Dasamonguepeio: and being landed, sent Pemisapan word by one of his owne Savages that met me at the shore, that I was going to Croatoan, and meant to take him in the way to complaine unto him of Osocon who the night past was conveying away my prisoner, whom I had there present tied in a handlocke. Heereupon the king did abide my comming to him, and finding my selfe amidst seven or eight of his principall Weroances and followers, (not regarding any of the common sort) I gave the watchword agreed upon (which was, Christ our victory) and immediately those his chiefe men and himselfe had by the mercy of God for our deliverance, that which they had purposed for us. [In other words they were slain.] The king himselfe being shot thorow by the Colonell with a pistoll, lying on the ground for dead, & I looking as watchfully for the saving of Manteos friends, as others were busie that none of the rest should escape, suddenly he started up and ran away as though he had not bene touched, insomuch as he overran all the company, being by the way shot thwart the buttocks by mine Irish boy with my petronell. In the end an Irish man serving me, one Nugent, and the deputy provost, undertooke him; and following him in the woods, overtooke him; and I in some doubt least we had lost both the king & my man by our owne negligence to have beene intercepted by the Savages, wee met him returning out of the woods with Pemisapans head in his hand.”
So ended Pemisapan’s conspiracy.
Seven days later word came to Lane at Roanoke from Captain Stafford at Croatoan that he had sighted a great fleet of three and twenty sail approaching the coast: but whether they were friends or foes he could not discern, and he advised the governor to “stand upon as good guard” as he could. They proved to be the fleet of Sir Francis Drake on his “prosperous” return from the sacking of St. Domingo, Cartagena, and St. Augustine. This spoiling of Spanish possessions accomplished, Sir Francis had turned from the direct homeward course to visit Sir Walter’s colony and see how it fared with them. The next day Captain Stafford followed close upon his messenger, having travelled through the night before and that day twenty miles by land, and arrived at Roanoke with a letter from Sir Francis conveying a “most bountifull and honourable offer” to the governor. He would supply the colony with what necessities they required,—victuals, clothing, munitions, barks, pinnaces, and boats manned and provisioned. The following day the fleet appeared in the road of Roanoke’s “bad harborow” and came there to anchor. And the next, Lane and Drake met on his flagship and exchanged greetings.
Sir Francis renewed his offer, to which he said all the captains of his fleet had assented, and asked for details of the colony’s needs. Thanking him and his captains with warmth for their generosity Lane craved the following: That Drake would take with him to England a number of weak and unfit men of the colony, and in their places supply oarsmen, artificers, and others; that he would leave sufficient shipping and provisions to carry the colonists into August or later, when they might have to return to England; also some ships’ masters, not only to convey them to England “when time should be,” but to search the coast for some better harbour, if there were one; provide them a number of small boats; and supply them with “calievers, hand weapons, match and lead, tooles, apparell, and such like.” All these desires Sir Francis stood ready cheerfully to meet. At his request Lane sent to him the various officers of the colony with their lists of needs—the “Master of the Victuals,” the “Keeper of the Store,” the “Vice-treasurer.” Drake forthwith turned over to Lane the “Francis” of his fleet, “a very proper bark of 70 tun,” and ordered her to be provisioned for an hundred men for four months. Also, two pinnaces and four small boats. And two of his masters, with their consent, were assigned to Lane’s service till the time he had promised for their return to England.
On the twelfth the bark was provisioned, the two loaned masters were aboard her, and several of Lane’s best men, ready to pass from the fleet’s anchorage to Roanoke Island. The very next morning an unwonted storm arose which scattered the fleet. The tempest raged through four days, and “had like to have driven all on shore if the Lord had not held his loving hand over them, and the Generall very providentially forseene the worst himselfe.” As it was, several of the fleet were driven to put to sea, while the “Francis,” with her precious cargo, the two masters, and Lane’s choice men, was seen to be free from the others and also “to put cleere to Sea.” After the storm was over Drake came ashore and offered Lane another ship, provisioned as the “Francis” had been, and with another master. This was a large bark, the “Bonner,” of one hundred and seventy tons, and Sir Francis said that she could not be brought into the harbour but must be left in the road.
Thereupon Lane called his remaining chiefs into council, and the upshot of their deliberations, considering the situation of the colony,—their reduced numbers, the carrying away of the “Francis” with her provisions and company, the hopelessness of the arrival of Sir Richard Grenville with the relief fleet now long overdue,—was the decision that Sir Francis’s second offer, “though most honourable of his part,” must be declined, and that he be petitioned in all their names to give the colony passage with him back to England. This request Lane personally delivered, and Drake promptly granted. Accordingly his pinnaces were sent to Roanoke to take off the men and their effects. But the weather was yet boisterous, and the pinnaces were so often aground that much valuable stuff was lost. “The most of all we had, with all our Cards [charts], Books, and writings were by the Sailers cast overboard, the greater number of the fleet being much aggrieved with their long and dangerous abode in that miserable road.”
The returning colonists were bestowed among the several ships, and on the nineteenth all set sail for home, where they duly arrived, at Portsmouth, on the twenty-seventh of July.
Almost immediately after the colonists had abandoned Roanoke and sailed off with Drake, a ship sent out by Raleigh at his “sole charges” to their relief, arrived on the coast of Carolina. She had left England after Easter, freighted plentifully with stores most necessary for the infant colony. When her captain found this “paradise of the world,” as he termed their seat, deserted, he returned with his cargo to England. Hakluyt gives the brief account of this voyage as third in the series of Raleigh’s Virginia expeditions. A fortnight later Sir Richard Grenville’s delayed relief fleet, comprising three ships full laden with supplies of all sorts, at last arrived at the deserted place. In order to preserve possession of the country for England he left fifteen men (not fifty as some after chroniclers stated) at Roanoke Island, and then returned as he had come.
While so much material was lost by the colonists in the hurry of departure, Thomas Hariot preserved notes from which he subsequently wrote out a particular and helpful description of the country of “Virginia,” its inhabitants, productions, animals, birds, and fishes, which was first published in 1588 and Hakluyt reproduced the next year; and John White brought home many sketches, drawings, and water colours, which subsequently appeared as illustrations of Hariot’s book.
Others of the colonists brought home specimens of the country’s products, among them the tobacco plant and the potato root. Both were first introduced into general use in Europe by Raleigh.