Columbus and Other Heroes of American Discovery

by N. D'Anvers

While the preliminary steps in the organization of these two companies were being taken, two short though important visits were paid to North America—one by Martin Pring in the Speedwell, resulting in the discovery of several of the harbors of Maine, and of the Saco, Kennebec, and York Rivers; the other by George Weymouth, who supplemented his predecessors’ work by a thorough survey of the coast of Maine, and the discovery of the Penobscot River.

VIEW ON THE COAST OF MAINE.

On the 19th December, 1606, after an unsuccessful attempt by the Plymouth Company to settle a colony in the lands assigned to it, the London Company sent forth the expedition destined to obtain the first permanent foothold in the present United States. Three vessels, the Sarah Constant, the God-speed, and the Discovery, bore to the site of their new home one hundred and five men, of whom the most noteworthy were the commander, Newport, Bartholomew Gosnold, Gabriel Archer, Edward Maria Wingfield, the Rev. Robert Hunt, George Percy, brother to the Earl of Northumberland, and the great John Smith.

The voyage out was rendered harassing by perpetual disputes; and when, on the 26th April, 1607, the colonists sailed up Chesapeake Bay, the seeds were already sown of future troubles. Naming the southern extremity of the bay Cape Henry, and the northern Cape Charles, after the sons of James I., the explorers landed on the peninsula, about fifty miles from the mouth of the bay. The sealed instructions which had been brought out by the commander were now opened, when it was ascertained that the government was to be vested in a council, to consist of Gosnold, Smith, Newport, Ratcliffe, Martin, and Kendall, under the presidency of Wingfield, and that, among other minor tasks, the emigrants were to discover the water communication still supposed to exist between Virginia and the Pacific.

Having fixed, on the 13th May, 1607, on the site of the first settlement, which they named Jamestown, in honor of their monarch, the emigrants divided their forces, some setting to work to fell trees and so forth, others joining Captain Newport in fitting out a shallop in which to make the first discovery so eagerly hoped for by all.

Entering the river Powhatan, which they christened James, the exploring party sailed up as far as the now well-known Falls, by which further progress was barred, and after paying a visit to the native chieftain, Pawatah—who received his strange guests with ill-disguised fear—returned disappointed and disgusted to Jamestown within a week of setting out. A little later, Newport set sail for England, and his departure seems to have been the signal for the breaking out of the fire of discontent and jealousy which had long been smoldering.

From the first, Smith had been, according to one account, the ring-leader of the malcontents, and according to his own, the most oppressed among the ill-used colonists. In any case, his name crops up as a bone of contention in all the documents still extant relating to the much-vexed early days of Jamestown. Famine, disease, and quarrels among themselves greatly reduced the original number of the emigrants before the first summer was over, and, but for the kindness of the Indians, all would probably have perished.

Refraining from entering into details of the disputes between Wingfield and Smith, and, when the former had been deposed, between his successors, Ratcliffe and Martin, and the same noted member of the council, we must content ourselves with adding that the supreme power finally passed into the hands of John Smith, and that, whatever may have been his faults as a private individual, he proved himself more than equal to the emergency as the leader of what had now become little more than a forlorn hope.

By his energetic measures, even before he was formally elected president of the council, Smith succeeded in restoring first peace and then prosperity to the almost despairing band of survivors, and the winter of 1607 found him in a position to pursue the geographical explorations so suddenly interrupted, and with which alone we have, strictly speaking, now to do. On the 10th December he started in a small boat with two Englishmen and two Indian guides, up the little river Chickahominy, which flowed into the James river a few miles above the infant settlement.