Jamestown DBQ

Jamestown seemed at first to be a promise of new life and a new, safe lifestyle for all. However, this was not the case, because of the 110 original settlers, only 40 survived. The reason the English came to the Americas is to establish the first permanent settlement. A group of investors called The Virginia Company. The first settlers were men of the ages 17-35. Most were lower classmen, more so poor people. Early Jamestown was a colonization of English people in America that lasted from 1607 to 1611. What is so confusing about this is why so many of the colonists died in such a short period of time.

One of the first causes of death in the Jamestown were environmental issues. One of the issues was that when the English settled, they did not settle far enough upstream. When high tide arrived, it sometimes mixed with the freshwater in the stream, creating brackish water. Brackish water causes poor health if people used it as their water supply. Also, they happened to land in it’s longest unbroken period of drought. Without rainfall, it was very difficult to impossible to water crops for food. Brackish water and lack of rainfall were a detriment to the settlers and the environment during the years 1607 to 1611.

Another cause of death in early Jamestown was the lack of settler skills. One of the issues is that, in 1607, out of the 110 settlers that traveled, 82 of them had occupations, but 47 of them were ‘gentlemen’. That is over 55% of the total people with an occupation. ‘Gentlemen’ were people born of wealth who were not used to working with their hands or working at all. Another problem is that there were no females whatsoever in both trips in 1607 and 1608. Females had many important jobs in the community, which were caring for the young in homes, creating clothing and furniture, and also for medical care. Another thing the English lacked was proper skills of organizing a trade and being civil. “In 1609 Francis West and 36 men sailed up the Chesapeake Bay to try to trade for corn with the Patawomeke Indians…” Although it sounds as if the English meant for a peaceful trade, the document also states this: “Though West was able to load his small ship with grain, the success involved ‘some harshe and Crewell dealinge by cutting of towe of the salvages heads and other extremetyes.’” It seems the English took to violence rather than negotiating or acting civil.

One last reason the English died so quickly was because of their relationships with the natives. In the previous statement, when the English were confronted with a trade of corn, they responded with violence and ended up decapitating two of them and dismembering many others. There is no evidence in the documents to support why the English used force rather than peaceful trade. Perhaps they used force because they didn’t understand the Indians and did not know how to interact with them in any other way. The surviving Indians would most likely want revenge on the people who killed their own and took their crops forcefully.

Although Jamestown seemed as if nothing could go wrong, many things obviously did. There were many, many issues in the surrounding environment, including brackish water and water with festering waste. Another problem was how poorly their settler skills were. 55% of people who had occupations were gentlemen, who had no skills with labor whatsoever. Finally, the way they treated the Natives was very poor, and the Natives most likely tried to retaliate against them and take revenge. The English were basically overall terrible and had no settler skills, lived in a bad environment, and treated the Natives poorly.

Dennis B. Blanton, “Jamestown’s Environment,” Center for Archaeological Research, College of William and Mary, Williamsburg, Virginia, 2000.

Adapted from “The Lost Colony and Jamestown Droughts,” Science, April 24, 1998.

Adapted from John Smith , The Generall Historie of Virginia, New England, and the Summer Isles, Book III, 1624.

Ivor Noel Hume, The Virginia Adventure, Alfred A. Knopf, 1994.