As the ships anchored at Hatoraske, smoke was seen rising on Roanoke
Island, giving hope that the colonists were still alive. On the morning
of the 16th, Governor White, Captain Cooke, Captain Spicer, and a small
company set forth in two boats for Roanoke Island. En route they saw
another column of smoke rising southwest of "Kindrikers mountes." There
are no mountains on this coast, except the great sand dunes. Perhaps the
smoke was coming from the general area occupied today by the Nags Head
dunes. They decided to investigate this latter smoke column first. It
was a wearisome task that consumed the whole day and led to nothing,
since no human beings were at the scene of the woods fire.
The next day, August 17, they prepared to go to Roanoke Island. Captain
Spicer and six other men were drowned in the treacherous inlet when
their boat capsized. Despite this unfortunate occurrence, White was able
to proceed with the search. They put off again in two boats, but before
they could reach the place of settlement it was so dark that they
overshot their mark by a quarter of a mile. On the north end of the
island they saw a light and rowed toward it. Anchoring opposite it in
the darkness, they blew a trumpet and sang familiar English tunes and
songs, but received no answer. In the morning they landed on the north
end of the island and found only the grass and sundry rotten trees
burning. From this point they went through the woods to that part of the
island directly opposite Dasamonquepeuc on the mainland, west of the
north end of Roanoke Island, and from there they returned by the water's
edge round about the north point of the island until they came to the
place where the colony had been left by Governor White. From the
description just given of White's itinerary, this place must have been
near the shore on the north end of the island on the east side, i. e.,
at or near the present Fort Raleigh National Historic Site. In the
course of the long walk along the shore, nothing of interest was seen
except footprints which two or three natives had made in the sand during
the night.
As they climbed the sandy bank toward the settlement area, they found
CRO carved in Roman letters on a tree at the brow of the hill. Going
from there to the site of the dwelling houses, they found all of the
houses taken down and the area strongly enclosed with a palisade of tree
trunks, with curtains and flankers "very Fort-like." One of the chief
trees, or posts, had the bark peeled off, and carved on it in capital
letters was the word CROATOAN, but without the maltese cross or sign of
distress that White had asked the settlers to use in such messages in
the event of enforced departure from Roanoke Island. On entering the
palisade, they found iron and other heavy objects thrown about and
almost overgrown with grass, signifying that the place had been
abandoned for some time.
From the fort and settlement area, White proceeded again along the shore
southward to the "point of the creek" (i. e., the point of Shallow Bag
Bay or, as it was called in 1716, "Town Creek"), which had been
fortified with "Falkons and small Ordinance" and where the small boats
of the colony were habitually kept, but could find no sign of any of
these things. Then, on returning to the fort and settlement area, White
searched for certain chests and personal effects which he had secretly
buried in 1587. The Indians had discovered the hiding place, had rifled
the chests, torn the covers off the books, and left the pictures and
maps to be spoiled by rain. Considering that Gov. John White was
probably John White the artist and illustrator of the expedition of
1585-86, one can imagine his feelings on seeing his maps and pictures
irretrievably ruined. However, according to his own words he was cheered
at the thought that, as indicated by the word CROATOAN on the palisade
post, "a certaine token," his daughter, granddaughter Virginia Dare, and
the colonists would be found at Croatoan Island, where Manteo was born
and where the Indians had been friendly to the English.
As stormy weather was brewing, White and his little group returned in
haste to the harbor where their ships were at anchor. Next day they
agreed to go to Croatoan Island to look for the colonists but the
weather would not permit. They planned to go to the West Indies instead,
where they would have taken on fresh water and ultimately have returned
to Croatoan. However, the elements willed otherwise and they were blown
toward the Azores. From Flores in this group, they made their way to
England.
Governor White could not finance another expedition to America himself,
and Raleigh, although enjoying a large income at times, spent lavishly.
Some of the money and energy that might have gone into the Virginian
enterprise, Raleigh expended, during 1587-1602, in colonizing estates
which he had received in Ireland. The Virginian enterprise would have
required a prince's purse, but Raleigh was not a prince. Walsingham died
in 1590, a blow to Raleigh. In July 1592, Raleigh was disgraced and
imprisoned for marrying Elizabeth Throckmorton without the Queen's
knowledge or consent. White, therefore, accepted the facts with
resignation. His last recorded words, dated February 4, 1593, are: "And
wanting my wishes, I leave off from prosecuting that whereunto I would
to God my wealth were answerable to my will."
As late as 1602, Raleigh was still seeking in vain for his lost colony.
In that year he sent out an expedition under Samuel Mace, who reached
land some "40 leagues to the so-westward of Hatarask," presumably at or
near Croatoan Island. Here they engaged in trading with the Indians
along the coast. They probably did not look as diligently as they should
have for the lost colonists, because they alleged that the weather made
their intended search unsafe. On August 21, 1602, in a letter to Sir
Robert Cecil, Raleigh expressed his undying faith in the overseas
English Empire which he had attempted to establish, saying, "... I shall
yet live to see it an English Nation." The memory of the Lost Roanoke
Colony by that time had become an imperishable English tradition. After
the establishment of the Jamestown settlement in Virginia in 1607, the
Virginia colonists evidenced an almost constant interest in trying to
learn from the Indians the whereabouts of the Roanoke settlers. However,
the hearsay data they collected were never sufficiently concrete to be
of any real assistance in locating Raleigh's men, and the answer remains
a mystery to this day.
_Connecting Links with Jamestown and New England_
Following his marriage to Elizabeth Throckmorton, which displeased the
Queen, Raleigh remained out of favor until after the capture of Cadiz,
in 1596, in which he had participated. Upon the accession of King James
I, in 1603, he again lost favor at Court and on July 16, 1603, was
imprisoned in the Tower of London on the charge of having conspired to
place Arabella Stuart on the throne instead of James. At the trial in
November, Raleigh, along with Lords Cobham and Grey, was convicted and
condemned to death. The lives of all three were dramatically spared at
the last minute, but the conviction and sentence of death against
Raleigh were allowed to stand and he remained in prison in the Tower
until 1616.
One consequence of the conviction of Raleigh was the loss of any rights
that he might still have had under the patent of 1584 giving him the
sole right to colonize the vast territory called Virginia. The patent
had obligated him to settle Virginia within 6 years but so long as the
mystery of the Lost Colonists remained unsolved, Raleigh could allege
that his colonists might be living somewhere in Virginia and that in
consequence his rights under the Charter of Queen Elizabeth were still
in force. These claims he asserted as late as 1603. In fact, the
abolition of Raleigh's claims appears to have been one of the
outstanding consequences of the Cobham plot trails. Because his patent
was now clearly lost and because of his imprisonment, Raleigh was unable
to participate in the movement that culminated in the settlement of
Virginia in 1607. Yet this movement, and the movement to settle New
England, had close ties with him. Among the leading spirits behind the
later successful Virginian enterprise were Richard Hakluyt and Sir
Thomas Smythe, two of those to whom Raleigh had deeded his interest in
the Lost Colony undertaking on March 7, 1589. Likewise, among the early
leaders of the North Virginia, or Plymouth, group were Raleigh Gilbert
and Sir John Gilbert, sons of Raleigh's half-brother, Sir Humphrey
Gilbert. Raleigh Gilbert participated in the effort to plant a
settlement on the Kennebec River in Maine in 1607 and was a member of
the Plymouth Company as late as 1620.
_Later Historical Information on Fort Raleigh_
According to a letter, dated May 8, 1654, from Francis Yeardley, of
Virginia, to John Farrar, a young trader and three companions went to
Roanoke Island in September 1653. An Indian Chieftain "received them
civilly and showed them the ruins of Sir Walter Raleigh's fort." They
brought back a sure token of their having been there, which they gave to
Yeardley.
John Lawson wrote that the ruins of the fort could be seen in 1709 and
that old English coins, a brass gun, a powder horn and a small
quarter-deck gun made of iron staves and hooped with iron had been found
on the site.
An act of 1723 regarding a proposed town on Roanoke Island speaks of
"300 Acres of Land lying on the No. E't side of the said Island,
commonly called Roanoke old plantation," thus suggesting that at that
date the northeastern part of the island was regarded as the scene of
Raleigh's settlements.
The earliest known map to show Fort Raleigh is the Collet map of 1770,
which indicates a fort on the northeast side of the island near the
shore line at what appears to be the present Fort Raleigh site. It is
marked simply "Fort," without name. A later copyist calls it "Pain
Fort," probably because he confused the notation of Paine's residence on
the Collet map (in different type from "Fort") as part of the fort name.
Benson J. Lossing, the historian, wrote in 1850 that "slight traces of
Lane's fort" could then be seen "near the north end" of Roanoke Island.
Edward C. Bruce reported in _Harper's New Monthly Magazine_, May 1860,
that the trench of the fort was clearly traceable as a square of about
40 yards each way, with one corner thrown out in the form of a small
bastion. He also mentions fragments of stone and brick. Partial
archeological excavation of the fort was undertaken by Talcott Williams
in 1895. Additional archeological excavations by the National Park
Service were undertaken in 1947, 1948, and 1950.
[Illustration: FORT RALEIGH NATIONAL HISTORIC SITE
_NORTH CAROLINA_]
ROANOKE SOUND
WATERSIDE THEATER OF 'THE LOST COLONY' PRODUCTION
SOUVENIR SHOP
VISITOR CENTER
THOMAS HARIOT TRAIL
RESTORED FORT
STOCKADE
ENTRANCE
PARKING
345 TO MANTEO. 3 MILES
JULY 1960 NHS-RAL-7003
_Recent History of Fort Raleigh_
On April 30, 1894, the Roanoke Colony Memorial Association purchased the
fort and 10 acres of surrounding land for memorial purposes. In 1896,
the memorial area was extended to 16.45 acres, and the Virginia Dare
monument was erected. In order to promote a more active program of
interpretation at Fort Raleigh, the Roanoke Island Historical
Association was organized in 1932. With Federal aid a series of
buildings, constituting a symbolical restoration and an open-air
theater, were constructed. In 1935, the area became a State historical
park under the administration of the North Carolina Historical
Commission. Two years later, the production of Paul Green's _Lost
Colony_ pageant-drama attracted Nation-wide attention to Fort Raleigh.
The immediate success of the play caused it to be repeated each season,
and the performance is now recognized as America's outstanding folk
play.
_Guide to the Area_