The church that was burned in the Jamestown fire of January 17, 1608,
was the wretched affair of logs, sedge, and dirt, built by the colonists
to take the place of the awning between two trees under which they first
worshipped. In a map of the Virginia settlement sent by Zuñiga to Philip
the Third in September, 1608, the site of a church is indicated enclosed
within the fort. Captain Newport employed his mariners in rebuilding this
church, "all which works they finished cheerfully and in short time." The
time, it appears, was short indeed. Anas Todkill and his collaborators
assert that it was "little need they should stay and consume victuall
for fourteene days, that the Mariners might say they built such a golden
Church, that _we_ can say the raine washed neere to nothing in fourteene
days."
Our "docteur of Divinitie" duly records that when Newport departed
"Captain Smith and Master Scrivener divided betwixt them the rebuilding
Jamestown, the repairing our Pallizadoes, the cutting down trees,
preparing our fields for planting our Corne and rebuilding our Church."
This, at best only a flimsy affair, was the second Church (we suppose the
mariners' work was mended, not destroyed), and the good preacher, Master
Hunt, was still alive. The day of his death is not known. He was certainly
living in December, 1608, for somebody--and doubtless in the church--then
married John Laydon to Ann Burras; and we know of no minister who came
over until 1610. In the interval between his death and the arrival of Mr.
Bucke, daily prayers, and homilies on Sunday, were said in the church,
although there was no minister. We are aware that it behooves us to be
pretty careful in this matter of churches, now that the shovels and picks
of the Association for the Preservation of Virginia Antiquities are busy
with the foundations of the Jamestown churches. They will never find the
foundation of the first one, nor of the second, for the very good reason
that they had none.
The 20th of April all hands were at work hewing down trees and planting
corn, when an alarum from the guard caused every man to drop axe and hoe
and take up arms, each one expecting an assault from the savages. But
presently a trumpet blast reached the ear, and a ship was seen sailing
up the James with the red cross of St. George flying from the masthead.
This was the _Ph[oe]nix_, a marine ph[oe]nix, rising from the sea after
"many perrills of extreame storms and tempests." This happy arrival of
Captain Nelson, "having been three months missing after Captain Newport's
arrivall, being to all our expectations lost, having been long crossed
with tempestuous weather and contrary winds, did so ravish us with
exceeding joy that now wee thought ourselves as well fitted as our harts
could wish both with a competent number of men as also for all other
needful provisions till a further supply could come to us." Captain
Francis Nelson, "an honest man and expert mariner," turned his back on
the "fantastical gold," and freighted his ship for her return voyage
with cedar; and when he sailed for home he took with him the gold-hunting
Captain Martin, and Smith's "True Relation of Virginia,"--the first book
written by an Englishman in America,--which was printed at the Greyhound
in Paul's Churchyard in London.
[Illustration: Old Fort--Jamestown Island.
Copyright, 1906, by Jamestown Official Photo. Corp'n. ]
Our colonists were living so near the Indian Court, that stirring
incidents were constantly occurring to prevent indulgence in peace and
security. Powhatan soon sent Captain Smith a present of twenty turkeys,
upon condition he should in return receive twenty swords. Smith knew that
Newport had been most imprudent in putting arms in the Indians' hands, so
he accepted the turkeys and returned the usual gifts,--copper kettles,
toys, etc.,--at which his Savage Majesty was hugely displeased. He had
sent his "Christian" boy, Thomas Savage, with the turkeys, but certain
indications of Powhatan's treachery induced Smith to keep the boy. An
Indian was captured and frightened into disclosure of Powhatan's plot to
murder the English as soon as the Indian Namontack should be returned by
Newport. Thefts of spades, shovels, swords, and tools were continually
occurring, and it was discovered that Powhatan had received these stolen
goods. Finally several Paspaheghans were arrested and imprisoned in the
fort. The Indians could never suffer the capture of their men, but would
always ransom them with fair words, presents, and promises.
Powhatan, hearing that his braves were detained, "sent his Daughter
a child of tenne years old," accompanied by "Rawhunt, exceeding in
deformitie of person, but of a subtil wit and crafty understanding," to
beg their release. The little girl, he knew, would be refused nothing
by the man whose life had been spared for her sake. She had crossed the
York in a canoe, and walked twelve miles through the woods. We can see
Captain Smith, delighted with the sight of her pretty face and graceful,
childish figure, and refreshing her with the best of the dainties Captain
Nelson had left. His sympathy with children we have already noticed.
Indeed, there is no doubt that Pocahontas was a high favourite with all
the colony. No other female, child or woman, ever visited it until Madame
Forrest and Ann Burras arrived in the following December,--nearly two
years after the coming of the English.
"Rawhunt" (says Smith, whose words are always better than mine), "with
a long circumstance told mee how well Powhatan loved and respected mee;
and in that I should no doubt any way of his kindnesse, he had sent his
child which he most esteemed to see me; a Deare and bread besides for
a present: desiring me that the Boy [Savage] might come againe which he
loved exceedingly. His little Daughter hee had taught this lesson also,
not taking notice at all of the Indeans that had beene prisoners three
daies, till that morning that she saw their fathers and friends come
quietly, and in good tearmes to entreate their libertie. In the afternoon
we guarded them to the Church, and after prayer gave them to Pocahontas,
the King's Daughter, in regard of her father's kindnesse in sending her.
After having well fed them, as all the time of their imprisonment, we gave
them their bowes, arrowes or what else they had and with much content sent
them packing. Pocahontas also we requited with such trifles as contented
her, to tell that we had used the Paspaheyans very kindly in releasing
them."[42] The "Boy" evidently was not returned. The ambassador of a
subtle wit and crafty understanding, failed, it appears, to accomplish
everything.
I give the age of the little princess as Smith gives it. Other historians
have advanced it two years.[43] Yet another class of her admirers fondly
hope she was fourteen years of age, for then she would have been old
enough to fall in love with Captain Smith, pine at his coldness, break her
heart at finding him after her marriage alive, and broken-hearted die in
England. I am personally anxious to believe she could have been not more
than ten or eleven years old when she came with Rawhunt to beg for the
release of the prisoners. Smith says "tenne years old."
It must have been during this summer that she came so often to Jamestown.
Strachey, our learned, reliable historian, describes the dress of Indian
maids and matrons, and informs us that girls before twelve years of age
wore none at all in summer. He says, "the before-mentionde Pocahontas,
a well-featured, but wanton young girle, Powhatan's daughter, sometymes
resorting to our fort, of the age then of eleven or twelve years; would
get the boyes forth with her to the market place, and make them wheele,
falling on their hands, turning their heeles upwards; whome she would
follow and wheele soe herselfe, naked as she was, all the fort over."
This could not have happened had she been older than eleven or twelve,
nor could it have happened in winter. The next summer she would have
been too old for such a pastime and such attire. A recent journal tells
us that Alphonso of Spain was fond of this sport (wheeling on hands and
feet) the summer he went a-wooing before his marriage. I might, therefore,
imagine it to be an amusement of royalty, had I not seen little negroes in
Virginia excel in it. Evidently it was not given us, by the Indians, along
with corn and tobacco. Those wild English "boyes" at the fort taught it
to our little American princess, and if Strachey failed to admire her,--to
find Helen's beauty in a brow of Egypt,--he was unfortunate, besides being
wofully in a minority. All the other Englishmen delighted in her, whatever
she did; and she cordially liked them, and dearly loved the captain who
taught her to call him "father."
We may be sure that she could not have visited the fort so familiarly
without attracting the notice and interest of the good missionary and
clergyman. An Indian boy named "Chanco" was also a favourite with the
colonists, and was the means, like Pocahontas, of rendering essential
service to them. Like her he became a Christian; and I can but think
that both were taught in their early years by that holy man of God,
Robert Hunt. But here the similitude ceases. She saved the life of John
Smith, and perhaps one other: he saved the lives of all the colonists at
Jamestown. She is justly to be immortalized in bronze on the soil that
but for him would have been bathed in Christian blood; yet no statue of
Chanco will tell the world of his heroic action.
"There was a little city and few men within it, and there came a great
king against it.... Now there was a poor man and he delivered the
city--yet no man remembered that poor man."