When I consented to prepare this volume for a series, which should
deal with the notables of American history with some familiarity and
disregard of historic gravity, I did not anticipate the seriousness of
the task. But investigation of the subject showed me that while Captain
John Smith would lend himself easily enough to the purely facetious
treatment, there were historic problems worthy of a different handling,
and that if the life of Smith was to be written, an effort should be
made to state the truth, and to disentangle the career of the adventurer
from the fables and misrepresentations that have clustered about it.
The extant biographies of Smith, and the portions of the history of
Virginia that relate to him, all follow his own narrative, and accept
his estimate of himself, and are little more than paraphrases of his
story as told by himself. But within the last twenty years some new
contemporary evidence has come to light, and special scholars have
expended much critical research upon different portions of his career.
The result of this modern investigation has been to discredit much of
the romance gathered about Smith and Pocahontas, and a good deal to
reduce his heroic proportions. A vague report of--these scholarly
studies has gone abroad, but no effort has been made to tell the real
story of Smith as a connected whole in the light of the new researches.
This volume is an effort to put in popular form the truth about Smith's
adventures, and to estimate his exploits and character. For this purpose
I have depended almost entirely upon original contemporary material,
illumined as it now is by the labors of special editors. I believe that
I have read everything that is attributed to his pen, and have compared
his own accounts with other contemporary narratives, and I think I have
omitted the perusal of little that could throw any light upon his
life or character. For the early part of his career--before he came to
Virginia--there is absolutely no authority except Smith himself; but
when he emerges from romance into history, he can be followed and
checked by contemporary evidence. If he was always and uniformly
untrustworthy it would be less perplexing to follow him, but his
liability to tell the truth when vanity or prejudice does not interfere
is annoying to the careful student.
As far as possible I have endeavored to let the actors in these pages
tell their own story, and I have quoted freely from Capt. Smith himself,
because it is as a writer that he is to be judged no less than as an
actor. His development of the Pocahontas legend has been carefully
traced, and all the known facts about that Indian--or Indese, as some
of the old chroniclers call the female North Americans--have been
consecutively set forth in separate chapters. The book is not a history
of early Virginia, nor of the times of Smith, but merely a study of his
life and writings. If my estimate of the character of Smith is not that
which his biographers have entertained, and differs from his own candid
opinion, I can only plead that contemporary evidence and a collation of
his own stories show that he was mistaken. I am not aware that there has
been before any systematic effort to collate his different accounts
of his exploits. If he had ever undertaken the task, he might have
disturbed that serene opinion of himself which marks him as a man who
realized his own ideals.
The works used in this study are, first, the writings of Smith, which
are as follows:
“A True Relation,” etc., London, 1608.
“A Map of Virginia, Description and Appendix,” Oxford, 1612.
“A Description of New England,” etc., London, 1616.
“New England's Trials,” etc., London, 1620. Second edition, enlarged,
1622.
“The Generall Historie,” etc., London, 1624. Reissued, with date of
title-page altered, in 1626, 1627, and twice in 1632.
“An Accidence: or, The Pathway to Experience,” etc., London, 1626.
“A Sea Grammar,” etc., London, 1627. Also editions in 1653 and 1699.
“The True Travels,” etc., London, 1630.
“Advertisements for the Unexperienced Planters of New England,” etc.,
London, 1631.
Other authorities are:
“The Historie of Travaile into Virginia,” etc., by William Strachey,
Secretary of the colony 1609 to 1612. First printed for the Hakluyt
Society, London, 1849.
“Newport's Relatyon,” 1607. Am. Ant. Soc., Vol. 4.
“Wingfield's Discourse,” etc., 1607. Am. Ant. Soc., Vol. 4.
“Purchas his Pilgrimage,” London, 1613.
“Purchas his Pilgrimes,” London, 1625-6.
“Ralph Hamor's True Discourse,” etc., London, 1615.
“Relation of Virginia,” by Henry Spelman, 1609. First printed by J. F.
Hunnewell, London, 1872.
“History of the Virginia Company in London,” by Edward D. Neill, Albany,
1869.
“William Stith's History of Virginia,” 1753, has been consulted for the
charters and letters-patent. The Pocahontas discussion has been followed
in many magazine papers. I am greatly indebted to the scholarly labors
of Charles Deane, LL.D., the accomplished editor of the “True Relation,”
and other Virginia monographs. I wish also to acknowledge the courtesy
of the librarians of the Astor, the Lenox, the New York Historical,
Yale, and Cornell libraries, and of Dr. J. Hammond Trumbull, the
custodian of the Brinley collection, and the kindness of Mr. S. L. M.
Barlow of New York, who is ever ready to give students access to his
rich “Americana.”