Virginia Coastal Zone Management - Spring/Summer 2007
See PDF of this issue for accompanying images.
Learn More From These Websites
http://historicjamestowne.org/index.php - Association for the Preservation of Virginia Antiquities’ Historic Jamestowne website, including updates on the Jamestown Rediscovery dig.
www.apva.org/jr.html - APVA’s Jamestown Rediscovery archaeological project website.
www.nps.gov/jame - National Park Service’s Historic Jamestowne website.
www.jamestown2007.org/ - Official Jamestown 2007 event website, from the Jamestown- Yorktown Foundation.
www.mariner.org/chesapeakebay/colonial/col009.html - The Mariners Museum Interactive John Smith 1612 Map of Virginia.
www.virtualjamestown.org/ - Virtual Jamestown Archive - featuring texts of original documents from Jamestown settlement. A project of the Virginia Center for Digital History.
www.historyisfun.org/ - Jamestown Settlement, administered by the Jamestown-Yorktown Foundation, a Virginia agency.
A Site 400 Years in the Making
By Virginia Witmer, Outreach Coordinator
“The six and twentieth day of April, about four o’clock in the morning, we descried the land of Virginia; the same day we entered into the Bay of Chesupioc we could find nothing worth the speaking of but fair meadows and goodly tall trees, with such fresh waters running through the woods as I was almost ravished at the first sight thereof.” -- George Percy, member of the Virginia Company
Following that “first landing” (now site of First Landing State Park in Virginia Beach), the explorers pressed on, looking for a secure place to settle, away from the channel and safe from Spanish ships. The English, like the Spanish before them, were looking for ways to benefit from North America.
Jamestown’s Birth
On May 14, 1607, the Virginia Company ships landed on Jamestown Island, a peninsula on the banks of the James River, 60 miles from the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay.
The inhabitants of Jamestown then began a struggle to survive that lasted well over a decade and was punctuated by conflict - within their group and with their Native American neighbors - and by starvation and disease - Jamestown was not a healthy place to live (mosquitoes carried diseases, the weather was hot, water was not always potable from the river and food was scarce). The settlers could not know that they also arrived in the middle of a multi-year drought. Over half of the settlers died within that first year of arrival, many from disease, and more deaths followed during the “starving time” in 1609.
But the settlement survived. And it grew and expanded into the late 17th century, leaving legacies quintessential to the American spirit - among them, private enterprise and representative government. This venture by the Virginia Company was a money-making one, and although many attempts at starting industries failed, tobacco became the settlement’s key export crop. The first representative assembly in the New World convened in the Jamestown church on July 30, 1619. It became the model for assemblies in other colonies.
Jamestown’s Changing Role in History
Jamestown remained the capital of Virginia until its major statehouse, was burned in 1698. The capital was moved to Williamsburg that year and Jamestown began to slowly disappear. By the 1750s the land was primarily owned and heavily cultivated by two families. A military post was located on the island during the American Revolution, and American and British prisoners were exchanged there. In 1861, the island was occupied by Confederate soldiers who built an earth fort near the church as part of the defense system to block the Union advance up the James River. Little further attention was paid to Jamestown until preservation was undertaken in the twentieth century.
Jamestown’s Rebirth
In 1893, Mr. And Mrs. Edward Barney, owners of the 1500-acre site of Jamestown, gifted 22 ½ acres to the Association for the Preservation of Virginia Antiquities (APVA). This area, now known as “Old Towne,” includes the 1639 church tower and is also the location of the James Fort. By 1893, erosion had eaten away the island’s western shore and James Fort was presumed to lay completely underwater. With federal assistance, a sea wall was constructed in 1900 to protect the area from further erosion. The remaining acreage on the island, the area into which settlement expanded during the 17th century, and now known as “New Towne”, was acquired by the National Park Service (NPS) in 1934 as part of the Colonial National Historical Park. In 1994, archaeologist William Kelso discovered the footprint of James Fort. Today, Historic Jamestowne is jointly operated by the APVA and NPS.
The archaeologists and additional interpretive staff at Historic Jamestowne help visitors understand the significance of the finds and of the information to be derived from subtle signs in the dirt. An “archaearium,” a state-of-the-art interpretive and exhibit space, opened in May 2006. A new National Park Service visitors center opened late in 2006 to tell the history of Jamestown before and after the arrival of the English.
As we celebrate the 400th anniversary of the founding of Jamestown, plan to spend at least a day at Historic Jamestowne and Jamestown Settlement. There is a lot to see and much more to ponder. Jamestown Settlement, operated by the Jamestown-Yorktown Foundation (Commonwealth of Virginia), is located adjacent to the entrance of Historic Jamestowne.
Jamestown Settlement is a living-history and educational center that includes an opportunity to board replicas of the ships - the Susan Constant, Godspeed and Discovery. When you disembark, there are galleries to explore, a film to catch which details the cultures that came together at Jamestown (Indian, British and African), and a re-created Powhatan Village and James Fort, where you can engage in period activities, such as grinding corn or playing quoits. Interpretive staff help you step back into the daily life of a 17th-century colonist.
