Category: Biographies

Captain John Smith

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 Captai...

Chapters

9. Chapter 9

The next contemporary document to which we have occasion to refer is Smith's Letter to the Treasurer and Council of Virginia in England, written in Virginia after the arrival of...

16. Chapter 16

Smith describes with considerable particularity the coast, giving the names of the Indian tribes, and cataloguing the native productions, vegetable and animal. He bestows his fa...

7. Chapter 7

For this he was condemned to be hanged; but “before he turned of the lather,” he desired to speak privately with the President, and thereupon accused Mr. Kendall--who had been r...

4. Chapter 4

After a few days the natives came off in boats to visit them, proper people and civil in their behavior, bringing with them the King's brother, Granganameo (Quangimino, says Str...

1. Chapter 1

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...

15. Chapter 15

If further evidence were wanting, we have it in “The New Life of Virginia,” published by authority of the Council, London, 1612. This is the second part of the “Nova Britannia,”...

6. Chapter 6

Next day they went ashore at a place Newport calls Queen Apumatuc's Bower. This Queen, who owed allegiance to Powhatan, had much land under cultivation, and dwelt in state on a...

11. Chapter 11

They anchored at night at a place called Richard's Cliffs, north of the Pawtuxet, and from thence went on till they reached the first river navigable for ships, which they named...

3. Chapter 3

Affairs in Transylvania did not mend even after the capture of Regall, and of the three Turks' heads, and the destruction of so many villages. This fruitful and strong country w...

14. Chapter 14

It is now time for the appearance upon the scene of the boy Henry Spelman, with his brief narration, which touches this period of Smith's life. Henry Spelman was the third son o...

13. Chapter 13

The Dutchman was captured, who, notwithstanding his excuses that he had escaped from Powhatan and did not intend to return, but was only walking in the woods to gather walnuts,...

2. Chapter 2

In this strait, the ingenious John Smith, who was present in the reconnoitering army in the regiment of the Earl of Meldritch, came to the aid of Baron Kisell, the general of ar...

12. Chapter 12

For the charge of the voyage of two or three thousand pounds we have not received the value of one hundred pounds, and for the quartered boat to be borne by the souldiers over t...

10. Chapter 10

We should like to think original, in the above, the fine passage, in which Smith, by means of a simple compass dial, demonstrated the roundness of the earth, and skies, the sphe...

5. Chapter 5

In George Percy's Discourse concerning Captain Newport's exploration of the River James in 1607 (printed in Purchas's “Pilgrims”) is this sentence: “At Port Cotage, in our voyag...

17. Chapter 17

Smith's maxims were excellent, his notions of settling New England were sound and sensible, and if writing could have put him in command of New England, there would have been no...

18. Chapter 18

Even as late as this time many supposed New England to be an island, but Smith again asserts, what he had always maintained--that it was a part of the continent. The expedition...

8. Chapter 8

Everything was now ready for the journey to Powhatan. Smith had the barge and eight men for trading and discovery, and the pinnace was to follow to take the supplies at convenie...

19. Chapter 19

It is certain he got on well with scarcely anybody with whom he was thrown in his enterprises. He was of common origin, and always carried with him the need of assertion in an i...