Chapter 51

The clamors became so loud that Smith punished the ringleader, one Dyer, a crafty fellow, and his ancient maligner, and then made one of his conciliatory addresses. Having shown them how impossible it was to get corn, and reminded them of his own exertions, and that he had always shared with them anything he had, he told them that he should stand their nonsense no longer; he should force the idle to work, and punish them if they railed; if any attempted to escape to Newfoundland in the pinnace they would arrive at the gallows; the sick should not starve; every man able must work, and every man who did not gather as much in a day as he did should be put out of the fort as a drone.

Such was the effect of this speech that of the two hundred only seven died in this pinching time, except those who were drowned; no man died of want. Captain Winne and Master Leigh had died before this famine occurred. Many of the men were billeted among the savages, who used them well, and stood in such awe of the power at the fort that they dared not wrong the whites out of a pin. The Indians caught Smith's humor, and some of the men who ran away to seek Kemps and Tussore were mocked and ridiculed, and had applied to them --Smith's law of "who cannot work must not eat;" they were almost starved and beaten nearly to death. After amusing himself with them, Kemps returned the fugitives, whom Smith punished until they were content to labor at home, rather than adventure to live idly among the savages, "of whom," says our shrewd chronicler, "there was more hope to make better christians and good subjects than the one half of them that counterfeited themselves both." The Indians were in such subjection that any who were punished at the fort would beg the President not to tell their chief, for they would be again punished at home and sent back for another round.

We hear now of the last efforts to find traces of the lost colony of Sir Walter Raleigh. Master Sicklemore returned from the Chawwonoke (Chowan River) with no tidings of them; and Master Powell, and Anas Todkill who had been conducted to the Mangoags, in the regions south of the James, could learn nothing but that they were all dead. The king of this country was a very proper, devout, and friendly man; he acknowledged that our God exceeded his as much as our guns did his bows and arrows, and asked the President to pray his God for him, for all the gods of the Mangoags were angry.

The Dutchmen and one Bentley, another fugitive, who were with Powhatan, continued to plot against the colony, and the President employed a Swiss, named William Volday, to go and regain them with promises of pardon. Volday turned out to be a hypocrite, and a greater rascal than the others. Many of the discontented in the fort were brought into the scheme, which was, with Powhatan's aid, to surprise and destroy Jamestown. News of this getting about in the fort, there was a demand that the President should cut off these Dutchmen. Percy and Cuderington, two gentlemen, volunteered to do it; but Smith sent instead Master Wiffin and Jeffrey Abbot, to go and stab them or shoot them. But the Dutchmen were too shrewd to be caught, and Powhatan sent a conciliatory message that he did not detain the Dutchmen, nor hinder the slaying of them.

While this plot was simmering, and Smith was surrounded by treachery inside the fort and outside, and the savages were being taught that King James would kill Smith because he had used the Indians so unkindly, Captain Argall and Master Thomas Sedan arrived out in a well-furnished vessel, sent by Master Cornelius to trade and fish for sturgeon. The wine and other good provision of the ship were so opportune to the necessities of the colony that the President seized them. Argall lost his voyage; his ship was revictualed and sent back to England, but one may be sure that this event was so represented as to increase the fostered dissatisfaction with Smith in London. For one reason or another, most of the persons who returned had probably carried a bad report of him. Argall brought to Jamestown from London a report of great complaints of him for his dealings with the savages and not returning ships freighted with the products of the country. Misrepresented in London, and unsupported and conspired against in Virginia, Smith felt his fall near at hand. On the face of it he was the victim of envy and the rascality of incompetent and bad men; but whatever his capacity for dealing with savages, it must be confessed that he lacked something which conciliates success with one's own people. A new commission was about to be issued, and a great supply was in preparation under Lord De La Ware.

XIII

SMITH'S LAST DAYS IN VIRGINIA

The London company were profoundly dissatisfied with the results of the Virginia colony. The South Sea was not discovered, no gold had turned up, there were no valuable products from the new land, and the promoters received no profits on their ventures. With their expectations, it is not to be wondered at that they were still further annoyed by the quarreling amongst the colonists themselves, and wished to begin over again.

A new charter, dated May 23, 1609, with enlarged powers, was got from King James. Hundreds of corporators were named, and even thousands were included in the various London trades and guilds that were joined in the enterprise. Among the names we find that of Captain John Smith. But he was out of the Council, nor was he given then or ever afterward any place or employment in Virginia, or in the management of its affairs. The grant included all the American coast two hundred miles north and two hundred miles south of Point Comfort, and all the territory from the coast up into the land throughout from sea to sea, west and northwest. A leading object of the project still being (as we have seen it was with Smith's precious crew at Jamestown) the conversion and reduction of the natives to the true religion, no one was permitted in the colony who had not taken the oath of supremacy.

Under this charter the Council gave a commission to Sir Thomas West, Lord Delaware, Captain-General of Virginia; Sir Thomas Gates, Lieutenant-General; Sir George Somers, Admiral; Captain Newport, Vice-Admiral; Sir Thomas Dale, High Marshal; Sir Frederick Wainman, General of the Horse, and many other officers for life.

With so many wealthy corporators money flowed into the treasury, and a great expedition was readily fitted out. Towards the end of May, 1609, there sailed from England nine ships and five hundred people, under the command of Sir Thomas Gates, Sir George Somers, and Captain Newport. Each of these commanders had a commission, and the one who arrived first was to call in the old commission; as they could not agree, they all sailed in one ship, the Sea Venture.

This brave expedition was involved in a contest with a hurricane; one vessel was sunk, and the Sea Venture, with the three commanders, one hundred and fifty men, the new commissioners, bills of lading, all sorts of instructions, and much provision, was wrecked on the Bermudas. With this company was William Strachey, of whom we shall hear more hereafter. Seven vessels reached Jamestown, and brought, among other annoyances, Smith's old enemy, Captain Ratcliffe, alias Sicklemore, in command of a ship. Among the company were also Captains Martin, Archer, Wood, Webbe, Moore, King, Davis, and several gentlemen of good means, and a crowd of the riff-raff of London. Some of these Captains whom Smith had sent home, now returned with new pretensions, and had on the voyage prejudiced the company against him. When the fleet was first espied, the President thought it was Spaniards, and prepared to defend himself, the Indians promptly coming to his assistance.

This hurricane tossed about another expedition still more famous, that of Henry Hudson, who had sailed from England on his third voyage toward Nova Zembla March 25th, and in July and August was beating down the Atlantic coast. On the 18th of August he entered the Capes of Virginia, and sailed a little way up the Bay. He knew he was at the mouth of the James River, "where our Englishmen are," as he says. The next day a gale from the northeast made him fear being driven aground in the shallows, and he put to sea. The storm continued for several days. On the 21st "a sea broke over the fore-course and split it;" and that night something more ominous occurred: "that night [the chronicle records] our cat ran crying from one side of the ship to the other, looking overboard, which made us to wonder, but we saw nothing." On the 26th they were again off the bank of Virginia, and in the very bay and in sight of the islands they had seen on the 18th. It appeared to Hudson "a great bay with rivers," but too shallow to explore without a small boat. After lingering till the 29th, without any suggestion of ascending the James, he sailed northward and made the lucky stroke of river exploration which immortalized him.

It seems strange that he did not search for the English colony, but the adventurers of that day were independent actors, and did not care to share with each other the glories of discovery.

The first of the scattered fleet of Gates and Somers came in on the 11th, and the rest straggled along during the three or four days following. It was a narrow chance that Hudson missed them all, and one may imagine that the fate of the Virginia colony and of the New York settlement would have been different if the explorer of the Hudson had gone up the James.

No sooner had the newcomers landed than trouble began. They would have deposed Smith on report of the new commission, but they could show no warrant. Smith professed himself willing to retire to England, but, seeing the new commission did not arrive, held on to his authority, and began to enforce it to save the whole colony from anarchy. He depicts the situation in a paragraph: "To a thousand mischiefs these lewd Captains led this lewd company, wherein were many unruly gallants, packed thither by their friends to escape ill destinies, and those would dispose and determine of the government, sometimes to one, the next day to another; today the old commission must rule, tomorrow the new, the next day neither; in fine, they would rule all or ruin all; yet in charity we must endure them thus to destroy us, or by correcting their follies, have brought the world's censure upon us to be guilty of their blouds. Happie had we beene had they never arrived, and we forever abandoned, as we were left to our fortunes; for on earth for their number was never more confusion or misery than their factions occasioned." In this company came a boy, named Henry Spelman, whose subsequent career possesses considerable interest.

The President proceeded with his usual vigor: he "laid by the heels" the chief mischief-makers till he should get leisure to punish them; sent Mr. West with one hundred and twenty good men to the Falls to make a settlement; and despatched Martin with near as many and their proportion of provisions to Nansemond, on the river of that name emptying into the James, obliquely opposite Point Comfort.

Lieutenant Percy was sick and had leave to depart for England when he chose. The President's year being about expired, in accordance with the charter, he resigned, and Captain Martin was elected President. But knowing his inability, he, after holding it three hours, resigned it to Smith, and went down to Nansemond. The tribe used him kindly, but he was so frightened with their noisy demonstration of mirth that he surprised and captured the poor naked King with his houses, and began fortifying his position, showing so much fear that the savages were emboldened to attack him, kill some of his men, release their King, and carry off a thousand bushels of corn which had been purchased, Martin not offering to intercept them. The frightened Captain sent to Smith for aid, who despatched to him thirty good shot. Martin, too chicken-hearted to use them, came back with them to Jamestown, leaving his company to their fortunes. In this adventure the President commends the courage of one George Forrest, who, with seventeen arrows sticking into him and one shot through him, lived six or seven days.

Meantime Smith, going up to the Falls to look after Captain West, met that hero on his way to Jamestown. He turned him back, and found that he had planted his colony on an unfavorable flat, subject not only to the overflowing of the river, but to more intolerable inconveniences. To place him more advantageously the President sent to Powhatan, offering to buy the place called Powhatan, promising to defend him against the Monacans, to pay him in copper, and make a general alliance of trade and friendship.

But "those furies," as Smith calls West and his associates, refused to move to Powhatan or to accept these conditions. They contemned his authority, expecting all the time the new commission, and, regarding all the Monacans' country as full of gold, determined that no one should interfere with them in the possession of it. Smith, however, was not intimidated from landing and attempting to quell their mutiny. In his "General Historie" it is written "I doe more than wonder to think how onely with five men he either durst or would adventure as he did (knowing how greedy they were of his bloud) to come amongst them." He landed and ordered the arrest of the chief disturbers, but the crowd hustled him off. He seized one of their boats and escaped to the ship which contained the provision. Fortunately the sailors were friendly and saved his life, and a considerable number of the better sort, seeing the malice of Ratcliffe and Archer, took Smith's part.

Out of the occurrences at this new settlement grew many of the charges which were preferred against Smith. According to the "General Historie" the company of Ratcliffe and Archer was a disorderly rabble, constantly tormenting the Indians, stealing their corn, robbing their gardens, beating them, and breaking into their houses and taking them prisoners. The Indians daily complained to the President that these "protectors" he had given them were worse enemies than the Monacans, and desired his pardon if they defended themselves, since he could not punish their tormentors. They even proposed to fight for him against them. Smith says that after spending nine days in trying to restrain them, and showing them how they deceived themselves with "great guilded hopes of the South Sea Mines," he abandoned them to their folly and set sail for Jamestown.

No sooner was he under way than the savages attacked the fort, slew many of the whites who were outside, rescued their friends who were prisoners, and thoroughly terrified the garrison. Smith's ship happening to go aground half a league below, they sent off to him, and were glad to submit on any terms to his mercy. He "put by the heels" six or seven of the chief offenders, and transferred the colony to Powhatan, where were a fort capable of defense against all the savages in Virginia, dry houses for lodging, and two hundred acres of ground ready to be planted. This place, so strong and delightful in situation, they called Non-such. The savages appeared and exchanged captives, and all became friends again.

At this moment, unfortunately, Captain West returned. All the victuals and munitions having been put ashore, the old factious projects were revived. The soft-hearted West was made to believe that the rebellion had been solely on his account. Smith, seeing them bent on their own way, took the row-boat for Jamestown. The colony abandoned the pleasant Non-such and returned to the open air at West's Fort. On his way down, Smith met with the accident that suddenly terminated his career in Virginia.

While he was sleeping in his boat his powder-bag was accidentally fired; the explosion tore the flesh from his body and thighs, nine or ten inches square, in the most frightful manner. To quench the tormenting fire, frying him in his clothes, he leaped into the deep river, where, ere they could recover him, he was nearly drowned. In this pitiable condition, without either surgeon or surgery, he was to go nearly a hundred miles.

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 of the distinguished antiquarian, Sir Henry Spelman, of Coughan, Norfolk, who was married in 1581. It is reasonably conjectured that he could not have been over twenty-one when in May, 1609, he joined the company going to Virginia. Henry was evidently a scapegrace, whose friends were willing to be rid of him. Such being his character, it is more than probable that he was shipped bound as an apprentice, and of course with the conditions of apprenticeship in like expeditions of that period--to be sold or bound out at the end of the voyage to pay for his passage. He remained for several years in Virginia, living most of the time among the Indians, and a sort of indifferent go between of the savages and the settlers. According to his own story it was on October 20, 1609, that he was taken up the river to Powhatan by Captain Smith, and it was in April, 1613, that he was rescued from his easy-setting captivity on the Potomac by Captain Argall. During his sojourn in Virginia, or more probably shortly after his return to England, he wrote a brief and bungling narration of his experiences in the colony, and a description of Indian life. The MS. was not printed in his time, but mislaid or forgotten. By a strange series of chances it turned up in our day, and was identified and prepared for the press in 1861. Before the proof was read, the type was accidentally broken up and the MS. again mislaid. Lost sight of for several years, it was recovered and a small number of copies of it were printed at London in 1872, edited by Mr. James F. Hunnewell.

Spelman's narration would be very important if we could trust it. He appeared to have set down what he saw, and his story has a certain simplicity that gains for it some credit. But he was a reckless boy, unaccustomed to weigh evidence, and quite likely to write as facts the rumors that he heard. He took very readily to the ways of Indian life. Some years after, Spelman returned to Virginia with the title of Captain, and in 1617 we find this reference to him in the "General Historie": "Here, as at many other times, we are beholden to Capt. Henry Spilman, an interpreter, a gentleman that lived long time in this country, and sometimes a prisoner among the Salvages, and done much good service though but badly rewarded." Smith would probably not have left this on record had he been aware of the contents of the MS. that Spelman had left for after-times.

Spelman begins his Relation, from which I shall quote substantially, without following the spelling or noting all the interlineations, with the reason for his emigration, which was, "being in displeasure of my friends, and desirous to see other countries." After a brief account of the voyage and the joyful arrival at Jamestown, the Relation continues:

"Having here unloaded our goods and bestowed some senight or fortnight in viewing the country, I was carried by Capt. Smith, our President, to the Falls, to the little Powhatan, where, unknown to me, he sold me to him for a town called Powhatan; and, leaving me with him, the little Powhatan, he made known to Capt. West how he had bought a town for them to dwell in. Whereupon Capt. West, growing angry because he had bestowed cost to begin a town in another place, Capt. Smith desiring that Capt. West would come and settle himself there, but Capt. West, having bestowed cost to begin a town in another place, misliked it, and unkindness thereupon arising between them, Capt. Smith at that time replied little, but afterward combined with Powhatan to kill Capt. West, which plot took but small effect, for in the meantime Capt. Smith was apprehended and sent aboard for England."

That this roving boy was "thrown in" as a makeweight in the trade for the town is not impossible; but that Smith combined with Powhatan to kill Captain West is doubtless West's perversion of the offer of the Indians to fight on Smith's side against him.

According to Spelman's Relation, he stayed only seven or eight days with the little Powhatan, when he got leave to go to Jamestown, being desirous to see the English and to fetch the small articles that belonged to him. The Indian King agreed to wait for him at that place, but he stayed too long, and on his return the little Powhatan had departed, and Spelman went back to Jamestown. Shortly after, the great Powhatan sent Thomas Savage with a present of venison to President Percy. Savage was loath to return alone, and Spelman was appointed to go with him, which he did willingly, as victuals were scarce in camp. He carried some copper and a hatchet, which he presented to Powhatan, and that Emperor treated him and his comrade very kindly, seating them at his own mess-table. After some three weeks of this life, Powhatan sent this guileless youth down to decoy the English into his hands, promising to freight a ship with corn if they would visit him. Spelman took the message and brought back the English reply, whereupon Powhatan laid the plot which resulted in the killing of Captain Ratcliffe and thirty-eight men, only two of his company escaping to Jamestown. Spelman gives two versions of this incident. During the massacre Spelman says that Powhatan sent him and Savage to a town some sixteen miles away. Smith's "General Historie" says that on this occasion "Pocahuntas saved a boy named Henry Spilman that lived many years afterward, by her means, among the Patawomekes." Spelman says not a word about Pocahuntas. On the contrary, he describes the visit of the King of the Patawomekes to Powhatan; says that the King took a fancy to him; that he and Dutch Samuel, fearing for their lives, escaped from Powhatan's town; were pursued; that Samuel was killed, and that Spelman, after dodging about in the forest, found his way to the Potomac, where he lived with this good King Patomecke at a place called Pasptanzie for more than a year. Here he seems to have passed his time agreeably, for although he had occasional fights with the squaws of Patomecke, the King was always his friend, and so much was he attached to the boy that he would not give him up to Captain Argall without some copper in exchange.

When Smith returned wounded to Jamestown, he was physically in no condition to face the situation. With no medical attendance, his death was not improbable. He had no strength to enforce discipline nor organize expeditions for supplies; besides, he was acting under a commission whose virtue had expired, and the mutinous spirits rebelled against his authority. Ratcliffe, Archer, and the others who were awaiting trial conspired against him, and Smith says he would have been murdered in his bed if the murderer's heart had not failed him when he went to fire his pistol at the defenseless sick man. However, Smith was forced to yield to circumstances. No sooner had he given out that he would depart for England than they persuaded Mr. Percy to stay and act as President, and all eyes were turned in expectation of favor upon the new commanders. Smith being thus divested of authority, the most of the colony turned against him; many preferred charges, and began to collect testimony. "The ships were detained three weeks to get up proofs of his ill-conduct"--"time and charges," says Smith, dryly, "that might much better have been spent."