Early Jamestown Research Paper

In the document titled “Jamestown’s Environment”, it says that the tides caused saltwater to overflow into their drinking water, turning it into brackish water, deeming it undrinkable. Also, in the document “Rainfall in Jamestown”, you can see that in there was a large drought during the first 5 years that Jamestown was established, which didn’t really help crop growth. Finally, in “Chronology of English Mortality”, it talks about how the area bred disease that constantly sickened many of the settlers and even killed them. So, all of that can connect back to the thesis since the diseases and lack of water ended killing so many of the

This is shown by document D which shows a trading incident between the Native Americans and the settlers. Francis West and thirty six men sailed up the Bay to try to trade for corn. Instead, the settlers received grain after “some harshe and crewell dealinge by the cut of towe of the salvages heads and other extrymetyes.” This lost all trust between the two groups, if there was some before. This also shows the tension between the two groups and the unwillingness to benefit from each other, essentially and mostly on the colonist’s part.

There are many people died in Jamestown. The first reason of why did so many colonists die at Jamestown is because of the native. In Document B “Principal Powhatan and English Settlements, 1607-1611” the map shows that Jamestown is surrounded by Powhatan settlement and water. This is important because when the settlement brought up trouble with Indians, they will have nowhere to go. Bad relationship with Indians brings more death. Another reason is the environment of Jamestown. In Document C: Rainfall, the graph compares the amount of rain before the settlers arrive Jamestown and after. Settlers arrived Jamestown in 1607, which is the time that Jamestown is facing drought. This is important because the drought makes the crop unable to grow

King James I approved of the first colonist ship in 1607 which would create Jamestown. These 110 people originally came for riches. Many colonists died in Jamestown because the English were not prepared to survive against starvation and Indian attacks. Document B is a chronology (timeline) based of a magazine by J. Frederick Fausz. The magazine is entitled “An Abundance of Bloodshed on Both Sides: England’s First Indian War, 1609-1614.”

Disease wiped out a number of colonists and was very difficult to stop. The main cause of disease was the filthy water the colonists were drinking. “Disease in the early years (attributed) to Jamestown’s position at the salt-fresh water transition” (Doc A). Salt would intrude into the fresh water and cause disease to whomever drank the water. But salt wasn’t the only factor that made the water unsanitary. “Filth (was) introduced into the river tended to fester rather than flush away” (Doc A). According to the colonists’ plans, the waste would be washed out through the freshwater transition, but in reality, the waste festered back into the water due to rising sea levels. Many of the Jamestown colonists were wiped out from diseases, and there wasn’t enough doctors to save them all. There were only 2 total surgeons to heal the all the infected colonists (Doc C). With the amount of colonists sick, the amount of doctors at Jamestown was surely not enough to heal all the patients. Disease was one of their biggest challenges because there was no way to overcome it, yet, it was not their only

The tides also contributed in killing colonists because when it is a high tide, the salt water would come into their freshwater rivers and creeks, making the water brackish and would make it bad to drink. Drinking too much brackish water is not good for you and can give you a disease and kill you. The tides also mixed the water which further contaminated the water. Droughts killed many colonists in the Jamestown drought in 1607 to 1611 shown by document B that shows tree rings which

Many Jamestown colonists died because of their lack of preparation. According to the information video, a group of English investors called the Virginia Company paid for this voyage to Jamestown in return for reaping some of the riches collected by the colonists. This idea was widely influenced by the Spanish becoming extremely rich from their successful trip to the New World. In addition, Document A states, that “ahead lay possible riches” for the English men to find. The Englishmen originally did not plan to stay in Jamestown; the reason for sailing to Jamestown was to find gold quickly and return to England to hopefully become as rich as the Spanish. Furthermore, Document C notes that, out of the first supply of men, 43% of the men were gentlemen, who are people defined as a being of wealth not used to working with his hands. In comparison, only about 11% of the original settlers were laborers. This proves that the majority of men lacked actual skill for finding any gold at all, and that there was no way the crew was prepared for this voyage.

The deaths of approximately 440 colonists from Jamestown, England's first permanent colony, got many people wondering "Why did so many colonists die?" There are many factors that caused Jamestown to struggle so much, and begin a voyage back to England. A major reason why many colonials died was because they didn’t bring nearly enough supply's, nor did they try to become friends with their surrounding neighbors, the Native Americans.. The evidence that was discovered lies in documents and or journal entries, nearby plants, and annual weather.

Diseases played a big role in Jamestown’s life throughout their history. Causing “neere halfe” (Document E) of the deaths in Jamestown, there had to be a reason. That reason is “brackish water” (Document A) or unclean water caused by the lack of strong currents in the river all of the disease origins such as feces of animals and humans settles and does not wash away. Since they had the disease in their only freshwater source, the lacked a major resource.

The people in Jamestown set themselves up for failure by picking a bad location and not exploring. The settlers just looked around and thought the land looked nice. As archaeologist Dennis B. Blanton wrote in “Jamestown’s Environment”, “The island is not situated at a point of great natural food abundance, especially relative to other locations very close by...Fish are present in the local streams, but only in the spring and early summer…”(Doc. A) Not only was the location bad that the colonists chose, but also there was an awful food supply. The only food supply that the colonists could get was fish and even the food supply of fish was scarce. The fish caught in the early summer would not last till the winter, when starvation was a high risk. Not having a decent food supply for the winter would kill even more people. In addition to not having a good food supply, they also had little to no rainfall. According to the graph of rainfall in Jamestown, “The Lost Colony And Jamestown Droughts” written in 1998, they got 2 inches less than the average rainfall in the

In the early Jamestown settlement disease was the primary causes of settler deaths. “[D]isease in the early years to Jamestown’s position at the salt/freshwater transition, where filth introduced into the river tended to fester rather than flush away.” -Dennis Blanton, “Jamestown’s Environment” (Source B) The settlers of Jamestown had to put their waste somewhere, so they decided to dump it in the nearby Jamestown River. Instead of flushing away quickly the dirty water filled with human waste just sat there for long periods of time until it eventually did flush away. Because of the cleanliness levels of this dirty water many who chose to drink it got sick and died. “Disease returns, 100 at Jamestown sickened and half the number died.” -Adapted from J. Frederick Fausz, “An Abundance of Bloodshed on Both Sides: England’s First Indian War 1609-1614,” The Virginia Magazine of History and Biography (Source G) When people got sick it happened in vast quantities, so it could spread even quicker and infect more people. The death rate of someone who was sick was also very high, many who were sick ended up dying.

The Jamestown drought was one huge cause of a lack of resources (Doc B). With a drought, it made it harder for the English to grow the little bit of food the settlers were able to grow. The water that was near the Jamestown settlement was mostly brackish (part fresh water and part salt water) water (Doc A). With the water being brackish it made it undrinkable causing the English to have to be careful of where the colonists got their water. After Francis West took the corn from the Patawomeke, he took both the grain and corn back to England knowing it wasn’t enough for the colony to survive, but was enough to make a trip back to England, and so he returned to England (Doc D).

One of North America’s very first colony Jamestown had many people die. Jamestown’s people came from England in search of gold, work, and many more things. However, Jamestown was far from safe and healthy. Lack of food, uncleansed water, and disease caused many deaths throughout the years Jamestown stood. It started when the people of Jamestown ran out of food.

On May 14, 1607, a group of roughly 100 members of a joint venture called the Virginia Company, founded the first permanent English settlement in North America. The Jamestown colonists purpose is to find gold, silver, and other resources all they want is claiming land and riches. Smith left the Jamestown settlers without a strong leader so he left all his people alone. There’s no houses for them, there’s no supplies for them to survive due to the lack of leadership. So the settlers faced many hardships they had not expected. The settlers lacked some skills necessary to contribute for themselves like farming, hunting, etc. Many settlers died not only because of starvation & disease but also during the winter many settlers starve or froze to death because they don’t have anything for that season. After all what happens to them the settler adjusted to their new lives in America. The few remaining colonists turned to local Powhatan Indians to help them learn the process of planting and harvesting corn and tobacco. The settlers relied on

The English settlement of Jamestown, Virginia, was founded on May 14, 1607 by Captain Christopher Newport and his fleet of a hundred or so Englishmen. During the next nine decades, this settlement would begin as "a verie fit place for the erecting of a great cittie(Tyler, 33)", and develop into "nothing but Abundance of Brick Rubbish, and three or four good inhabited houses(Miers, 107)." Two major factors led to the gradual decay and destruction of Jamestown: (1) The profit-before-survival attitude of the English settlers, and (2) the persistence of the Indians of the area to drive the English from their native lands.