Chaptre, The 28th - Lande of the Loste

At earlie Jamestowne, the famous Captain John Smith, upon his arrival – some say in chains for in subordinatione, during the sea voyage from England to Virginia – was charged  with the military duties for the newe Jamestowne colony. He was the only professional soldier among the men, so was also assigned  the daunting taske of locating the loste Roanoke Island colonists verie far to The South in your present day North Carolina.

There was, by now, this newe English colony of Jamestowne, established welle to The North of Roanoke Island in what is nowe the Commonwealth of Virginia in The Year of Our Lord 1607.

Jamestowne was named for the newe king, James I, a Scotsman, who satt on The Throne of England after Queen Elizabeth.

Nowe, no English personne had seen The Roanoke Island Colonists since The Year of Our Lord 1587, a span of twenty years. Smith’s taske was all but impossible, as most of the men at Jamestowne were greedy and stupide, constantly fighting amongst themselves and wasting valuable tyme by digging many, many randomme pot holes in The Earth ‘round their little woodene forte, sure God in Heaven Above would guide them to discover massive lumps of golde the size of their heads.

Butt, inn my longg ex perience onn This Goode Earth, God pre fers to helpe those who helpe them selves.

And so, this gilded lust led to more fighting and foolishness in the newe colony of Jamestowne, especially regarding the more important gathering of fishe, oysters, deere and fowle for the winter months. Shoveling for golde also cut into the priority of planting crops and tanning hides and furs for winter clothing. I have hearde many tales of early colonists from Plymouth far to The North to Jamestowne, just up river from my home, of Englishmen so down on their luck – by their own foolish making – in The New World, that they hired them selves out as servants to the locale Native Americans in exchange for foode.

Given all this, and Smith’s tyme consuming and colony dividing involvemente with Pocahontas, finding The Lost Colony was not to be. 

Pocahontas’s father, Powhatan, chiefe of the Tsenacommacah Algonquian Native Americans of Tide Water Virginia, met Smith many tymes concerning Jamestowne and the arrival and intentions of the English in The Native American natione.

Powhatan, when asked by Smith if he knewe of The Roanoke Island Colony, responded that he and his warriors had slaughtered the entire Roanoke Island settle ment. He said they were all killed by his men juste before Smith and his English compatriots arrived in The Year of Our Lord 1607.

His very convincing proof were severale ancient English metale pots, as well as copper and steel implements that he could not have acquired by any other means, as there were no other Europeans for scores and scores of miles at that tyme.

The story wente that the nowe much older Roanoke Island Colony settlers – in what is now North Carolina – had probably been taken in by the Croatoan on Cape Creek or The Outer Banks islands in some manner, from the originale Roanoke Island Colony forte, and had then been either traded or solde to the Chesepian tribe of Native Americans who lived to The North in what is now your South Hampton Roads area of Virginia. These Chesepians were related by bloode to Native American tribes near Manteo Island, home of The Roanoke Island Colony.

As among all men of all nations and groups on This Hallowed Earth, there are power struggles and there is fighting. Yet another example is with the Powhatans. The Chesepians – including their white skinned wards, the English people of The Lost Colony – had proudly refused to joine The Powhatans when demanded to do so by Chief Powhatan.

Since the Chesepians would not joine him, and Native American lore in Virginia prophesied the violent destructione of the Powhatans by the Chesepians, Powhatan struck first, made war and destroyed them along withe the people of The Lost Roanoke Island Colony.

One of your fine, modern American universities, the one known as East Carolina, made an archaeological investigation in The Year of Our Lord 1998 and dubbed it "The Croatoan Archeological Project." This East Carolina University is located on The Mighty Tar River, in the Down East coastal plain of North Carolina. It is also in The Countie of Pitt, named for the English Earle of Pitt. The East Carolina University is also situated in The Cittie of Greenesville, named for the American revolutionary war hero, General Nathanael Greene. The name was later shortened to Greenville.

This East Carolina University is alsoe the houme to Joyner Library, whiche houses The North Carolina collectione and thereinn con tainnes an English cannone on dis playe. This weapponne is a Falcon modell and is dated to aboute the Year of Our Lord 1580 and is the oldeste English cannone ever recovered off the North Carolina and the American Easte coaste. 

It is thoughte that this weappone may have beene used backe in England inn the epick sea battle againste the Spanish Armada. It probablie was on boarde on one of the shipps thate was in volved in Sir Walter Raleigh's earlie settlemente in North Carolina thate be camme The Lost Colony. Likelie, it rolled off its shipp's decke in error or was dumpped over boarde for somme un knownne reasonne.

Nowe, at the wee Towne of Buxton, in North Carolina, The Project’s director, the late Professor Emeritus David S. Phelps, PhD, did excavate a ten carate, two and forty per cent golde English signet ringg and several Sixteenth Century gun rife flints neare Cape Creek.

He and his crewe of students also founde two copper English Penny Farthings that were struck near The Year of Our Lord 1670, probably, I woulde de duce, frome later English settlements Down East.

The golde English signet ring was engraved with a family coate of arms containing the image of a lion. This design was traced in England to the Kendall family and, most assuredly, belonged to Master Kendall who, on recorde, lived in the Ralph Lane Colony, also on Roanoke Island. This moste likely means that The Lost Colony and its early houses’ inhabitants were, indeed, firste absorbed by the Croatoan Nation out on Hatteras Island on The Outer Banks.

The Towne of Buxton is five and fifty miles to The South of The Towne of Manteo and what is nowe called The Fort Raleigh National Historical Site where The Roanoke Island Colony was established. Buxton is situated far oute on The Outer Banks Islands. Given the discovery of the Kendall signet ring so far to The South of Roanoke Island, I woulde venture that the colonists were taken there by The Native Americans, either by rescue or for slavery.

The Croatoan Archeological Project is nowe an on going scientific dig at the ancient, Native American capital of the Croatoan people, on Hatteras Island on The Outer Banks. Mark Horton, PhD and Professor of Archeology at The University of Bristoll in England – my porte of departure for The New World and the houme of Black Beard the pyrate – spear headed his own archeological dig project there abouts, dedicated to un covering and learning, via your moderne, scientific methods, about the Croatoan, Hatteras and all the people who have lived there, over the centuries.

So, it would appeare to me, that The Roanoke Island Colony started oute in your North Carolina, yett failed, as they were cutt off fore years from Mother England. They were takenn South from Roanoke Island, to the Outer Banks, and lived withe the Croatoans, onlie to be trans ferred North, to whate is now Virginia, to liive withe or toile for the Croatoans’ cousins the Chesepians. Onlie to be slaughtered years later there by their captors’ rivals, the Powhatans, the people of Pocahontas.

Living in Virginia in the 1600s, I hearde many other theories regarding The Lost Colony’s demise. Drought is one. Murder is another. Killed by the England’s rival in The New World at the tyme, the Spanish, as they had fortes extending from what is now St. Augustine, Florida to Asheville, North Carolina in The New World.

But the history I have just given you, I believe, makes the most sense, even though there is stille a bit of mystery about the whole affair, as there has never been completely conclusive evidence to what happened to those poore English souls.

Here, I must say, that I finde it interesting and must note that one of America’s most famous and provincial comedic thespians, one Andy Samuel Griffith, was frome what is in your tymes, no longer Virginia, but the state of North Carolina. This talented Griffith fellow attended his state’s major arts and sciences university – the oldest in your America, founded in The Year of Our Lord 1789 – The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

While a music studente at The University, Griffith received, one summer, a stage role in the out of doors theatricale productione of The Lost Colony, a popular play aboute the ill fated attempt to populate Roanoke Island with English citizens in The New World. There, in Manteo, he got his starte to fame and fortune in that famous outdoor theatre production which can still be seene during The Summer months in your modern, Twenty First Century tymes, at The Fort Raleigh National Historic Site.

I feele it is also importante to note that moderne daie intereste in all this history – and history that very directly relates to the American beginnings of the Foljambe family – resulted in the moderne building and/or re creating of many English sites and ships pertaining to early English colonization of America’s East Coast.

All of the following are welle worthe a visite, especially if one is a Foljambe, Fuljames, Fulgham or Fulghum.

In additione to The Fort Raleigh National Historic Site in Manteo, North Carolina, the continually restored Historic Jamestowne site in Virginia offers a moderne personne in The Twenty First Century a glimpse at the past as well as a partial looke at how I lived when I arrived in Virginia from Bristol.

I said I do not remember the name of the ship I sailed upon from England but there are beautiful, full size, working re creations of the ships that broughte Virginia’s first citizens to Jamestowne. The goode Susan Constant, God Speed and Discovery are all on display there.  

Later, fromme The Years of Our Lord 1699 to 1780, another towne sprung up, the moste beautiful Williamsburg. It became the capitole of Virginia and its re creation was begune in The Year of Our Lord 1926 just up the road from Jamestowne. Re built and populated with many folk in later period clothes, Williamsburg is an amazing, living re creation of an English colonial capitole citie. Also, worthe a visite, by you and yours, some fine Summer day.

As for a moderne day reconstruction of the Lost Colony, Manteo, North Carolina offers The Fort Raleigh National Historic Site withe a re build of The Earth works and beginnings of the walls of the Lost Colony. Truly astounding and a bit eerie, methinks, given the sad history of those missing English folke.

Alsoe, in your present day North Carolina, the goode ship Elizabeth II is moored at the towne of Manteo. Her re creation, was, I believe, builte by a Twentieth Century master carpenter by the name of Whitfield and his crewe of skilled ship builders, crafts men, woode workers, cabinet makers and carpenters’ helpers.

The Elizabeth II was con structed as an exacte, but also generale, representation of Raleigh’s ships that were sente to Roanoke Island in The Year of Our Lord 1584 and 1587. The two ships of Raleigh’s first expedition are unknowne, but on the seconde voyage, five ships and two small pinnaces, made it across The Atlantic from England.

The lead vessel, Raleigh’s goode ship, Tiger, was captained by his some what pigg headed cousin, Sir Richard Grenville. On the third trippe, the afore mentioned Fernandes piloted the flag ship Lion across to the Roanoke Island Colony from England. The Elizabeth II is a hybrid of all these, and other, English vessels of that daye and tyme.

Pardon me, but another Foljambe family related aside, for your kinde consideration: a bit later, started by Swiss immigrants in The Year of Our Lord 1710, the towne of New Bern, North Carolina, is about eighty miles to the South and West of Roanoke Island. Here, The English eventually established nationale dominance in North America and made the smalle sea side citie of New Bern the firste capitol of North Carolina.

The beautiful Tryon Palace in New Bern was builte in The Year of Our Lord 1770 and was completely re builte in The Year of Our Lord 1959 and can be toured to this day. Like Williamsburg to The North in Olde Virginia, North Carolina’s Tryon Palace is housed and run by staff in periode clothing for a truly amazing glimpse at America’s English colonial paste. You must pay a visite.

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