Admiral of New England – Captain John Smith and the American Dream (American Roots in English Soil (ARIES))

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Description

In September 1609, a badly burnt soldier was carried from Jamestown Fort, Virginia, to a waiting ship. He was taken down the James River to sail back to England. It seemed that Captain John Smith of Willoughby’s leadership of the tiny settlement at Jamestown had come to a sad end.

For the year of his elected Presidency, Smith had led the first permanent English-speaking colony on the shore of North The united states. He had survived disease and capture by the Algonquin Indians. He had been spared execution by Powhatan, their great chief, through the pleading of Pocahontas, his eleven year old daughter. Powhatan’s people and Smith had traded for food which kept the colony alive through two hard winters.

But Smith’s injuries and a new regime at Jamestown ended his contribution to Virginia. He never returned to the colony. His protected arrival in London offered little aside from pain and disgrace. And yet the second half of John Smith’s life, from 1609 to 1631, produced achievements at least as significant as his contribution to Virginia. This book is a celebration of those achievements, from his leaving Jamestown, his exploration of New England, his meeting Pocahontas in London, his writing about The united states and his promotion of the idea of self-governing colonies.

These years of further exploration, writing and promoting the idea of colonies in The united states were not so filled with the ‘brave adventures’ of his youth. But they saw Smith help to establish new settlements to the north of Virginia in the region he was the first to call ‘New England’. His vision of how these settlements must operate contributed to the birth of the ‘American Dream’.
This short book was written and illustrated with the help of Y7 students at the King Edward VI Grammar School, Louth, the same school where John Smith completed his formal education in the 1590s. It was the fifth book in the ‘American Roots in English Soil’ series, published to celebrate Lincolnshire’s rich heritage of Early American history. It was also a part of our contribution to the 400th Anniversary of the founding of Jamestown in 2007.

This ebook edition has been revised and is published to celebrate two more 400th Anniversaries in 2016. Firstly, this year is the 400th anniversary of the publication in London of John Smith’s book, ‘A Description of New England’, a book which along with Smith’s Map of New England was used by the Scrooby Separatists when they set out for The united states and settled at Plymouth, Massachusetts. They became better referred to as ‘The Pilgrim Fathers’.

Secondly, 1616 was the year in which John Rolfe of Heacham was brought to London by the Virginia Company along with his wife Rebecca, better referred to as Pocahontas, and their son Thomas. Whilst in London, Pocahontas met Smith again, despite the fact that she had been told by the English that he had died in Jamestown. Not long afterwards, she and John Rolfe set off from London to sail back to Virginia, only for Pocahontas to die and be buried at Gravesend.

But Smith lived on in London, published more books about The united states, and developed his vision for colonies there. He also wrote his autobiography and several books on Seafaring. Smith never went back to Jamestown and died at the age of fifty one in 1631. He was buried in St Sepulchre’s Church-without-Newgate, London, one of the churches to be destroyed when the Great Fire swept through London in 1666.

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