The Lost Colony: John White’s Journal

As I mentioned in a previous post, I began to question my previous conclusion of the fate of the Roanoke Island Lost Colony. The source of my doubts was John White’s behavior during his 1590 search for the colonists and his eventual abandonment of a group that included his only daughter and granddaughter. Further research was needed. One of the sources I used was John White’s journal of his final trip to Roanoke Island in 1590: 

http://nationalhumanitiescenter.org/pds/amerbegin/exploration/text6/white.pdf

Some details, while not quite answering my questions, swayed me into keeping an open mind as to the reasons White and company left without stopping at Croatoan. Other details confirmed the direction of my suspicions. Read it for yourselves a few times. Take notes. 

The Lost Colony: The Third Expedition

This series is meant to be a short overview of Walter Raleigh’s expeditions to the New World that culminated in the separation and abandonment of what is now know as the Lost Colony. At the end of this series, I’ll provide book recommendations. For now, it’s helpful to read the previous posts:

First Post - Explorers and the Lost Colony

Second Post - The Lost Colony: Influencing Factors

Third Post - The Lost Colony: First Expedition 

Fourth Post - The Lost Colony: Second Expedition 

The Third Expedition under John White - 1587

What we know of John White’s colony, later called The Lost Colony, is common knowledge: The group was supposed to have settled along the Chesapeake, but their Portuguese pilot, Simon Fernando, forced them to disembark on Roanoke Island. This just a year after Ralph Lane caused numerous problems with the natives. 

Within days, George Howe was brutally murdered by natives while searching for crabs. A couple of weeks later, White’s daughter, Eleanor Dare, gave birth to the first English baby born in the New World, Virginia Dare. Facing an imminent abandonment by Fernando and in need of supplies, the colonists sent John White back to England with the ships to tell Raleigh of their plight and to get aid. 

Grounds near Fort Raleigh

Where would the colonists stay in the meantime? They built homes on Roanoke, but according to all reliable sources, the colony planned to move fifty miles into the main. If Fernando really did abandon them on Roanoke, when did they come up with this plan? Surely not before they left England, as they were supposed to have gone to Chesapeake. And yet, the symbol for a fort located approximately fifty miles into the mainland was recently found on one of John White’s maps. A map that White had either left in England or had taken back with him. 

In his A Strange Kingdom book on the Lost Colonists, James Horn states the follow:

Then (White) and the assistants had to decide where the colonists would go when they left Roanoke Island. Mindful of the threat of attack by the Secotans, White and the settlers had decided to leave the island and move inland, where they hoped to find friendly Indian peoples to help them. The best prospect was somewhere near the head of Albemarle Sound, where the Chowanocs lived. White knew from discussions with Ralph Lane that both peoples had been loyal allies of the English the previous year. Possibly the aged Menatonon would be equally helpful to his settlers.

Horn doesn’t provide a footnote here, so we don’t know if his, “the best prospect was somewhere near the Albemarle Sound....” is based on a primary source, if it’s accepted speculation, or if he knew the symbol for the map had recently been found. It’s located on the northern edge of Secotan territory. Would they have gone there instead of the island of Croatoan (modern Hatteras) after everything that had transpired during past expeditions? And if so, why had they carved CROATOAN into a post and CRO in a tree?

While White was in England, war finally broke out with Spain, preventing his return. When he finally returned to Roanoke in 1590, he found the fort abandoned and nature taking over (indicating it had been abandoned for some time) his belongings strewn about and damaged, and no one around. Or so he reported. As mentioned above, he found CRO and CROATOAN carved on a post and a tree, indicating their destination. The token indicating distress was not included, so it seems they left peaceably and went with their friends down to what is now Hatteras Island and eventually assimilated with the natives. Pretty much everyone agrees that’s where they went. I agreed. Why not? 

Subsequent primary sources from other explorers seemed to settle the matter. Edward Bland explored “New Britainne” (Virginia and the northern part of North Carolina) in 1650—just over sixty years later. He traveled to the Albemarle Region (of which we speak) after hearing reports of Englishmen living among the natives. In his trip through the Carolinas in 1700, John Lawson reported meeting members of the Hatteras nation who had gray eyes and whose ancestors could “talk from a book.” In my mind, it was settled. While reading an advanced copy of Shannon McNear’s upcoming novel on the colony, even before I reached the part where John White had left for England, I started thinking about it and realized that couldn’t be the end of it. Not because there are so many theories about the fate of the colonists, but because of events that occurred upon John White’s return in 1590. 

Suddenly, what had been the obvious no longer made sense. I had to do more research and rethink everything.

The Lost Colony: The Second Expedition

This series is meant to be a short, light overview of Walter Raleigh’s expeditions to the New World that culminated in the separation and abandonment of what is now know as the Lost Colony. At the end of this series, I’ll provide book recommendations. For now, it’s helpful to read the previous posts:

First Post

Second Post

Third Post 

1585-Raleigh’s Second Expedition under Sir Richard Grenville and Ralph Lane 

Northeast Shore of Roanoke Island as it Looks Today

This near year-long expedition was a huge disaster that ruined relations forevermore with the natives in this region and in the Chesapeake area. Before it even started, the captain of a ship called the Lion arrived first and “left 30 starving men and no supplies on Croatan Island” (now Hatteras.) Later, upon his arrival, Raleigh’s cousin, Sir Richard Grenville, “sent a ship to Croatan to retrieve (them) and the ship returned with two men and no explanation of the fate of the others.” They just disappeared. 

Before Grenville sailed off, he put Ralph Lane in charge of the soldiers and the English interest in the region. Lane’s mismanagement and abuses over the next year hurt relations with the Secotans and other confederations. There are too many wrongs to list, but it included mooching off the natives, burning a village over a missing cup, kidnappings and holding a hostage, a beheading, and natives dropping dead by the dozens after being exposed to pathogens their immune systems instantly attacked, killing their host in the process. It’s little wonder that Lane and his men left the following year when Sir Francis Drake arrived to check on them. Lane truly made himself and the English a stench in the noses of the Secotans and other confederations. 

On a side note, it’s said the privateering Drake may have been transporting slaves from Africa to or from the Caribbean and that he may have taken some off the boat to make room for Lane and his men. I read that these people are believed to be the ancestors of the Lumbee Tribe. 

All natives did not live in harmony with one another, especially the Secotans. They had enemies and they went to war with them. After everything that transpired, they were, in essence, at war with the English as well. 

Shortly after Lane abandoned his post, Grenville arrived on Roanoke and learned Lane and his men weren’t there. I don’t know if he knew they had left or if he thought they had mysteriously disappeared as the previous group of men had. Before taking off, Grenville left fifteen “well supplied men on Roanoke Island to maintain Raleigh’s patent” and went back to England. As with the previous group of men left on Croatan, they were never seen again. 

Can you see a pattern emerging?

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Quotes are from Beechland and the Lost Colony by Philip McMullan. 

The Lost Colony: The First Expedition

A Look at Roanoke and the Lost Colony

First Post

Second Post

As I mentioned in a previous post, there are so much facts and details involved in events that led up to the disappearance of members of Sir Walter Raleigh’s third expedition to the New World, numerous books had to be written to present it all. What follows is the barest of facts. If you would like to learn more, see my second post for a few resource recommendations. 

Raleigh’s First Expedition: 

In 1584, Walter Raleigh received a patent from Queen Elizabeth to establish a colony in the New World. He wanted to settle “at the edge of Spanish territory.” Queen Elizabeth refused at first, but changed her mind after the Spanish attacked English ships. 

In  July 1584, Philip Amadas and Arthur Barlowe landed on the Outer Banks of what is now North Carolina. They eventually made their way to Roanoke Island. The expedition was a smashing success. With the exception of one encounter that may or may not have happened, it was everything one would hope first contact would be and wished that it would have been throughout the ages. During their time there, they were hosted by members of the Secotan Confederation. 

For a short summary and chronology of the expedition, go to the National Park Service’s page on Amadas and Barlowe.

The Lost Colony: Influencing Factors

As I mentioned in my previous post, I recently worked through questions I had about the fate of the Lost Colonists. It's helpful to read that post first and then continue here.

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History is cause and effect. We cannot look at one historical event without examining catalysts that led up to it, along with changes that came about as a consequence of that event. I couldn't begin to understand the Lost Colony until I had a grasp on the political, economic, and religious situations of the time, and the personal goals of those involved.

However, so much was involved with the arrival and disappearance of the Lost Colony, entire books had to be written to present all the facts. Books are still being written. There are several theories out there, but in trying to figure out what was bothering me about this situation, I decided to stick solely with known facts.

So I read. Much of what I originally gleaned all those years ago came from books such as Solving the Mystery of the Lost Colony by Lee Miller, The First Voyage to Roanoke 1584 by Arthur Barlow, and Thomas Harriot's A briefe and true report of the new found land of Virginia, along with a few other sources, including Ralph Lane's journal of his disastrous expedition. This past month, I downloaded Beechland and the Lost Colony by Philip McMullen and James Horn's A Kingdom Strange: The Brief an Tragic History of the Lost Colony of Roanoke. All of those sources taught me much about Roanoke Island, the natives who lived along the coast, and Raleigh's expeditions, but in these posts, I sometimes quote McMullen's Beechland and Horn's Strange Kingdom. While I don't agree with McMullen's theory for reasons I'll state later, he does a fabulous job of laying out chronological events that led up to the disappearance of the colonists. Quotes from both books are place in quote marks.

To start, it’s important to remember that Spain was a formidable power taking over parts of Europe, the Caribbean and South America. An expansion financed by what seemed like an infinite amount of gold mined in South America.

What is now the US Atlantic coast wasn’t a hidden gem Sir Walter’s men just happened to stumbled on. The Spanish knew about it. According to Horn's Kingdom Strange, Spanish ships sailed past the Outer Banks on occasion, and sailors had, one on occasion, wrecked their ship on one of the islands. Other nations were already fishing in the area around Newfoundland and likely around the area that’s now Nova Scotia and Maine. The Pilgrims were aware of them forty years later and had encounters with a few of them. 

With ships exploring and fishing in the waters to the north and to the south of the mid-Atlantic coast, once can assume a few of those ships sailed past it as well, including the Spanish. No one wanted the Spanish to take possession of more land and resources. In fact, England wanted to stop them all together. 

As Horn stated in his Strange Kingdom, “Ralegh would organize (but not lead) a large expedition to establish a harbor on Roanoke Island, from which English privateers could harass Spanish shipping in the Caribbean and western Atlantic, establishing a long-term English presence in the New World that would in time fatally undermine Spain’s empire.”

His first attempt to do so began in 1584. 

Next post: Raleigh's First Expedition

A Look at Roanoke: Explorers and the Lost Colony

Several years ago, the famous Lost Colony of Roanoke Island finally captured my history-loving attention. It began with an article I was writing on the charming town of Edenton, North Carolina. Even before that, I’d read Edward Bland’s The Discovery of New Brittaine and knew early explorers had traveled into the region to find the colonists. I wanted to know if there was a connection between that search and Edenton. The quest to answer that question immersed me in the centuries-old mystery, and I had a strong desire to learn all there was to know about the group that disappeared on the shores of the Graveyard of the Atlantic with little evidence as to where they’d gone. I read books, spoke with local historians, read first-hand accounts written by participants in what, I learned, was three expeditions, not just one. After soaking it all in, I came to the simple conclusion that the colonist went to Croatoan just as they indicated they had, and that was the end of the story. 

After satiating my curiosity, I kept up on the continued search for the colony, but turned my attention elsewhere. Recently, though, I was offered the opportunity to read an advanced copy of Shannon McNear’s upcoming release, Elinor. Shannon was faithful to the facts, and the vivid picture she painted in her novel provided a realistic glimpse into what the colonists may have experienced. My interest flared once again, and as the colonists headed toward the New World in her novel, I also began to read non-fiction books on Raleigh’s expedition. Something was bothering me and I couldn’t put my finger on it. After typing out all the facts, I finally figured out what it was. 

And I changed my position. 

Over the course of the next week, I’ll present those facts in several posts, ending with my new guess as to the fate of 118 men, women and children, and two newborns, who risked their lives for a new start in a new land only to disappear from history.