by James Horn
Pemisapan played his role well and convinced Lane of the necessity to act swiftly. How much Lane knew about the Chowanocs and Mangoaks is uncertain. He had been intending for some weeks to explore the Chowan and Roanoke Rivers, and once Amadas and his men were safely back at the fort, Lane took the pinnace and two boats and set out in March with fifty or sixty men (including Manteo and three other Indians) to engage the Chowanocs. An expedition that had been planned initially as a friendly visit now took on a more deadly purpose.7
The Englishmen moved rapidly up Albemarle Sound and entered the broad waters of the Chowan River, where they found a fertile land, well watered with “goodly” corn fields. They sailed past “Ohaunoock,” the blind town, as Lane called it because it could not be seen from their boats, and shortly afterward arrived at Chowanoc. Muskets at the ready, Lane and his men stormed into the capital and seized the aged and “impotent” (infirm) chief Menatonon. As Pemisapan had foretold, an assembly of the principal men of the Chowanocs, Mangoaks, Weapemeocs, and Moratucs was in progress, but the Indians were not plotting an attack on the English. Taken completely by surprise, they offered no resistance and sought instead to negotiate.
Menatonon told Lane that it was Pemisapan, not he, who conspired to stir up trouble between the colonists and local Indians. Pemisapan, the old chief explained, had sent word that the English were fully bent on destroying his people and had dispatched similar messages to the Moratucs and Mangoaks along the Roanoke River. Menatonon had therefore called together his chiefs and allies to assess the threat. The Secotans, he emphasized, were the colonists’ enemy, not the Chowanocs or Mangoaks, who had no reason to attack the English other than in self-defense. But who was Lane to believe, Pemisapan, who had been a reliable ally during the previous nine months, or Menatonon?8
The English commander decided to reserve judgment and entered into lengthy talks with the Chowanoc chief. During the two days they conferred, he learned more about the region than he had in all the explorations and conversations with other peoples up to that time. The old chief told him that three days up the Chowan River by canoe and another four days overland to the northeast lay a province bordering the sea, ruled by a powerful king whose seat was on an island in a bay. This king had such great quantities of pearls that he adorned not only himself with them, but also his chief men and followers, and his “beds and houses are garnished with them . . . that it is a wonder to see.” The king traded with white men, but Menatonon advised Lane to go only with a large force and plenty of provisions, because the king was reluctant to allow strangers to enter into his country or “to meddle with the fishing of any Pearl there.” Menatonon said that the king was able to take a great many men into battle who fought very well.9
This was the first time the English had heard of Wahunsonacock (Powhatan), the formidable chief of the Powhatans, who ruled over approximately a dozen tribes along the James and York Rivers in Virginia. Undaunted by the fierce reputation of the Powhatan chief, Lane resolved to organize a major expedition to the Chesapeake Bay by land and sea once reinforcements arrived from England. Attracted by riches in pearls and the fertile country around Skicóak, he believed that the Chesapeake might offer the English a better location for a settlement than the Outer Banks.
For the time being, however, Lane’s interest remained focused on lands to the west. A few months earlier he had picked up rumors from Indians living at the mouth of the Roanoke River of “strange things” at the head of the river, thirty to forty days away. They say, Lane wrote, that the river issued forth from a great rock that bordered a sea. When winds blew off the sea, the upper waters of the river became salty and brackish. Menatonon confirmed the rumors, prompting Lane to wonder whether there might be a water passage through the mountains that led to the Pacific.
3.5 Indians Panning for Gold in a Mountain Stream (engraving by Theodor de Bry, 1590). Jacques Le Moyne’s map of Florida noted the existence of a great lake in the Appalachians where Indians gathered silver from a river flowing from the mountains. Skiko told Ralph Lane in 1586 that the Indians of Chaunis Temoatan panned for gold in a swift running river in the mountains.
Menatonon’s son, Skiko, offered even more valuable information about the interior. He told Lane that the Mangoaks often journeyed up the Roanoke River to a distant province, where they traded for a “marvelous and most strange Mineral.” The famed province was called “Chaunis Temoatan” and was more than twenty days from the land of the Mangoaks. The Indians’ name for the mineral was “wassador,” which meant copper. But Lane noted in his report to Ralegh that wassador could refer to any metal, and Skiko, who had learned of the metal when held captive by the Mangoaks, had described it as very soft and pale. To Lane’s ears this suggested gold, and according to Skiko, the region was full of it. Although he had not been to Chaunis Temoatan himself, Skiko had learned that Indians of the country panned for wassador in a swift-running river that came down from the mountains. He reported that the Mangoaks had such vast quantities of the metal “they beautify their houses with great plates” of it.10
Skiko’s sensational news was a turning point for Lane. Here at last was specific information that might lead him to gold in the mountains and perhaps other riches beyond. His course of action was clear. He would have to make contact with the Mangoaks, find out more about the mysterious metal wassador, and follow their trading route inland to Chaunis Temoatan.
After receiving a ransom for the release of Menatonon, Lane left the Chowanoc capital and sailed back downriver to the head of Albemarle Sound, where he dispatched the pinnace with Skiko on board to Roanoke Island. He had taken the precaution of holding Skiko hostage in case the Chowanocs should be tempted to turn against him. But Lane saw to it that Skiko was treated well, since he had no wish to antagonize the Indians unnecessarily.
Lane then set out with forty men to explore the Roanoke River. He hoped to be supplied with food by local peoples en route, but Pemisapan’s messages to those along the river warning them that the English intended to attack anyone they encountered had had their desired effect. Lane reported that they did not see a single Indian for three days, nor was an ear of corn to be had in any of the towns they passed.
The decisive encounter took place about a hundred miles upriver. Near the falls of the Roanoke, the English were suddenly set upon by a party of warriors (probably Mangoaks) hidden along the river bank, who let fly a volley of arrows at one of the boats as it passed by. None of the English were injured, but in Lane’s mind the attack confirmed that far from helping him in his quest to find Chaunis Temoatan, the Mangoaks would likely be a significant hindrance.
Only a much larger and better equipped expedition would have any chance of penetrating far into the interior, and Lane therefore reluctantly decided to return to the fort. After a difficult journey back, during which they ran out of supplies and were reduced to eating the two mastiffs they had brought with them for the assault on Chowanoc, the half-starved men arrived at Roanoke Island on Easter Monday, exhausted but grateful to be alive.11
The expedition’s outcome had been frustrating, like so much else about the colony’s first nine months. Lane was convinced he was on the brink of a great discovery and yet could not find the certain proof he needed to send to England. The fleet that he had thought would arrive by the spring had still not appeared, and now he had the added worry of being attacked by the Secotans and their allies at any moment. Lane’s one comfort was his growing regard for the Chowanocs and their chief, Menatonon, who had been faithful in their promises and had stated their wish for a firm alliance with the English.
That Lane’s expedition had survived took Pemisapan by surprise. He had not expected the Englishmen to return, believing they would surely perish in the interior. But the chief knew that the best means of fatally weakening the colonists was through their stomachs, and in the late spring he moved to cut off all food supplies. Lane had not considered the possibility that his men would have to cultivate their own food; his men
were soldiers, not farmers. Other than a small garden plot used for experiments with plants brought from the West Indies, the English had made no effort to raise their own crops. They assumed they would either have sufficient stores from England or would be able to barter with local peoples for supplies. Pemisapan’s refusal to provide food therefore gave Lane little choice but to divide his men into small bands and send them out to live off the country as best they could. Groups of about twenty were sent to Croatoan, Hatarask, and the mainland opposite Roanoke Island.
Lane’s decision to divide his men into small groups made the English far more vulnerable to attack. Pemisapan’s warriors could now pick off the colonists piecemeal. Lane and his principal officers would be killed first, the chief planned, which would be the signal for a general uprising to dispatch the rest of the colonists. Pemisapan had spent the previous couple of months trying to recruit Mangoaks, Moratucs, and Weapemeocs to join him by promising large quantities of copper and shares in the spoils and had called for a council to meet on June 10, 1586. A council would confirm whether or not others were prepared to support him and provide an opportunity to plan the attack.
How successful Pemisapan was in recruiting support for the attack is unclear, because the council never took place. In late May Lane received advance warning of the Secotans’ intentions from Skiko, who had befriended the English, and quickly devised a counterstrategy. Lane sent a messenger to inform Pemisapan that he had heard news of the arrival of an English fleet and was going south to Croatoan Island to meet it. With Pemisapan under the impression that he had left the fort, Lane organized a surprise attack on the Secotans living on Roanoke Island and destroyed their settlement.
Quickly following up, on June 1 Lane crossed to the mainland with twenty-six men, including Manteo. On entering Dasemunkepeuc Lane saw that the Secotan chief was accompanied only by a small group of his principal followers and seized the opportunity to attack. Shouting “Christ our victory,” the prearranged watchword, he led his men toward the startled Indians surrounding the chief. Philip Amadas shot Pemisapan, who fell to the ground, and the English began killing all those assembled, except some of Manteo’s friends who happened to be in the town.
In the midst of the fighting, the English were amazed to see Pemisapan, whom the soldiers had thought dead, suddenly leap to his feet and sprint into the woods nearby. Although badly wounded, he had kept his wits about him and had feigned death while waiting for an opportunity to escape the slaughter. One of Lane’s men, Edward Nugent, went off in hot pursuit and after a long chase emerged from the woods, holding up the severed head of the chief for all to see. Pemisapan’s death ended the fighting and soon afterward the English returned across the water to Roanoke Island in triumph.12
THE HOSTILITIES between the Secotans and English that led to the murder of Pemisapan transformed Anglo-Indian relations in the region. The Secotans on Roanoke Island and the mainland had been routed by the English and seriously depleted by disease. The killing of their chief made the likelihood of any future renewal of good relations with the English extremely remote. The Weapemeocs, who until recently had been enemies of the Secotans, had split over whether to join the attack to expel the English. Okisko’s people who were loyal to Menatonon had refused to take part, whereas other Weapemeoc peoples who lived in the eastern part of their territory near the coast (and closer to the English) probably joined Pemisapan. The Chowanocs had aligned themselves with the English, perhaps in the expectation that the newcomers would aid them against the Mangoaks, or other Iroquoian peoples in the interior, who might try to invade their territories. For Menatonon, the threat from the west was more pressing than that posed by the English in the east. Finally, Manteo had remained loyal to the English throughout the hostilities, which suggests that his people, the Croatoans, were also willing to support the English rather than the Secotans.13
There was no general uprising of the Secotans and Weapemeocs following Lane’s murderous attack on Dasemunkepeuc, which no doubt led Lane to assume that he had foiled Pemisapan’s plans. The English likely plundered the town for stored provisions that would help them get through June and July, by which time the Secotans’ ripening corn would be ready for harvesting. If the Indians’ supplies were not enough to last his men through the summer until a relief expedition arrived from England, Lane probably reasoned they had every justification to attack other Secotan towns for food and compel local peoples to supply them. Nevertheless, Lane remained anxious about the possibility of reprisals by the Secotans and Weapemeocs and must have realized that the colonists’ occupation of Roanoke Island was in the long run untenable. His assessment reinforced his growing belief that the English should relocate their colony to the southern shore of the Chesapeake Bay as soon as possible.
ONLY A WEEK after the killing of Pemisapan, Lane was suddenly confronted by a potentially far more dangerous threat. Captain Edward Stafford, stationed at the southern end of Hatarask Island, had spotted a great fleet, “but whether they were friends or foes, he could not yet discern.” Either help was at hand at long last, or the Spanish had learned of their location and sent a fleet of warships from Havana to destroy them.14
The fleet was friendly. But the ships that lined the horizon off the Outer Banks were not those anticipated by the English commander. Instead of the expedition headed by Bernard Drake and Amias Preston, the fleet sighted by Captain Stafford belonged to Sir Francis Drake, newly arrived from the West Indies and Florida coast.
The strategy devised by the queen and her ministers the previous year to undermine Spanish power in America had had two major components. The first was a large-scale attack on the West Indies and Spanish Main, the second the establishment of a colony and privateering base on the mainland of North America.
In September 1585 Sir Francis Drake had left Plymouth with a fleet of twenty-five ships (two of them the queen’s own galleons) and eight pinnaces, carrying approximately 900 mariners and 1,000 soldiers, the greatest force yet sent by the English to Spanish America. The plan called for Drake first to harass shipping off the Spanish coast, possibly capturing one of the annual treasure fleets arriving from New Spain. He was then to proceed to the West Indies, where he would occupy Cartagena or Nombre de Dios as a preliminary to crossing the isthmus to attack Panama and disrupt the flow of Peruvian silver and other valuable commodities. If all went well, he might attempt to establish a garrison in the region with the aid of escaped slaves and local Indians, who, it was anticipated, would join the English out of hatred for their Spanish overlords.
Drake’s fleet had arrived in the West Indies in mid-December. During the winter he pillaged Santo Domingo, Hispaniola, and Cartagena, but failed in the critical objective of establishing a beachhead on one of the islands or the mainland from which to attack Panama. Since their arrival, disease had ravaged the fleet, and Spanish authorities reported that the English had secretly buried “boatloads” of dead. The amount of booty taken from the Spanish did not remotely approach the expectations of those participating in the voyage, leading to widespread grumbling and disputes among Drake’s men. Drake realized by April 1586 that he had neither the manpower nor the support of his officers for an assault on Panama, and after considering an attack on Havana, Cuba, dismissed the idea for the same reasons. Instead, he left the West Indies the following month and set a course for Roanoke.
The Virginia leg of Drake’s expedition had been integral to plans for the voyage from the beginning. After ravaging the West Indies, Drake was to send part of his fleet north to Virginia to reinforce Ralegh’s colony on Roanoke Island. Drake probably made the decision to clear the Florida coast of Spanish garrisons en route to Roanoke Island after picking up rumors of an imminent attack on the English colony. By the 1580s only a couple of small garrisons remained, Santa Elena to the north and the main settlement, St. Augustine, farther south, which was the Florida governor’s seat.
Drake arrived at St. Augustine toward the end of May and landed his men unopposed near
a small wooden fort that the governor, Pedro Menéndez Marqués, had hastily thrown up. With only seventy or eighty soldiers to confront the English, Marqués opted to withdraw and join the townspeople hiding in the surrounding woods, leaving the English to loot and burn at will. The town was systematically stripped of any items—artillery, tools, furniture, and hardware—that would be useful to the colonists at Roanoke before it was completely destroyed. An eyewitness reported that of the 250 houses, not one was left standing.15
Continuing north, the English considered attacking the small garrison at Santa Elena on Port Royal Sound but could not find an entry to the harbor. After refilling their water barrels a few miles farther up the coast, the fleet moved on and arrived at Hatarask Island on June 8. A day later the fleet reached Port Ferdinando, where Ralph Lane, accompanied by some of his officers, hastened to meet “the Generall,” as he called Drake.
To Lane’s weary eyes the fleet must have been a magnificent sight. Twenty-three ships, including Drake’s royal flagship, the huge Elizabeth Bonaventure (600 tons), the Primrose (400 tons), and the Galleon Leicester (400 tons), rode bravely at anchor a couple of miles out to sea, serviced by a flotilla of small boats hurrying back and forth between them. At that moment, as Lane surveyed the great fleet strung out along the coast, the ships’ pennants fluttering in the brisk wind, the promise of an English North America must have finally seemed a reality. For the first time, an English fleet in American waters had put in at an English colony.16