by John Butman
But Challons did not follow his instructions. The Richard departed Plymouth in mid-August 1606, with thirty-one men aboard, and was soon hit by a powerful storm, which forced Challons to sail south toward the West Indies: Spanish territory.3 By early November, they had reached the Florida channel, and from there they intended to head north to their original destination.
But then they ran into unpredictable turbulence of a different kind. They came upon a fleet of eleven Spanish merchant vessels, heavily armed. Not expecting any problems—because England and Spain were now at peace, having signed the Treaty of London the year before—Challons stayed his course through the fleet, hoisting the English flag to let the Spanish know his country of origin. But, quite unexpectedly, one of the Spanish ships fired a shot at the Richard. Thinking the Spanish must have misunderstood his intentions or were unaware of the peace, Challons maneuvered the Richard within hailing distance of the admiral’s ship. He identified himself, explained his mission of plantation, and even brought out his commission for the admiral to inspect—as if he were showing a driver’s license to a skeptical police officer.4
According to the later testimony of Nicholas Hind, this did nothing to change the behavior of the Spanish. They fired two more shots at the Richard, this time damaging her “through and through,” then boarded the ship with drawn rapiers, stabbed and wounded Sassacomoit, and “abused and beat every man in the ship.”5 All the crew members were taken prisoner and dispersed among the Spanish ships, which continued on their way to Spain. Challons, Hind, and the Richard, along with all its goods and possessions, ended up in Seville, where the men were imprisoned. A few of the English crew were lucky enough to have been placed aboard a ship that lost its way and ended up in France. There they were set free and returned to England, where their testimony led to frantic diplomatic efforts to get Challons’s remaining crew members released and the Richard and her contents returned.
That proved to be not so easy. As it turned out, Challons had not only sailed off course, he had sailed into murky legal waters. This is exactly where the terms of the Treaty of London were vague and open to interpretation. The treaty called for free commerce and allowed ships to enter the other’s ports—even warships could seek haven if forced by weather or emergency. Also, the treaty made null and void all letters of marque that sanctioned piracy and plundering. But it did not enshrine the rights of the English to trade in the West Indies. Nor did it settle the respective claims of the two countries to Virginia.
In Seville, Challons was interrogated but eventually released into the custody of two English merchants. The captain then began a long legal wrangle to have his men freed. Some of these sailors were forced to testify before La Casa de Contratación, which reviewed the case. But when the president of La Casa could “find no cause of offense” on their part, he changed tack and grilled them about Virginia—and, in particular, the commodities available in that part of the New World.6 Clearly, the Spanish still mistrusted England’s intentions in America and they wanted to learn what knowledge the English seafarers had about the place.
Back in London, Gorges, Popham, and Robert Cecil found themselves dragged into the whirlpool of charges and countercharges about the Richard incident. Even James became embroiled in the diplomatic spat. Gorges tried to put a sarcastic twist on the situation, writing that the Plymouth Company’s colonial effort had been foiled by “our good friends the Spaniards.” He argued that they were probably worried that the English, under the terms of the peace treaty, would enjoy too much liberty of the seas. He entreated Cecil to help with the case.7
As Cecil and his counselors debated the issues, it was evident that there was great uncertainty about who was in the right and who was in the wrong. Did the Richard have the right to pass through Spanish-controlled waters? Did the Spanish ships have any right to seize the ship and take Challons’s crew into custody? To get to an answer, Cecil commissioned one of his secretaries, the lawyer Levinus Munck, to set out the options. Munck argued that, on the one hand, it might be best to leave the Challons prisoners “to their fortune”—that is, to do nothing—because pursuing the case might “stir up some greater inconveniences.” On the other hand, he reasoned, an argument could be made that the Challons ship had been going toward a location, North Virginia, whose ownership was “disputable” under the treaty. If that argument were accepted, then the Spanish, while perhaps entitled to stop the Richard, had no right to attack it or molest its crew.8
As the councillors weighed the arguments, English merchants, especially those doing business in or with Spain, urged them to take a stand on the matter. In February 1607, Nevill Davis, a merchant who lived in Seville and who acted as translator for Challons’s captured seamen, wrote to Sir John Popham, warning that the Spanish would continue “to prevent us from going” to Virginia “by any means they can.” This was a deeply disturbing prospect to Davis because he hoped that it was precisely in these “remote and unknown places” that England would find a “safer and [more] profitable trade” than they had with Spain. The Treaty of London was supposed to have boosted trade. But, Davis complained, English merchants had been impeded, suffering molestations and onerous tax impositions, and they were facing a cumulative loss of about £80,000. And, as had been the case fifty years before, the main issue was the collapsing market for cloth. “All our woolen commodities,” Nevill wrote, were “in no estimation here” because the Spanish not only made plenty of their own cloth but also their products were better suited to the hot climate than English woolens. He closed his letter with a sentence that could have been written half a century earlier: “It is requisite,” Nevill declared, that “we seek other places for the venting of our cloth.”9
FORTUNATELY, THE PLYMOUTH Company’s second ship—the one organized by Popham—did not encounter any difficulties. Captained by Thomas Hanham, Popham’s grandson and one of the eight original investors listed in the Virginia charter, it sailed in September 1606, a month after the departure of the Richard. The crew included Tahánedo and probably Amóret, the two Indians who had been living with Popham and who were taken as guides and interpreters.10
Of course, when Hanham set out, he knew nothing of Challons’s troubles, and the party fully expected to rendezvous with the Richard on the north coast of Virginia in a matter of weeks. Hanham and company made their way across the Atlantic in good time, waited at the agreed meeting place, and when the Richard did not turn up, went in search of potential settlement sites. Early in 1607, having dropped off the crew and the Indians, Hanham arrived back in England and delivered his report to Popham. Despite the troubles with the Richard, Hanham’s findings were so precise and encouraging that, according to Gorges’s later testimony, the Lord Chief Justice waxed “confident of the business” such that “every man of any worth… was willing to join in the charge for sending over a competent number of people to lay the ground of a hopeful plantation.”11
As Popham and Gorges raised the funds for a fully-fledged colonial voyage, they realized that they faced the pressure of time. The leaders of the rival London Company had finally dispatched their ships, and barring some kind of mishap of the kind that befell Challons, they were likely to be the first to establish a colony in Virginia. Worse than this, however, was the potential threat from France, who had long been active fur traders in North America. In a letter to Cecil, Gorges feared that England’s neighbors—meaning France—could enter the country and “thereby make themselves great.” He explained that the French were already “in hand with the natives”—in other words, trading with them.12
In the urgency to get the expedition underway, Popham selected leaders with blood ties rather than with talent and relevant experience. George, his 56-year-old nephew, was chosen to lead the colony and to serve as captain of the ship Gift of God. Gorges did not think much of the choice, later characterizing George as “old,” large, and “unwieldy”—a man “fearful to offend” and unwilling to contest anyone who opposed him.13 Clearly, these were
less than ideal qualities for the governor of a colony. But Sir John was the driving force behind the Plymouth Company and Gorges could not really object.
As commander of the second ship, the Mary and John, Popham named Raleigh Gilbert, second son of Sir Humphrey. Although Gorges was Raleigh’s cousin, he was no kinder in his assessment of the young man, characterizing him as “headstrong,” “desirous of supremacy,” and “of small judgment.” What’s more, Gilbert had a chip on his shoulder, believing that he had rightful ownership to the original patent granted to his father, even though the patent had long ago passed to Walter Ralegh.14
Despite doubts about Popham’s choice of leaders, a hundred people signed on as settlers for his colony. Little is known about them except that they were all men and included soldiers, carpenters, a shipwright, a chaplain, a smith, a cooper, and one or more cooks. In addition to Popham and Gilbert, the main figures were Edward Harlow, master of ordnance, Robert Davis, ship captain and sergeant-major, and George Carew, whose job as “searcher” was to ensure there were no breaches of discipline and quash any attempts at private trading.15 Also aboard was Skicowáros, the last of the three Indians who had stayed at Plymouth Fort, and the man whom Gorges hoped would be instrumental in assisting the company with its trading ventures in America.
They set sail from Plymouth at the end of May 1607.16 During the voyage, the Gift of God and Mary and John were separated, as so often happened on transatlantic trips. But the two ships reunited in the first week of August, and a few days later Gilbert and George Popham selected a plantation site on Sabino Point, which juts into the Sagadahoc River, now the Kennebec, not far inland from the Atlantic. The site faced north, so it had an unobstructed view of the river and the outflow to the sea, enabling the colonists to keep an eye out for possible attacks from Indians, the French, or Spanish. Also, it backed onto a hill, providing some protection to the rear. A shallow cove, with a sandy beach, lay to the east.
Finally stepping ashore, Popham and Gilbert inaugurated the colony, which became known as the Popham Colony or, more simply, Sagadahoc, after the river where it was situated. The chaplain, Richard Seymour, preached a sermon “under the spreading branches of the great trees, which afforded a grateful shelter from the August sun.”17 As was by now customary, the colony’s commission was read aloud, after which George Popham was made president of the colony, and Gilbert, James Davis, Robert Davis, and Edward Harlow were named as his assistants. The next day the workers began digging the foundations for a fort, which they named St. George, after the patron saint of England. The surviving plan shows an elaborate, enclosed compound, its stone walls punctuated with gun enclosures, and its interior containing a neat array of buildings, including lodgings for the admiral and president, a chapel, buttery, bakehouse, guardhouse, and several private houses. By October, the settlers had completed the fort as well as several of the other buildings. Also, they had constructed a pinnace, the first vessel built by the English in America, and they christened it Virginia—as a tribute to the land and the queen.18 While the workmen toiled, Gilbert explored the river and met and traded with local Indians. He was able to reconnect with Tahánedo, with Skicowáros serving as a go-between.
After a couple of months, the leaders sent one of the ships back to England with cargo and news of their progress, to assure Popham and Gorges that they had arrived safely and their work was underway. They loaded up the Mary and John with a variety of goods, mostly furs and a plant containing silken fibers (probably milkweed) that might prove useful in the weaving of cloth. They had found no sassafras, confirming that they had settled well north of the tree’s natural habitat.
The vessel arrived back in Plymouth harbor in early December, and the crew learned that John Popham, chief proponent of the colony, had died the previous June, less than two weeks after the ships had sailed to the New World. Following Popham’s death, Sir Ferdinando Gorges had taken over much of the responsibility for the project, and as soon as the Mary and John had docked, he dispatched a hurried letter to Robert Cecil marked “late at night.” The ship had arrived, Gorges wrote with a combination of feverish excitement and worried disappointment, “with great news of a fertile country, gallant rivers, stately harbors, and a people tractable.” Unfortunately, there were no goods or commodities that would “satisfy the expectation of the Adventurers.” But while Gorges acknowledged that this might “blemish the reputation of the design,” he oozed optimism that the colonists would still be able to bring forth a variety of commodities, including timber for ships’ masts, rich furs, and even grapes—“if they can keep the Frenchmen from the trade.” It seems the colonists had already become viticulturists, producing a wine “much like the claret wine that comes out of France.” Gorges promised to supply Cecil with further details and added a note with news of Challons, whose men were still imprisoned in Spain.19
Two days later, Gorges followed up his late-night missive with another letter. This time, he blamed George Popham and Raleigh Gilbert for their failure to send more promising news of the commodities in Sagadahoc. Also, he revealed that Gilbert had sent letters to his friends in England about his claim to the patent. In view of their dereliction of duty, Gorges suggested that he himself could take on even greater responsibility and, without spending much of the king’s money, “bring to pass infinite things.”20
Meanwhile, in the Sagadahoc settlement, the colonists started to suffer from the biting cold, and they had good reason to complain. They had arrived on the northeast coast during one of the coldest periods on record—a two-hundred-year span, starting around 1550, that was so brutally severe that it has become known as the “Little Ice Age.” James Rosier had reported on an idyllic land, but that was in summer, not winter. He could not have known just how far the temperature could plunge and how much snow could fall.
As the weather grew colder, Gilbert and Popham concluded that their stores could not support the entire complement of colonists through the winter. They sent home a large number of settlers—perhaps as many as half of the colony—and another cargo, mostly of felled trees suitable for the making of masts. On the way back, the colonists stopped at the Azores for provisions and, on the instructions of the leaders, sold the masts to pay for the supplies. As a result, when the Gift of God arrived in England, it carried no commodities that the backers could sell to recoup their investment.
Gorges was again compelled to report disappointing news to Cecil. “Our second ship has returned,” he wrote, “but with nothing more” than the first ship had delivered.21 There would be no financial gain, no return to the investors. This turn of events so angered Francis Popham that he, with his mother, Lady Anne Popham, filed a suit in the Admiralty Court against the master of the Gift of God for selling the masts.22 There was some encouraging news, however. The arriving ship also carried a letter from George Popham, addressed to King James himself, that seemed to contradict the bad news and described the rich commercial potential of the colony. “All the native inhabitants repeatedly assert that there are nutmegs, mace and cinnamon in these parts,” wrote Popham, as well as “bitumen, Brazil wood, cochineal and ambergris, along with many other important and valuable things, and all very plentiful at that.” Even more enticing, Popham further reported that he had been assured by the Indians that, in the “western part of this province, no more than seven days journey from our Fort St. George at Sagadahoc,” there was a “sea which is extensive, wide and deep”—so large, in fact, that the Indians “have no idea how far it extends.” Popham concluded, without evidence, that “this can be none other than the Southern Ocean, stretching towards the land of China which doubtless cannot be far away from this region.”23
Unfortunately, Popham’s claims about the commercial potential of the region were fabrications or, more charitably, wishful thinking. Of the commodities he mentioned, only ambergris might have been available to the colonists. The route to Cathay was also an audacious fiction, although there were two large bodies of water that lay to the
west—Lake Champlain and the St. Lawrence River. The colonists who returned on the Gift of God brought home much less rosy reports. They told of hardship, especially the “extremity of the weather” that had “sorely pinched” them. Their clothes were thin and their diet poor. Gilbert, with his headstrong ways, had sowed division in the colony. What’s more, the Indians had been far from cooperative, preferring to be “subtle and cunning” in their dealings and unwilling to reveal the sources of the wanted commodities. This should not have been surprising. It had been just two years since the Waymouth kidnapping and, even with the intervention of Skicowáros and Tahánedo, the Indians had not forgotten or forgiven the transgression.24
As he conveyed the news to Cecil, Gorges appealed for patience and asked for permission to put together a supply mission that he would organize himself. This he received, and he promptly sent the Mary and John back to Sagadahoc with fresh supplies and some significant news: John Gilbert, the eldest son of Sir Humphrey, had died and left the considerable family estate to his younger brother, Raleigh.
The news forced the young Gilbert to make a difficult decision: to stay and lead a struggling wilderness colony or go home and manage a great English estate. His decision was complicated by a number of factors. Gilbert’s coleader, George Popham, perhaps succumbing to the cold, had died in February, aged about fifty-eight. Also, the colony’s chief sponsor, John Popham, was dead, and this meant that further supplies could not be counted on, even with Gorges managing the venture. The colonists had not yet completed the planned colonial buildings nor realized the hoped-for commercial potential: they had found none of the exotic commodities listed by Popham, and they had failed to establish reliable trading relationships with the Indians that would guarantee them a supply of furs and other tradable goods.