Volume 1

Travels and works of Captain John Smith, President of Virginia, and Admiral of New England / edited by Edward Arber.

  • John Smith
Date:
1910
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Travels and works of Captain John Smith, President of Virginia, and Admiral of New England / edited by Edward Arber. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    1630, at//. 927-931. He will then see things with Smith’s eyes, and from his standpoint. In the second of these accounts, our Author speaks of “ I with my party ” in the James river Settlement. The Colony soon broke into two divisions, that headed by Ratcliffe, Martin, and Archer ; and that which followed Smith. As everything relating to that Settlement in the present Text, might (however true in itself) be antecedently prejudiced on the ground that it was an ex parte statement; the manifesto of a Party that did not perish, when the other side did in The Starving Time of 1609-10: we have printedinthe following pages of this Intro- dnction all the Eye-witness testimonies we could find, of the state of the Colony during the nearly thirty months our Author was there ; he having arrived with the Expedition in Chesapeake Bay on the 26th April 1607, and left James town, after having been injured by gunpowder, for England on the 4th October 1609. Here again the result is perfectly satisfactory. These Eye-witness Accounts supply us with a lot of new and most interesting information ; and, above all, afford us a number of important dates on which to pivot the history of those thirty months. Seeing therefore that all this illustrative material only brings out the general truthfulness of the Text at large ; once more, from this fresh test, we accord to our Author a fresh measure of confidence. Undoubtedly, Smith was the Saviour of the James river Settlement. Before we give these most valuable contemporary documents, it may be well to touch upon the false charge of an imaginary mutiny, which nearly cost our Author his life while on the voyage out to Virginia. It does not appear that Smith actually did anything at all. Wingfield states, p. lxxxiii, that on 17 September 1607, he was fined by the Colony to pay ^200 [=^800 now] to Captain Smith, /. 389, for that I had said hee did conceale an intended mutany. Also— Master Smyths quarrell, [with me, was] because his name was mencioned in the entended and confessed mutiny by Galthropp. /. xc. Stephen Galthorpe died on 15 Aug. 1607, see/, lxxi. This accusation appears to have been made at Dominica, on the 24th Mar. 1607, /. lvii-lviii; and during the six days [28th Mar.-2 Apr. 1607] the Ex¬ pedition stayed at Nevis,/, lix, our Author says: Such factions here we had, as commonly attend such voyages, that a paire of gallowes was made; but Captaine Smith, for whom they were intended, could not be perswaded to use them : but not any one of the inventers but their lives by justice fell into his power to determine of at his pleasure; whom with much mercy he favoured, that most basely and unjustly would have betrayed him. /. 910. The exact nature of the wild charge against Smith will be seen at/. 388. He however remained a prisoner until the Gentlemen in the Colony having on June 6,/. liii, put up a petition to the Council, he was sworn of the Council on the 10th June 1607,/. liv ; or as he puts it at pp. 92, 388, he was imprisoned, [for nothing !] 13 weeks.
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