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A New Voyage to Carolina
John Lawson (1674?-1711) was a British explorer, naturalist and writer. He played an important role in the history of colonial North Carolina. He led a small expedition out of Charleston and up the Santee River to explore the Carolina backcountry. Along the way he took careful note of the vegetation, wildlife and, in particular, the many Indian tribes he encountered. Lawson wrote an account of his adventure, A New Voyage to Carolina (1709), in which he described the native inhabitants and the natural environment of the region. The book was an instant success and several editions were published including versions in German and French. The resulting publicity attracted many settlers to North Carolina. Lawson played a major role in the founding of two of North Carolina's earliest settlements-Bath and New Bern. Bath became the first town incorporated in what was to become North Carolina. Part of the incorporated land was owned by Lawson and he became one of the first town commissioners. Later he became clerk of the court and public register for Bath County.
360 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1709
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About the author
John Lawson
8 booksLibrarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.
John Lawson (1674? – 1711) was an English explorer, naturalist and writer.
John Lawson (1674? – 1711) was an English explorer, naturalist and writer.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
August 12, 2025
The newness of this book is long gone; but its historical importance, for students of the early history of the American colonies, remains. When John Lawson published A New Voyage to Carolina in 1709, he hoped to encourage the book’s English readers to consider journeying across the ocean to what, at the time, was a single Carolina colony. In the process, however, he provided a valuable historical resource – a close and perceptive look at the people and the resources of what are now North Carolina and South Carolina.
The English-born Lawson seems to have been interested in nature and exploration from a early age, having attended many lectures of the Royal Society, England’s national academy of sciences. In 1700, at the age of 26, he travelled to Carolina, and built for himself a career as a surveyor, eventually assisting in the foundation of the early North Carolina towns of Bath and New Bern. And, having achieved success as a Carolinian, he returned to England in 1709, to publish A New Voyage to Carolina as a way of encouraging other English people to consider relocating to the colony.
The early passages of A New Voyage to Carolina chronicle Lawson’s journey with a party of fellow explorers across both North and South Carolina (the two colonies officially split in two in 1712, three years after the publication of Lawson’s book). Some of Lawson’s experiences on the journey were quite vivid. In one overnight stay, for example, Lawson records that “Our Landlord was King of the Kadapau Indians, and always kept two or three trading Girls in his Cabin. Offering one of these to some of our Company, who refus’d his Kindness, his Majesty flew into a violent Passion, to be thus slighted, telling the Englishmen, they were good for nothing” (p. 51).
From a narrative of his own travel experiences, Lawson proceeds to a highly detailed and thorough consideration of the resources of Carolina – plants, animals, fish, birds. As North Carolina is today known as “the Land of the Long Leaf Pine,” I appreciated Lawson’s focus on the fact that “Of Pines, there are, in Carolina, at least four sorts.” He assures the reader of his time that “This Tree affords the four great necessaries – Pitch, Tar, Rozin, and Turpentine” (p. 107); and he reminds the modern reader, in the process, that North Carolina today is the Tar Heel State, and the University of North Carolina’s sports teams the Tar Heels.
Lawson is downright charmed by the hummingbird, writing that “The Humming-Bird is the Miracle of all our wing’d Animals. He is feather’d as a Bird, and gets his Living as the Bees, by sucking the Honey from each Flower.” He focuses on the hummingbird’s “green, red, Aurora, and other Colours mixt”, and adds that “His Nest is one of the greatest Pieces of Workmanship the whole Tribe of wing’d Animals can shew, it commonly hanging on a single Bryar,” with “Eggs [that] are the bigness of Pease” (p. 158). Readers in England, where hummingbirds were unknown, no doubt read these passages of description with a certain fascination.
Yet Lawson soon returns to the subject that seems to interest him most – the interactions between the English and Indigenous people of Carolina. In the context of a discussion of intimate relationships between English men and Indigenous women, he expresses concern that the children of these relationships “are seldom educated any otherwise than in a State of Infidelity”, as the children remain with the mother and her culture. “And therefore, on this Score, it ever seems impossible for the Christians to get their Children (which they have by these Indian Women) away from them; whereby they might bring them up in the Knowledge of the Christian Principles” (p. 201).
Elsewhere, Lawson mentions the difficulties of trying to inculcate the principles of Christianity among the Indigenous people, stating that “No Man living will ever be able to make these Heathens sensible of the Happiness of a Future State, except he now and then mentions some lively carnal Representation, which may quicken their Apprehensions, and make them thirst after such a grateful Exchange” (p. 59). He wants, clearly enough, to see the Indigenous people adopt the Anglican faith of Queen Anne’s England, but he sees what is actually occurring among real people on the ground in Carolina, and reports accordingly.
The modern reader may be struck by Lawson’s compassionate attitude toward the Indigenous people of Carolina, at a time when such attitudes were decidedly not the norm; Lawson writes, late in the book, that
They really are better to us, than we are to them; they always give us Victuals at their Quarters, and take care we are arm’d against Hunger and Thirst: We do not so by them (generally speaking) but let them walk by our Doors Hungry, and do not often relieve them. We look upon them with Scorn and Disdain, and think them little better than Beasts in Humane Shape, though if well examined, we shall find that, for all our Religion and Education, we possess more Moral Deformities, and Evils, than these Savages do, or are acquainted withal. (p. 251)
Over the course of A New Voyage to Carolina, Lawson provides some hair-raising descriptions of the ritual tortures to which Indigenous warriors subject enemy prisoners of war – though he couldn’t have known at the time that, sadly, he was forecasting his own fate. Captured by Tuscarora warriors in 1712, at a time when conflict between the English and the Tuscarora had broken out into full-scale war, Lawson was subjected to ritual torture and then executed. It is sad to think of such a cruel and agonizing end to the career of this man who clearly loved his Carolina homeland. Yet A New Voyage to Carolina lives on, as an early evocation of the glories of a particularly beautiful part of what is now the United States.
The English-born Lawson seems to have been interested in nature and exploration from a early age, having attended many lectures of the Royal Society, England’s national academy of sciences. In 1700, at the age of 26, he travelled to Carolina, and built for himself a career as a surveyor, eventually assisting in the foundation of the early North Carolina towns of Bath and New Bern. And, having achieved success as a Carolinian, he returned to England in 1709, to publish A New Voyage to Carolina as a way of encouraging other English people to consider relocating to the colony.
The early passages of A New Voyage to Carolina chronicle Lawson’s journey with a party of fellow explorers across both North and South Carolina (the two colonies officially split in two in 1712, three years after the publication of Lawson’s book). Some of Lawson’s experiences on the journey were quite vivid. In one overnight stay, for example, Lawson records that “Our Landlord was King of the Kadapau Indians, and always kept two or three trading Girls in his Cabin. Offering one of these to some of our Company, who refus’d his Kindness, his Majesty flew into a violent Passion, to be thus slighted, telling the Englishmen, they were good for nothing” (p. 51).
From a narrative of his own travel experiences, Lawson proceeds to a highly detailed and thorough consideration of the resources of Carolina – plants, animals, fish, birds. As North Carolina is today known as “the Land of the Long Leaf Pine,” I appreciated Lawson’s focus on the fact that “Of Pines, there are, in Carolina, at least four sorts.” He assures the reader of his time that “This Tree affords the four great necessaries – Pitch, Tar, Rozin, and Turpentine” (p. 107); and he reminds the modern reader, in the process, that North Carolina today is the Tar Heel State, and the University of North Carolina’s sports teams the Tar Heels.
Lawson is downright charmed by the hummingbird, writing that “The Humming-Bird is the Miracle of all our wing’d Animals. He is feather’d as a Bird, and gets his Living as the Bees, by sucking the Honey from each Flower.” He focuses on the hummingbird’s “green, red, Aurora, and other Colours mixt”, and adds that “His Nest is one of the greatest Pieces of Workmanship the whole Tribe of wing’d Animals can shew, it commonly hanging on a single Bryar,” with “Eggs [that] are the bigness of Pease” (p. 158). Readers in England, where hummingbirds were unknown, no doubt read these passages of description with a certain fascination.
Yet Lawson soon returns to the subject that seems to interest him most – the interactions between the English and Indigenous people of Carolina. In the context of a discussion of intimate relationships between English men and Indigenous women, he expresses concern that the children of these relationships “are seldom educated any otherwise than in a State of Infidelity”, as the children remain with the mother and her culture. “And therefore, on this Score, it ever seems impossible for the Christians to get their Children (which they have by these Indian Women) away from them; whereby they might bring them up in the Knowledge of the Christian Principles” (p. 201).
Elsewhere, Lawson mentions the difficulties of trying to inculcate the principles of Christianity among the Indigenous people, stating that “No Man living will ever be able to make these Heathens sensible of the Happiness of a Future State, except he now and then mentions some lively carnal Representation, which may quicken their Apprehensions, and make them thirst after such a grateful Exchange” (p. 59). He wants, clearly enough, to see the Indigenous people adopt the Anglican faith of Queen Anne’s England, but he sees what is actually occurring among real people on the ground in Carolina, and reports accordingly.
The modern reader may be struck by Lawson’s compassionate attitude toward the Indigenous people of Carolina, at a time when such attitudes were decidedly not the norm; Lawson writes, late in the book, that
They really are better to us, than we are to them; they always give us Victuals at their Quarters, and take care we are arm’d against Hunger and Thirst: We do not so by them (generally speaking) but let them walk by our Doors Hungry, and do not often relieve them. We look upon them with Scorn and Disdain, and think them little better than Beasts in Humane Shape, though if well examined, we shall find that, for all our Religion and Education, we possess more Moral Deformities, and Evils, than these Savages do, or are acquainted withal. (p. 251)
Over the course of A New Voyage to Carolina, Lawson provides some hair-raising descriptions of the ritual tortures to which Indigenous warriors subject enemy prisoners of war – though he couldn’t have known at the time that, sadly, he was forecasting his own fate. Captured by Tuscarora warriors in 1712, at a time when conflict between the English and the Tuscarora had broken out into full-scale war, Lawson was subjected to ritual torture and then executed. It is sad to think of such a cruel and agonizing end to the career of this man who clearly loved his Carolina homeland. Yet A New Voyage to Carolina lives on, as an early evocation of the glories of a particularly beautiful part of what is now the United States.
October 8, 2008
The title describes the book well, "A New VOYAGE to CAROLINA; Containing the Exact Description and Natural History of that COUNTRY: Together with the Present State thereof. And A JOURNAL Of a Thousand Miles, Travel'd thro' several Nations of INDIANS. Giving a particular Account of their Customs, Manners, &c."
He was hired to survey an area that was basically the mid east coast, South Carolina north to Virginia. He does so & his observations, comments & entire journey make for some fascinating reading. The wording & spelling is tough to get through sometimes. I've read it piecemeal over several years. The text & his map are free from Project Guttenberg.
He was hired to survey an area that was basically the mid east coast, South Carolina north to Virginia. He does so & his observations, comments & entire journey make for some fascinating reading. The wording & spelling is tough to get through sometimes. I've read it piecemeal over several years. The text & his map are free from Project Guttenberg.
Read
April 3, 2025Surprisingly easy to read for a 300-year-old book. I kept seeing it referenced in various books about plants in the region and saw it was available with my library e-reader so I tried it out.
I think almost anyone would enjoy the relatively brief travel story that begins the volume. I continually marveled at how hard people were back then, that so many basically epic adventures would be described so matter-of-factly.
Nature people should enjoy the middle part, describing the various native plants and animals encountered. Hilariously almost every animal, fish, and bird includes basically a rating of how good it is to eat.
The final section (describing the lives and settlements of Native Americans) is fascinating both for the actual content and the 1700s English point of view from which it is written. Disentangling all that will keep your brain busy.
I think almost anyone would enjoy the relatively brief travel story that begins the volume. I continually marveled at how hard people were back then, that so many basically epic adventures would be described so matter-of-factly.
Nature people should enjoy the middle part, describing the various native plants and animals encountered. Hilariously almost every animal, fish, and bird includes basically a rating of how good it is to eat.
The final section (describing the lives and settlements of Native Americans) is fascinating both for the actual content and the 1700s English point of view from which it is written. Disentangling all that will keep your brain busy.
December 13, 2023
"We reckon them Slaves in Comparison to us, and Intruders, as oft as they enter our Houses, or hunt near our Dwellings. But if we will admit Reason to be our Guide, she will inform us, that these Indians are the freest People in the World, and so far from being Intruders upon us, that we have abandon'd our own Native Soil, to drive them out, and possess theirs."
John Lawson amassed an encyclopedic knowledge of Carolina in his short time. Much of the interior of the state, as Lawson found it, was still largely untouched by Europeans on his passing through.
The account of the journey itself and Lawson's attempts at an anthropology of the Native Americans makes this well worth reading.
John Lawson amassed an encyclopedic knowledge of Carolina in his short time. Much of the interior of the state, as Lawson found it, was still largely untouched by Europeans on his passing through.
The account of the journey itself and Lawson's attempts at an anthropology of the Native Americans makes this well worth reading.
December 8, 2023
Ahead of his time vis a vis to the Natives, ironically considering the means of his untimely departure.
January 29, 2013
In questo libro ho trovato un racconto di viaggio (dal Sud al Nord Carolina), una descrizione del Nord Carolina, liste di animali, fiori, frutti, alberi, animali, rettili, uccelli, pesci, usi e costumi degli indiani, una lista di vocaboli nelle diverse varietà che parlavano, la costituzione del Nord Carolina e il suo riassunto.
Lawson però non si rivolgeva a un italiano del ventunesimo secolo, si rivolgeva a inglesi e futuri americani suoi contemporanei. Quello che per loro rendeva questo libro prezioso, per me è stato noioso e inutile.
Della costituzione facevo a meno, così come di parte delle liste. Mi ha interessato il lato umano, scoprire qualcosa degli indiani, e sicuramente il lato linguistico, che è quello che mi verrà chiesto all'esame (non nascondo infatti che nei punti più inutili ho letto tra le righe, arrivando a saltare quasi tutta la costituzione e il suo riassunto), ma se a fine lettura posso dirvi che Lawson scriveva "chuse" anziché "chose", "publick" anziché "public" e metteva le maiuscole a tutti i sostantivi, è già tanto se ricordo qualcosa sulla religione degli indiani, sulla loro propensione all'alcol o su qualche cura assurda che prevedeva il dormire con un serpente senza denti.
Lawson però non si rivolgeva a un italiano del ventunesimo secolo, si rivolgeva a inglesi e futuri americani suoi contemporanei. Quello che per loro rendeva questo libro prezioso, per me è stato noioso e inutile.
Della costituzione facevo a meno, così come di parte delle liste. Mi ha interessato il lato umano, scoprire qualcosa degli indiani, e sicuramente il lato linguistico, che è quello che mi verrà chiesto all'esame (non nascondo infatti che nei punti più inutili ho letto tra le righe, arrivando a saltare quasi tutta la costituzione e il suo riassunto), ma se a fine lettura posso dirvi che Lawson scriveva "chuse" anziché "chose", "publick" anziché "public" e metteva le maiuscole a tutti i sostantivi, è già tanto se ricordo qualcosa sulla religione degli indiani, sulla loro propensione all'alcol o su qualche cura assurda che prevedeva il dormire con un serpente senza denti.
December 21, 2009
Hugh Lefler's edition of Lawson's 1709 classic is surely the best available in print today. John Lawson, though certainly a great naturalist, was also an astute observer of human beings. His portraits of colonial life in the Carolinas are unforgettable. He relates the scenes of Indian towns, portraits of the Carolina traders, Native customs and lore. Lawson is possessed of considerable good humor; the reader laughs with when he slips and falls comically into neck-high water. Though many read this book for the plants, I suggest reading it for the characters. There are few contemporary accounts of Native life in the Carolinas before the Tuscarora War as detailed, and fewer sources in all of the material from early Carolina that are as rich and descriptive.
June 23, 2011
John Lawson was one of the early explorer's of the interior of the Carolina colony in the early 1700's. This is a journal of his journey. Unfortunately, nothing particularly interesting happened. It's a pretty much straight forward narrative of a a rather uninteresting journey. He follows that with a lengthy lists of the various flora and fauna of Carolina. There are several places that prove interesting - in particular his ethnography of native culture, and in describing the birds of the area, his descriptions of the passenger pigeon and the Carolina parakeet are heart-breaking since both species are now extinct. This is a handy book to have as a reference, but not as interesting in reading.
March 26, 2012
A fascinating look back at the Carolinas as they existed in 1700. John Lawson prepared what he believed to be a rigorous narrative on the peoples, plants, animals, and productions as he encountered them on a four month expedition and also as a resident of the new town of Bath. Lawson was surprisingly (and refreshingly) respectful of the native peoples and wrote a relatively sympathetic profile of their customs.
December 19, 2008
Loved the journal entries...made for quick reading hear-and-there. Intersting to associate the discoveries and observations he writes about to the area in modern times.
February 28, 2016
Great book on nature and how comprehensive the knowledge of surveyors.
April 13, 2016
A lot of good and interesting information in this book, but it is very tedious to read because it is written in early 18th century English.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews