The Virginia Adventure: Roanoke to James Towne

by Ivor Noël Hume

In The Virginia Adventure, Noel Hume turns his attention to the two earliest English settlements in Virginia, Roanoke and James Towne, with fascinating results. Combining information gathered through excavations of the sites with contemporary accounts from journals, letters, and official records of the period, the author illuminates the exploits of Sir Walter Raleigh, Captain John Smith, and Powhatan; the life and death of Pocahontas; and the dissapearance of the Roanoke colony.

Genres: History, Archaeology, American History, 17th Century, Nonfiction

491 pages, Paperback

First published September 13, 1994

Reviews

[Jeremy Canipe · Rating 5 out of 5]

British-born and largely self-taught, Ivor Noël Hume was a famed historical archeologist and head of the archeology program at Colonial Williamsburg and author of many books in this field. This book combines two topics, namely the earliest English colonization efforts before and through Jamestown and the changing interpretations of the history of Jamestown as influenced by amateurs and then professional historical archeological digs.

In both regards, the book is worth you reading time. His work are must-reads for anyone interested in early colonial Virginia. The book is so well written as to be pleasure despite its length and details. We learn much about so many key actors on the stage, both English and Native American from his reconstruction and retelling of the story.

[Genni · Rating 4 out of 5]

Respected archaeologist writes readable history.

( I have been reading too many headlines recently.)

[Michael Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

Anyone with a serious interest in colonial Virginia knows (or ought to know) about this author. I first encountered him through his earlier work on Tidewater archaeology, Martin’s Hundred, which was a marvel of both scholarship and accessible writing. This subsequent work shows that wasn’t just a fluke.

Roanoke was the project of Sir Walter Raleigh, the first attempt in 1586 to plant an English settlement in “Virginia” (which meant the entire eastern seaboard), and it was a dismal failure for an assortment of reasons. When the supply ship, which was delayed far beyond the intended schedule, finally returned, the settlement on the swampy little island behind the barrier islands of North Carolina was completely empty, thereby creating America’s first unsolved mystery. There have been many theories since, but most .likely the English settlers were dispossessed by the local Indians and either killed or carried off and absorbed. (The Indians weren’t naïve about the long-range intentions of these light-skinned strangers.) But Noël Hume is an archaeologist and he’s less interested in speculating about the fate of the colonists than in uncovering the traces they left behind -- of which there aren’t many. However, being the chief archaeologist at Williamsburg, he’s also more interested in his own back yard.

Roanoke takes up less than a quarter of the book, the rest of which is given over to the establishment and survival struggles of Jamestown, the first (more or less) successful English colony, which was begun in 1607, a generation after Raleigh. It’s amazing that Jamestown held on at all, given the lack of organization of those involved, their fixation on discovering gold rather than planting crops, their tendency to strut and argue among themselves, and their general lack of understanding of how to deal with the natives. And then there’s Capt. John Smith, one of the greatest self-promoting blowhards America has ever produced. When Jamestown, which was very poorly situated for any purpose, was finally abandoned in favor of Williamsburg, the signs of the first settlement largely faded away, though the land continued to be planted and lived on. Subsequent generations knew where Jamestown’s fort and village were, more or less, and amateur historians and plundering treasure hunters made a mess of the site, to the grief of modern archaeologists.

Noël Hume leads the reader carefully through the story of the settlement’s creation, pinning down his descriptions with the artifacts people have found and their interpretations, and comparing life in Jamestown with other sites in Virginia as well as with contemporary Britain. He tells the stories of Capt. Smith and Pocahontas and John Rolfe, and of all the less well-known early settlers (a few of my own forebears among them, actually), citing historical sources and sifting fact from folklore. And he does it all in an elegant, self-deprecating, and slightly cynical style that is a joy to read. The last section of the book deals with the modern rivalries among archaeologists and self-important Virginia patriots, which still continue. And the extended bibliography will keep you busy well into the future.

[Luke · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this over my "spring break" when I was bed ridden with the flu. I could only put it down to eat and fall asleep. The book does a wonderful job interpreting the history of the two settlements based on primary sources and archeological evidence. The one downside to the book is that it was written over a decade ago before James Fort was rediscoverd so the last chapter is all speculation about the location of the fort, nevertheless a great istory of the Virginia Company and Jamestowne, a must read for any die-hard Virginian.

[David R. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hume is that rarity: am eminently readable archaeologist. This 1990s work tells the story of Virginia's earliest English settlements and keeps a close eye to the original source documents and archaelogical findings. He takes the time to scrutinize minute details in texts that yields often surprising conclusions, particularly with respect to James Fort and James Towne. Highly recommended!

[Daniel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Took me four months to read, but what an amazing story of the first colonies on American soil! Told from an Historical Archaeological perspective, Ivor Noel Hume's book is extremely readable for those of us who are amateurs.

[Allison Thurman]

Library

[colleen · Rating 4 out of 5]

read 10.11.05

[Mills College Library]

975.5425 N769v 1994