Posts Tagged ‘Jamestown’
Colonial National Historical Park
Posted by Chris | Filed under State Parks
This 9,352 acre park in the Tidewater are of eastern Virginia protects and interprets two sites: part of the site of Jamestown, the first permanent English settlement in North America, founded in 1607 on Jamestown Island in the James River; and the site of the decisive American-French victory over British forces in 1781 in the Battle of Yorktown at the mouth of the York River. The two park units are connected by the 23-mile Colonial Parkway.
Jamestown
Hardships beset the budding community from the outset. A fever that was likely typhoid claimed many lives; the island’s brackish water was undrinkable; perishable food spoiled; was virtually unbreathable; prolific mosquitoes and other insects made life miserable; and in the first cold, damp winter, more than 60 settlers perished from illness and starvation. Two winters later, the death toll reached 500, leaving a mere 60; but 1610, a large group of new settlers arrived from England just in time to save Jamestown from almost certain abandonment. From the beginning, there had been almost constant conflict between the settlers and the native Indians, who were alarmed by the rapid takeover of their traditional and, especially with the settlers’ clearing of land on which to grow tobacco. In 1622, the Powhatan Indians finally retaliated: close to 350 settlers were killed (about one-third of the population), and nearly all outlying settlements were destroyed.
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