Jamestown Colony

1606 -Constant, Godspeed, & Discovery sailed to Virginia

1607 - Christopher Newport captained the Susan Constant & designated the site for Fort Jamestown

1607 -Jamestown was founded

1608 -Captain John Smith was appointed governor

1609 - Temperance Flowerdew arrived in Jamestown on the Faulcon

1609 - George Yeardley arrived in Jamestown on the Sea Venture

1609 - The Starving Time

1610 - Lord Thomas West de la Warr appointed governor

1613 - Temperance Flowerdew married George Yeardley

1616 - George Yeardley began 1st of three terms as governor

Tuesday, October 6, 2009

Governor Thomas West Baron de la Warr (1577-1618)

After the Powhattans attacked Jamestown and killed the colony's governor, Lord West, Baron de la Warr headed a contingency of 150 men who landed in Jamestown, June 10, 1610, just in time to persuade the original colonists not to give up and return to England. As a veteran of English campaigns against the Irish, de la Warr employed "Irish tactics" against the Indians. He was appointed governor-for-life and captain-general. He outfitted three ships, recruited and equipped men at his own expense. Leaving his deputy Sir Samuel Argall in charge, Lord de la Warr returned to England and published a book about Virginia (The Relation of the Right Honourable the Lord de-la-Warre, of the Colonie, Planted in Virginia, 1611). Remaining the governor, he received complaints from the Jamestown colonists of Argall's tyranny in governing them. Thus to investigate the charges, Lord de la Warr set sail for Virginia again in 1618. He died en route. It is thought he might have been poisoned and buried at sea. The state of Delaware is named for Thomas West de la Warr (de-la-ware). Sir Thomas West's descendants built West Point Plantation.

5 comments:

Model on a Bottle (tm)April 15, 2011 at 5:12 PM
Hi, I have lots of West Ancestor Photos. It would be nice to connect the dots and find some living relatives. Benjamin West is in our family tree. Please email me. Thank you.
ReplyDelete
Replies
UnknownApril 27, 2013 at 6:45 PM
It is great to read upon your families history. It is great to know that our family member helped build this country.
ReplyDelete
Replies
UnknownMay 5, 2020 at 12:10 PM
Hi Amy West here. Trying to figure this all out. Seems I am a decendant of The West's.
ReplyDelete
Replies

Add comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)

Dorothy Elizabeth Wolfe (Southard)

Temperence Flowerdew & George Yeardley

Governor George Yeardley was the 2nd son of four, born to George & Rhonda Yeardley of London (c.1577-80). His father was a merchant tailor. He was a veteran of the Dutch Wars. In 1609, he cast off to Bermuda. He made it to Jamestown in May 1609 after surviving a hurricane at sea. That same year, Temperance Flowerdew arrived in Jamestown on the Faulcon ship. She had survived the same hurrican in the Atlantic.

1613 was an eventful year for George and Temperance. They married that year. They both sailed back to England for a visit. While in England, King James appointed George governor of Jamestown and Virginia. In 1625, George and Temperance were still living in Jamestown with three children. They have numerous descendants in the United States. Governor George Yeardley died a very wealthy man. Temperance remarried after his death, but died a few years later. She was married to her 2nd husband barely a year.

Pocahontas held Captive

By 1613, Chief Powhatan had captured many Jamestown settlers + people in the fort were starving. Captain Argall hatched a plan to get food from the Indians for the settlement. Pocahontas had been visiting regularly, trying to help the settlers. Argall tricked her into boarding his ship and held Pocahontas captive. He wanted food for the release of the Indian princess. He also demanded the release of the white captives. Chief Powhatan traded his captives for guns, but declined his daughter's return.

Peace of Pocahontas (8 years)

In 1614, Pocahontas married John Rolfe, a tobacco farmer. This marriage brought about an eight year peace with the Powhatan Indians. The Jamestown settlers convinced John & Pocahontas to travel to England. They felt the pair would be seen as celebrities and draw more settlers & money to Jamestown. Pocahontas was treated with great respect. She was even invited to King James' court, but the wet climate of England made her ill and she never recovered. She died in 1617. John returned to Jamestown alone.

Captain Newport (1563-1616) had three different wives. Each wife born one child. His first wife Elizabeth Glaufield bore Marian Newport (1615-1646).

Marian Newport married William Hatcher (1613-1680) and had four children. We are descended from their 3rd child, Benjamin Hatcher (1644-1728).

Benjamin married Elizabeth Greenhaugh (1645-1740). They had seven children. Their first daughter Elizabeth Hatcher (1680-1756) married Joseph Hopson (1680-1767).

Meredith Shellcross Hopson is a direct descendant.

Captain Christopher Newport (1561-1617)

Admiral of Virginia and founder of Jamestown and the American Dream

As a young man, Christopher Newport sailed with Sir Francis Drake in the daring, surprise attack on the Spanish fleet at Cadiz Harbor, Spain and participated in England's famous defeat of the Spanish Armada. During this war with Spain, Newport seized fortunes of Spanish and Portuguese treasure in fierce sea battles in the West Indies as a privateer for Queen Elizabeth I. He led more attacks on Spanish shipping and settlements than any other English privateer. After leading his men aboard an enemy ship off the coast of Cuba, his right arm was "stroken off", and Newport was referred to thereafter as, "Christopher Newport of the one hand." He had a hook for a right arm after that incident.

As Admiral of Virginia, Newport led the fleet of colonists who established the first permanent English settlement in the New World. He chose the site for Jamestown, led the initial exploration for King James, and negotiated peacefully with Chief Powhatan's Indian tribes. Newport repeatedly rescued the colonists from famine with four voyages to resupply the struggling colony.

On one such voyage, he captained the Sea Venture. During a hurricane, the Sea Venture was shipwrecked on Bermuda. Newport organized his passengers to build two new smaller vessels from their wreckage. These two small vessels were their deliverance to Jamestown.

In his later career, Newport led three long trading voyages to the Far East for the East India Company. He brought the first English ambassadors to Persia and India. His many voyages laid the foundations for the evolution of the British Empire. Captain Christopher Newport was an outstanding navigator, stern but compassionate sea captain and legendary leader of men.

"Pap", Shell Hopson was born and raised in Cadiz, Kentucky. There are numerous Hopsons in Cadiz. "Pap" raised his family in Gracey, Kentucky. Cadiz, Kentucky borders Gracey, Kentucky.

The Starving Time

Lack of food was not the only problem facing Jamestown when Temperance arrived. The water in the James River was salt water. Pond water was stagnant.

Common Diseases in Jamestown
Yellow Fever: an infection transmitted by mosquitoes. Characterized by high fever, jaundice, and vomiting.
Malaria: an infection transmitted by mosquitoes. Characterized by chills, fever, and sweating.
Typhus: an infection transmitted by fleas, lice, or mites. Characterized by headache, fever, depression, delirium, and rashes.
Dysentery: an infection is the lower intestines. Causes great pain, fever, and diarrhea.
Bubonic Plague: A contagious, often fatal disease caused by bacteria transmitted by fleas & people. Characterized by chills, fever, vomiting and diarrhea.
Measles: a contagious viral disease. Characterized by red spots on the skin, fever, and inflammation of the mucous membranes.
Smallpox: an infectious, often fatal disease. Characterized by fever, aches, and blisters that leave scars.
Influenza: a contagious viral infection. Characterized by inflammation of the respiratory tract, fever, chills, and muscle pain.
Mumps: a contagious disease. Characterized by swelling of the salivary glands.

Temperance Flowerdew

Temperance Flowerdew survived a hurricane at sea and ate rats for dinner. She arrived in Jamestown in August 1609, just in time for the winter famine that followed. She lived through that harrowing winter, called the “Starving Time” (when over 80 percent of Jamestown’s residents died of sickness, disease, or starvation).

In 1613, Temperance married Captain George Yeardley. He became one of the wealthiest men in Virginia. The couple had three children: Elizabeth in 1615, Argoll in 1617, and Francis in 1620, who died at a young age.

In 1616, George Yeardley was designated Deputy-Governor of Virginia. He negotiated an agreement with the Chickahominy Indians that secured food and brought peace to the colonists for two years. His term ended in 1617.

The couple traveled to England, where George was knighted at Newmarket in November 1618. Six days later he was commissioned Governor of Virginia. He was granted 300 acres of land to help defer the cost of maintaining himself as governor.

Temperance returned to Jamestown with her husband, Sir George Yeardley, Governor of Virginia. He now owned a private plantation of 1,000 acres on the south side of the James River, which he named Flowerdew Hundred, in honor of his wife, Lady Yeardley. With a population of about thirty, the plantation was economically successful with thousands of pounds of tobacco produced along with corn, fish, and livestock. The tobacco was shipped and sold in England.

Sir George paid 120 pounds to build the first windmill in British America in 1621. The plantation survived an attack by the Powhatan Indians in 1622, losing only six people. It remained an active private plantation unlike many others in the area.

Yeardley led the first General Assembly to meet on American soil, which convened at the church in Jamestown in July 1619. One of the first acts of this representative body was to set the price of tobacco. Sir Yeardley became a very wealthy man.

Sir George was appointed Deputy-Governor again in 1625, and he served a second term as Governor from March 1626 until his death in November 1627. He is buried in the churchyard at Jamestown, Virginia.

Lady Temperance Flowerdew Yeardley then married Governor Francis West, but she died the following year.

Bacon's Rebellion

Less than seventy years after the founding of Jamestown in 1607, the English settlement was burned and destroyed by Englishmen who lived there. What could have caused this terrible event that pitted Virginia citizans against one another?

It 1676, a young Englishman named Nathaniel Bacon (a relative of Sir Francis Bacon) became the leader of a group of farmers. Bacon's men had organized in an effort to protect their homes and family on the Virginia frontier from raiding Indians. The governor of Virginia, Sir William Berkeley, failed to provide an adequate defense for the colony's outlying areas. Thus the farmers formed their own small army.

In the course of unfolding events, Bacon and his followers killed a group of American Indians who were allies of the Jamestown settlers. This sparked Berkeley's anger, and he declared Bacon and his men to be rebels. Thus began a chain of events that became known has the Bacon Rebellion. The Native American Indians took the worst of it.

In September 1676 Bacon and his men took Jamestown. Fearing Berkeley's troops would win it back, they set fire to Jamestown. Afterwards, the colony moved inland and built Williamsburg.

James Oates & Bacon's Rebellion

James Oates (1647-1703) was a prominent planter and attorney for colonial Virginia and North Carolina. As a highly educated gentleman, he was called Esquire or Master. He was of such importance that he did not have to sign his name like ordinary people, for he was not what they considered an ordinary person. A study of old wills leads one to understand the significance of various things we pay no attention to today. When one was important enough to have a coat of arms and a signet ring, it identified him. All of James Oates important letters, deeds, etc. have this signet ring seal on them. There still exists some family silver with this signet (Coat of Arms) on it.

James Oates lived in Warwick County, Virginia. He was a friend of many outstanding men in Virginia, including Nathaniel Bacon. When Governor Berkeley resumed the governorship in 1660, he was determined to destroy every democratic process in the colony. The governor drastically limited suffrage, obtained the election of an entirely subservient assembly and had it set 14 years without re-election. By these and other measures, Virginia became an oligarchy and the ordinary man became more and more dissatisfied. Their growing discontent came to a head in 1676 when the governor declined to protect the frontier from Indian (Susquehannock tribe) attacks.

The Indians had been attacking the settlers relentlessly. Men of the Virginia wilderness and Jamestown Colony had tried in vain to get aid from King Charles. (What they didn't know at the time: King Charles was sending money & supplies to help fight the Indians. Governor Berkeley was pocketing the money and kept or sold the supplies.)

An overseer for Nathaniel Bacon plantation was murdered by the Indians. After this death, Bacon lead an attack on the Indians with a volunteer force. For this Governor Berkeley pronounced Bacon a traitor. In the uprising that followed, Bacon captured Jamestown and burned it to the ground, driving Berkeley across the Chespeake Bay. This became known as Bacon's Rebellion. Bacon's Rebellion came to a sudden end with the death of Bacon in October 1676 of a sudden fever. (Jamestown never recovered from Bacon's Rebellion. The community moved further inland and established Williamsburg.)

Governor lost no time. His reprisals were brutal with hangings (over 217) and confiscation of property. All this left an indelible stain upon Berkeley's memory in the colonists minds.

James Oates and his friends fled Warwick County, Virginia to save their necks. James and others had to lay low, which meant going to other parts of Virginia. James settled in Halifax County, Virginia. When Halifax appointed a governor, James Oates moved to Albemarle County, Virginia (now part or North Carolina).

James' first day in Albermarle County, he represented the governor at court. Within six weeks, all court sessions were head at James Oates' home. As word spread, various friends that had fled Jamestown,12-15 years earlier, started coming back and reunited with Esquire James Oates. The first General Assembly of North Carolina Colony was held in his house from 1696 till his death in 1703.

source: Oates-Earle and Related Families by William Lloyd Winebarger 929.2 011 W Filson Historical Society Library and Muhlenberg County Free Public Library

The Oates family is also identified with the early colonial period of North Carolina history in the Inglis Fletcher novels.

Why are Jamestown's plantations titled Hundreds?

In England, a hundred was the division of a shire for administrative purposes. The land measure above the hundred was the shire. A shire was under the control of a lord or sheriff. Hundred boundaries were independent of both parish and county boundaries. Most hundreds were in private hands, with the lordship of the hundred being attached to the manor (mansion) of the property area and made hereditary. The importance of the term “hundred" declined after the seventeenth century.

shire = county

hundred = plantation

Flowerdew Hundred

Flowerdew Hundred was among the earliest English settlements in the New World. Its 1,400 acres contain some of the country's best preserved and most significant archeological sites. Archeological investigation has revealed that this site was first inhabited as long ago as 11,000 B.C. In 1618 Governor & Captain General George Yeardley was granted 1,000 acres of land that he named in honor of his wife, Lady Temperance Flowerdew Yeardley. The plantation was economically successful with thousands of pounds of tobacco produced along with corn, fish and livestock. Yeardley became quite wealthy shipping tobbaco to England. The plantation survived the 1622 onslaught of Powhatan warriors, remaining an active and fortified private plantation unlike many others in the area.

Westover Hundred

Westover was named for Henry West, fourth Lord Delaware and son of Thomas West, Governor of Virginia. The shady tulip poplars framing the building are more than 150 years old. "Ancient" is the best word to describe the boxwood hedges which enclose the lawn. Westover, one of Virginia's oldest and grandest plantation mansions, is considered perhaps America's premier example of colonial Georgian architecture and a quintessential James River plantation house.

Georgian design elements are exemplified in Westover's symmetry, elegant proportions, distinctive brickwork and beautiful entrances. Notable features include formal doorways of stone on both main façades; a steeply pitched hip roof, one of only two known in Virginia, an off-center main hall and a finely detailed interior with full-length paneling and enriched plaster ceilings. Another special touch is the elaborate doorway, which continues to be recognized as "the Westover doorway" despite its adaptation to many other buildings. The initial “W” is embedded in the wrought iron gates. The gates are very unique and imported from England.

West & Shirley Hundred

West and Shirley Hundred was first settled in 1613 by Sir Thomas West, 3rd Baron de la Warr, and was named West and Shirley Hundred, for his mother, Cecily Shirley. (Thomas West married 1596 Cecily Shirley, the daughter of Sir Thomas Shirley) The plantation is located on the north bank of the James River and is the oldest active plantation in Virginia. West and Shirley presents a remarkable picture of an important Virginia tobacco plantation. Tobacco was regularly shipped back to England. The main house, formal brick farm buildings and two outbuildings (laundry and kitchen) were built c. 1738. Today, the plantation is also an education center offering field trips. Children watch the blacksmith ply his trade over an iron forge and create tools. In the storehouse, a spinner demonstrates the craft of wool spinning as was practiced in colonial times. Children can see farm animals in their habitat and experience a colonial schoolhouse.

Creating a New Tradition

We hope to gather together every five years as descendants of Jamestown and Plymouth. June 2011, we met in Williamsburg and explored Yorktown & Jamestown. In 2016, we plan to unite in Salem and explore Plymouth Colony.
left to right:
R1: Jill Everski, Dorothy Wolfe Southard (11th generation), Betty Southard Stokes (12th generation), Emma Southard (14th generation), Leslie Stokes (13th generation), and Olivia Southard (14th generation)
R2: Rob Southard (13th generation), Will Southard (13th generation), Gayle Bryant Southard, and Amy Stokes (13th generation)

Jamestown Colony

Queen Elizabeth

Jamestown named for King James

Tuesday, October 6, 2009

5 comments:

Powhatan Indian Village

Building Jamestown

Check out these links:

John Smith

Trade with the Powhatan Indians

John Smith Captured, 1607

Dorothy Elizabeth Wolfe (Southard)

1608

Mom is a direct descendant of . . .

Jamestown Descendants

Temperence Flowerdew & George Yeardley

"Courier Journal", 2013

Powhatan Indians attack in 1609

Pocahontas held Captive

Jamestown Cottage

Peace of Pocahontas (8 years)

proving our ancestry

Firing the Flintlock Gun

We have 4 direct links to Jamestown

Captain Christopher Newport

Captain Christopher Newport (1561-1617)

Meredith Shellcross Hopson ("Pap")

Temperance Flowerdew (1576-1628)

The Starving Time

Temperance Flowerdew

Sir Benjamin West (1738 - 1820)

Sidney Elizabeth West ("Gramma Wolfe")

Bacon's Rebellion

On my father's side we have . . . . .

James Oates & Bacon's Rebellion

"Oates-Earle & Related Families"

Belle Lee Luckett ("Grandmother Southard")

Nicholas & Samuel Gentry

Gentry's arrival to Jamestown Colony

Elizabeth "Bettie" Ann Lander ("Granny")

Why are Jamestown's plantations titled Hundreds?

Flowerdew Hundred Plantation

Flowerdew Hundred

Westover Hundred Plantation

"W" initial is for West

Westover Estate

Westover Hundred

West and Shirley Hundred Plantation

Plantation House

Kitchen

Laundry

Stables

Smoke House

A Working Plantation

West & Shirley Hundred

Sidney Elizabeth West ("Gramma Wolfe")

Family Reunion

Creating a New Tradition

About Me