Pocahontas: Savior of English America or Traitor to her people

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“She [Pocahontas] never spoke of herself, she never represented her emotions, presence or history. He [John Smith] spoke for and represented her” –Edward Said Orientalism 62
Pocahontas, a Powhatan Indian Princess, emerged from a culture of dark superstitions and bettered the relationship with a small group of English settlers in Jamestown and the English rulers of the New World. Her father, Chief Powhatan, was a respected and influential leader, who, by the seventeenth century had made his people not less primitive, but certainly stronger and more formidable than before. In 1605 the English were just discovering the promise land, and the Indians were just discovering the Europeans along with their weapons and diseases. Young Pocahontas managed to uphold moral relations between the Powhatan Indians and early English colonists in Jamestown, Virginia through John Smith, and English captain. Pocahontas single handily instigated one of the scarce eras of harmony between the Indians and the European colonist.
John Smith and two of his troops were shot at from behind bushes and wounded by the Powhatans. John Smith took up his gun and started shooting; killing four of the fifteen Indians, but the Indians backed Smith up to a river. He fell in, and could either let go of his gun or drown. Smith released the firearm and accepted the help of the Indians. Pocahontas, who Smith recalled as "a child of ten years old", witnessed this catastrophe and “Got his head in her arms, and laid her own upon his to save him from death: whereat the emperor was contented he should live to make him hatches.”
The Powhatons were a ceremonious tribe who greeted important visitors formally with a large feast and festive dancing. However, it was not uncommon...

... middle of paper ...

... US: Pantheon Books, 1997.

Horwitz, Tony. 2013. "POCAHONTAS ENGRAVING." Smithsonian 41, no. 7: 91-118. History Reference Center, EBSCOhost (accessed January 28, 2014).

Kelly, James C., and Barbara Clark Smith. Three North American Beginnings.
Edited by Nacy Eickel. N.p.: HarperCollins, 2007.

Nabokov, Peter, ed. Native American Testimony. New York, NY: The Penguin Group,
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"Pocahontas," The Biography Channel website, http://www.biography.com/people/pocahontas-9443116 (accessed Jan 28, 2014).

“Pocahontas,” The History Channel website, http://www.history.com/topics/pocahontas (accessed Jan 28, 2014).

World History: The Modern Era, s.v. "Pocahontas," accessed January 28, 2014. http://worldhistory.abc-clio.com/.

World History: The Modern Era, s.v. "John Smith: quote on Pocahontas," accessed January 28, 2014. http://worldhistory.abc-clio.com/.

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