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Impacts of European settlement on indigenous people
Native Americans and the European settlement
Native Americans and the European settlement
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Were the settlers attacked and “murdered? Did they die of natural causes? Or were they assimilated into Native American tribes?” The title of this documentary is Roanoke: The Lost Colony and directed by Brendan Greockel and Brian Leckey. This is an instructive documentary about the Roanoke settlers and how they suddenly disappear. “Croatoan” was the only clue left, carved on the trunk of a tree by the Roanoke Colony before they disappear. In the year 1587, over 100 English settlers came ashore Roanoke Island, NC, to establish the first English colony in America. Sir Walter Raleigh sent John
White, to be the governor of the Roanoke colony. Among the settlers was Eleanor, daughter of White, who gave birth to Virginia Dare. Because of some kind of problem White had to return to England for an emergency. He returned to the Roanoke Colony three years later and just found the word “Croatoan” carved on the trunk of a tree, but never found the Roanoke settlers or his family.
What happened to the Roanoke Colonist? The climate conditions they endured might have made them adapt into Native Am...
Thesis: The Roanoke colony proved to be an unsuccessful venture in the New World for England, since leaders of the expedition held the viewpoint that privateering would prove to be the most profitable aspect of founding the new settlements in the West. However future, still unsuccessful attempts to make a permanent colony at Roanoke, helped England understand how to build a prosperous one; and it became a building block for establishing future colonies for England and helped shape the ideas that would help launch their empire.
Against all Odds is a very interesting Documentary that follows the early settlement of Jamestown in the 17th century .With endless against the odds situations thrown out in from of the people of Jamestown left and right things seemed bleak. But a lot of perseverance from the early settlers including the Documentaries depiction of the original leader John Smith things seemed to resolve themselves. In Documentary there were several parts where it conceited with what is in chapter three of the Textbook the American Promise. For example, In the Documentary when the subject of the Tobacco business came up it was exampled in the same way as the first page of chapter three. With examples of how the product was grown and distributed out into the world. Making it a very valuable trade to be doing although very labor intensive, which is why it would soon lead into the slave trade. Something that was briefly shown in the documentary mainly to show what lengths the people of Jamestown were willing to go to make things work out in their new home.
“Four centuries ago, the English didn’t discover a new world--they created one,” asserts Charles Mann in his article, America, Found and Lost. The article describes the arrival of Jamestown settlers from across the Atlantic Ocean in 1607. They arrived in Virginia to acquire land, gold, and silver. But the Europeans were also fixed on finding a path to Asia. At this time time, Powhatan ruled the empire of Tsenacomoco. He had tripled the size of the city over three decades, and the population was at 14,000 people. The English brought with them a whole host of species that dramatically altered the landscape of the Chesapeake Region. Some were intentional, like tobacco. Others, such as honeybees, worms, and disease had an unintended but profound impact on the environment, changing its indigenous people forever.
In 1587, John White lead a crew of a hundred and seventeen to the island of Roanoke, hoping to form England’s first colony in America. The travel to Roanoke Island didn't trouble John White and they successfully set anchor on Roanoke in July 22, 1587. The Colony worked out exactly as planned until the colony ran out of supplies, forcing John White to sail back to England to collect more supplies then return home with the supplies. The
Cronon, William. Changes in the Land: Indians, Colonists, and the Ecology of New England. New York: Hill and Wang, 1983. Print.
The Jamestown and Plymouth settlements were both settled in the early 1600's. Plymouth and Jamestown were located along the shoreline in Massachusetts and Virginia, respectively. Although both had different forms of government, they both had strong leadership. Jamestown was controlled by the London Company, who wanted to profit from the venture, while the Puritans who settled at Plymouth were self-governed with an early form of democracy and settled in the New World to gain religious freedom. John Smith took charge in efforts to organize Jamestown, and at Plymouth William Bradford helped things run smoothly.
Looking at the early English colonies in the Chesapeake Bay region, it’s clear that the English had not learned any lessons from their experiences at Roanoke. Poor planning, a bad location, unrealistic expectations, flawed leadership, unsuccessful relations with the local Indians, and no hope of finding the mineral wealth the Spanish found in Mexico, all contributed to failure. The first colonists in the Chesapeake region were not only ignorant, lazy and unambitious, but their attempts were hampered before they had begun. However, a solution to these problems was found in a single plant: tobacco. Nevertheless, this cash crop ultimately created numerous problems for the colonists. The ignorance and indolent acts of the Chesapeake colonists to unsuccessfully restore the colony by themselves led to the demise of the colony as a whole especially regarding the planting of agricultural goods for food.
Cronon, William. Changes in the Land: Indians, Colonists, and the Ecology of New England. New York: Hill and Wang, 1983. Print.
A reestablishment of the colony was attempted. It was decided that John White would be the governor. Unfortunately, Indians attacked the colonists numerous times and all their supplies ran out. They decided to send White to obtain supplies in England. He left behind his daughter and his granddaughter, Virginia Dare who was the first child of European decent born in America. When John White arrived in England, the country was involved with a war between Spain and themselves. When White finally was able to come back, 2 years later, there was no one to greet them on the shores of Roanoke Island. There was only an eerie silence. The entire colony was abandoned. As the ship's crew inspected the city they had called Raleigh, one man found "CROA" carved on a tree. To this day the whereabouts of this colony is a mystery.
4.Roanoke Island— 12 mi (19 km) long and 3 mi (4.8 km) wide, off the NE coast of North Carolina between Albemarle and Pimlico sounds, site of the earliest English colony in North America. The first colonists, sent out by Sir Walter Raleigh landed in Aug. 1585 but returned to England in 1586. A second group, arriving in 1587, disappeared by the time additional supplies were brought from England in 1591. Artifacts from the lost colony are displayed in Fort Raleigh National Historic Site on the island.
N.A. “What Happened to the Lost Colony of Roanoke?” N.p., n.d. Web. 5 Oct. 2011
The General History of Virginia, New England, and the Summer Isles by John Smith, portrays the enormous troubles the settlers were faced with by the Native Americans. He explains how he was captured by Indians and also saved by a young Native American girl, Pocahontas. He vividly describes the ceremonies and rituals of the Natives performed before his execution. However, the execution never occurred due to the tremendous mercy showed by the king’s daughter who blanketed John Smith’s body her own. Pocahontas went on to persuade the Native Americans to help the settlers by giving them food and other necessities. Despite her efforts to reach peaceful grounds, her people were still bitter and planned an attacks on the colony. Nevertheless, Pocahontas saved them once again by warning the settlers of attacks. Pocahontas went on to marry an Englishman and traveled to England. She resembled the prosperity and good that was to be found in an untamed land.
The Native Americans of the southeast live in a variety of environments. The environments range from the southern Appalachian Mountains, to the Mississippi River valley, to the Louisiana and Alabama swamps, and the Florida wetlands. These environments were bountiful with various species of plant and animal life, enabling the Native American peoples to flourish. “Most of the Native Americans adopted large-scale agriculture after 900 A.D, and some also developed large towns and highly centralized social and political structures.” In the first half of the 1600s Europeans encountered these native peoples. Both cultures encountered new plants, animals, and diseases. However, the Indians received more diseases compared to the few new diseases to the Europeans. The new diseases resulted in a massive loss of Native Americans, including the Southeast Indians which had never encountered the new diseases. Three of the main tribes in the southeast were the Cherokee and the Creek. They were part of a group of southeast tribes that were removed from their lands. These tribes later became known as “The Five Civilized Tribes because of their progress and achievements.”
The first settlement was built by the English and consisted of 117 men, women, and children on Roanoke Island; which is off the coast of North Carolina. Within three years all of the colonists had disappeared leaving no trace of what happened to them. Analysis of tree rings has shown that Roanoke Island had the worst three-year drought in the past 800 years during the time they settled and disappeared. This is just one of the many challenges that colonists faced.
They arrived in 1587 and disappeared 3 years later and the only two clues left behind was “Croatoan” and “Cro” written on a fencepost and tree. (Basu). The “Croatoan” clue has been found at the site of many mysterious disappearances, where there have been no clues left behind except the word “Croatoan”. (Basu). “When John White came in 1590 and looked for the colony, he mentioned that the settlers talked about moving 50 miles into the main even before he left in 1587.” (Foresman). This explains a reason where they could have disappeared to and why John White was not able to find them when he returned from England. On the other hand, the colonists could have decided to make peace with the local Native American tribes and joined their tribes as friends. But they could have also been forced into the tribes as slaves since many colonists and Native Americans did not agree with each other. “Though the colonists forged friendly relationships with some local Native American tribes, the same could not be said for all of them…a previous group had been sent back…after disagreements and violence broke out with local tribes.”