Chowan River Ramblings, Part 3 – Arrival of the English

Looking out on the Chowan River, I see another cool, grey, and drizzly day. A steady northeast wind is making the water choppy. It’s been a cool spring and it seems we’ve gotten more rain than usual, although no doubt the farmers are thankful. You might even say it’s been a bit of an English spring, which somehow seems appropriate for the story to follow.

On this day in 1584, which was 439 years ago, British sea captains Philip Amadas and Arthur Barlowe, guided by Portuguese navigator Simon Fernandes, were sailing across the Atlantic from England in two tall ships financed by Sir Walter Raleigh and his friends. The captains and their crews, including a few, well-educated specialists such as artist John White and scientist Thomas Harriot, were headed for North America to explore and find a suitable spot for an English colony. They left England on April 27 and after stops in the Canary Islands and the Caribbean, they arrived at the Outer Banks, ironically, on July 4, 1584.

Queen Elizabeth I had recently granted to Raleigh exclusive rights on behalf of England “to discover, search, fynde out and viewe” any New World lands “not actually… inhabited by Christian people.” Given this permission, Raleigh wasted no time seeking fame and fortune in the New World, as Spanish and Portuguese explorers had done before him. Queen Elizabeth did not allow Raleigh himself to go on the voyage; she considered the venture too risky for her beloved Sir Walter. So, he sent his best men instead. Any land without Europeans would be considered fair game to claim. Native Americans, not being Christians, apparently had no say in the matter.

Besides “Christianizing the Savages” of the New World, as Europeans put it, Sir Walter Raleigh and his financial backers had more worldly motives for colonizing the Outer Banks region. It was near the world’s most lucrative shipping lanes at the time. Spanish and Portuguese ships laden with New World gold and silver rode the Gulf Stream’s powerful currents up the Atlantic coast on their way back home, and the closest they came to land was off the present-day Carolina coast.  Raleigh envisioned his New World colony as a base for English “privateering,” which was nothing more than a high-class word for piracy. Contrary to popular belief, Blackbeard and his ilk were not the first pirates to ply the Carolina shores. English and Spanish “privateers” were practicing the craft of piracy more than a century before Blackbeard was just a glimmer in his daddy’s eye.

Amadas and Barlowe, however, had a simpler mission, which was to gain the natives’ consent for establishing an English colony, rather than doing it against their will. Their two ships reached the Outer Banks, where they scouted for a channel through one of its treacherous inlets. They found a narrow passage at Roanoke Inlet, then anchored their ships at a location that most historians believe was around today’s Nags Head Woods. The inlet that likely provided them passage closed due to shifting sands in the mid-1800’s, despite frequent dredging in efforts to keep it open. It was probably along the stretch between Kitty Hawk and Kill Devil Hills today.

The local Indians were, of course, watching the English ships and their sailors the whole time. No doubt they were confused when the Englishmen went ashore, held a ceremony, and planted a stake by which they claimed to take possession of the land “in the right of the Queen’s most excellent Majestie.” Native Americans had no concept of land ownership. Sure, they claimed territory and defended it against their enemies, but they viewed their land claims as temporary, lasting only while they needed the land or could hold onto it.

Upon orders from the regional Indian chief, Wingina, the local village chief, Granganimeo, sent three scouts by canoe to the shore where the Englishmen stood. Wingina had appointed one of them as his ambassador to greet the English, and he addressed the Englishmen accordingly. Captain Barlowe reported it was a long speech, of which he understood not a word, although he could interpret some of the scout’s sign language, which appeared friendly and welcoming. When the Indian’s speech finally ended, Captain Barlowe responded in kind, using some of the same gestures he saw the Indian make. They grew comfortable enough with each other for Barlowe to invite the Indian scout to board his ship for a guided tour. The scout marveled at the modern comforts and technology he saw in the captain’s cabin, then sampled some of the ship’s table fare, which he seemed to enjoy.

After dining with the ship’s officers, the Indian scout signaled his request to disembark, so they escorted him back to shore where he returned to his canoe. Immediately, in Barlowe’s words, the Indian scout “fell to fishing, and in less than half an hour, had laden his boat as deep as it could swim.” May we now pause for a moment, so you readers who like to fish can reflect on the scene. It might have resembled John White’s drawing shown above, as he was on the expedition, busily drawing anything notable that he saw. The Indian scout rowed his canoe full of fish to shore and divided his catch into two piles for the two English ships. The scout and his two companions then left the scene, having accomplished their mission. In the days to follow, other groups of Indian men joined the Englishmen daily for dining and trading their wares.

The English delegation soon traveled to Roanoke Island, where Granganimeo’s wife and several other women met the Englishmen and escorted them to their village. There, the Indian women performed an act of mercy badly needed by the Englishmen: the women bathed them and washed their clothes, thereby making these foreign men more pleasant to be around. After donning clean clothes, the ships’ officers were treated to a sumptuous feast, followed by ritual smoking of a peace pipe with the Indian leaders. Captain Barlowe was virtually glowing after this event, writing, “We were entertained with all love, and kindness, and with as much bounty, after their manner, as they could possibly devise. We found the people most gentle, loving, and faithful, void of all guile, and treason, and such as lived after the manner of the golden age.”

In a few weeks, Amadas and Barlowe let the Indians know it was time to return to England. Then the English captains made an extraordinary request: they wanted to take two Indians back to England with them. The tribal elders, known as “weroances,” were willing to accommodate the Englishmen’s request and carefully screened their candidates to select the best two among them. They chose Manteo, a brave from the Croatan tribe on Hatteras Island, and Wanchese, a brave from Roanoke Island. These two young men could have hardly been more different from each other. Their amazing stories will be told, at least in part, in the next installment of Chowan River Ramblings.