A new and comprehensive gazetteer of Virginia, and the District of Columbia, Part 72

Author: Martin, Joseph. ed. cn; Brockenbrough, William Henry
Publication date: 1835
Publisher: Charlottesville, J. Martin
Number of Pages: 1278

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When we reflect upon the difficulties which were thrown in the way of Columbus at the court of Ferdinand and Isabella, even after they became convinced of the practicability of his scheme, and the yet more arduous dif- : ficulties which he encountered on his voyage, from the mutinous timidity of his crew, we may well doubt whether Henry's courage would have sus- tained him in the actual accomplishment of the enterprize, or whether Eng, land at that time afforded mariners sufficiently hardy to have persevered a sufficient length of time in a seemingly endless voyage upon an unknown sea.

Fortunately, perhaps for mankind the courage of England was not ' put June 24, 1497. to the test of making the first great adventure, and wheth: er she would have succeeded in that or not, she was not des- titute of sufficient courage to undertake an enterprize of very considerable magnitude, at that day, soon after the existence of land in our western hemisphere had been discovered.

The merit of this new enterprize is also due to a native of Italy, and his motive was the same which prevailed in most of the adventures of the time, the desire to discover a new route to India.

Giovanni Gaboto, better known by his Anglicised name of John Cabot,

*"Christophoro Colon temendo, se parimente, i Re Castiglia non assentessero alla sua impresa, non gli bisognasse proporla di nuovo a qualche altro principe, & cosi in cio passasse lungo tempo; mando in Inghelterra. vn suo fratello che hauena appresso di se, chiamato Bartolomeo Colon." Extract from the 13th ch. of his. Chris. Col. by his son Fenran: Col. preserved in Hacklyt, vol. III. p. 22.

t "Pastilo adunque Bartolomeo Colon per Inghelterra, volle la sua sorte, che desse in man di corsali, i quali lo spogliarono insieme con gli altri della sua naue. Per la qual cosa, & per la sua ponerta & infirmita, che in cosi diverse terre lo assalisono crudelmente, prolungo per gran tempo la sua ambasciata, fin que aquistata on poco di faculta con lar carte, ch ei fabricava comincio afar pratiche co il Re Enrico Settimo a cui appresento vn mappa mondo." Hacklyt, vol. III. p. 22.

# This date is preserved in some curious verses upon the map, of which we give a specimen. "Bartholomew Colon de Terra Rubra." "The yeere of Grace, a thousand and four hundred and fourscore" "And eight, and on the thirteenth day of Febuary more "In London published this worke. 'To Christ all laud therefore. Idem."

5 "Con allegro volto neretto la sua offerta, & mandolo a chiamate." Idem.

I " Gia scoperte L, Indie." Hacklyt 11I --- 24.

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HISTORY OF VIRGINIA.

a Venetian merchant who had settled at Bristol, obtained from Henry a charter for himself and his three sons Lewis, Sebastian and Santius, allow- ing them full power and authority to sail into all places in the eastern, wes- tern or northern sea under the banners of England, with five ships, at their own proper costs and charges, to discover countries before unknown to christians, to plant the banners of England in all such places, and to take possession of them, to hold as vassals of England, to have the exclusive mo- nopoly of the trade of all such places, paying to the king one-fifth of the clear profits of every voyage. All other persons were prohibited from vis- iting such places, and the Cabots were bound always to land on their re- turn only at Bristol .*

Under this patent containing "the worst features of colonial monopoly and commercial restriction," John Cabot and his celebrated son Sebastian embarked for the west. The object of Cabot being to discover the passage to India, he pursued a course more northwardly than any selected by pre- vious navigators, and the first land he reached was the coast of Newfound- land, which on that account he named Prima Vista, next the Island of St. John, and finally the continent, among the " Polar bears, the rude savages and dismal cliffs of Labrador," and this seems to have been the only fruit of the firstt British voyage to America.

* Hacklyt, Robertson, Marshall, Bancroft, Burke, &c.

t It seems to have been a prevalent error among historians to confound this first English expedition of John Cabot with his son Sebastian, under his orders, with the second expedition under the sole command of Sebastian, and the second expedition being of most importance, as a much larger portion of the continent was discovered, is most frequently spoken of, and the credit of it is of course given to Sebastian to whom it is due, and the first expedition having unacecountably been blended with the second, John has not received that credit which he deserved. This may account for the reason why it would appear that it had been attempted to deprive the father of the glory of having accompanied the expedition, as Bancroft (vol. I. p. 10,) thinks, and may solve the difficulty which Burke thinks insuperable, (vol. I. p. 37.) . Robert- son blends the two voyages, but gives John the credit of both, he is followed by Mar-' shall, Burke and Holmes, (Am. An .: vol. I. p. 17.) 'The fact of the two voyages may be established by the clearest evidence, and thus the father may be entitled to the me- rit of being the first discoverer, and his son Sebastian of extending the discovery from a small barren unpromising coast to the whole continent. See Bancroft, vol. I. p. 10, and 12, and references there quoted.

The first voyage was in 1497, the second in 1498, the first was undertaken with six ships, the second with only two, and three hundred men,-there is no account of the first expedition after the first discoveries of Newfoundland, and the Island of St. John; there is a detailed account of the voyage of the second up and down the coast from the 56th degree of lat. to the coast of Florida, &c. See Hacklyt III. 27, and 28-and V. 282-3. There seems, however an error in both of these last references, in the lat- ter by making Sebastian Cabot a " Venetian born," and in the former in making him say that he undertook the voyage by reason of the fame of the discoveries of Colum- bus having "created in his heart a great flame of desire to do some notable thing," after his father's death. This last account is quoted by Hacklyt from Baptista Ramusius, who gives it upon the authority of Galeacius Butigarius, the Popes legate in Spain, as having been told to him by Sebastian Cabot himself, but this story is set aside by the strongest evidence, which may be found on the same page, purporting to be an extract from the map of Sebastian Cabot, cut by Clement Adams, concerning his discovery of the West Indies, which is to be seen in her majesties " priuie gallerie of Westminster, . and in many other ancient merchants' houses."

"Anno Domino 1497 Joannes Cobotus Venetus, et Sebastianus illius fillius eam ter- ram fecerunt peruiam, quam nullus prius adire ausus fuit, die 24 Iunij, circiter ho- ram quintam bene mane. Hanc autem appellavit terram primum visam, credo quod ex mari in eam partem primum oculos iniecerat, etc. This together with the king's patent-"damus et concedimus pro nobis et hæredibus nostris, dilectis nobis Ioanni Caboto civi Venetiarum, Lodovico, Sebastiano, et Sancio, filijs dicti Ioannis, et eorum

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HISTORY OF VIRGINIA.

In the following year a new patent was given to John Cabot, and the en- +

Feb. 3, 1498. terprize was conducted by his adventurous and distinguished son Sebastian, in this expedition which was undertaken for purposes of trade as well as discovery, several merchants of London* took part, and even the king himself.t Cabot sailed in a north west course, in hopes of finding a north west passage to India, as far probably as the 58th or 60th degree of latitude, until he was stopped by the quantities of ice which he encountered, and the extreme severity of the weather, he then turned his course southward and followed the coast according to some writers to the coast of Virginia, and in the opinion of some as far as. the coast of Florida .; The only commodities with which he returned to Eng- . land, as far as our accounts inform us, were three of the natives of the newly discovered countries. He found upon his return, the king immer sed in his preparations for a war with Scotland, which prevented his engaging in any further prosecution of his discoveries, or entertaining any design of settlement.

It is not our purpose to notice the Portuguese discoveries under Cotereal, the French under Verrazzani and Cartier, or their abortive attempt at set- tlements in Canada, and New England. Nor shall we notice the extensive inland expedition of the Spaniards under Soto from Florida, through the states of Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, across the Mississippi, and into Louisiana,-or the attempts of the French at settlement in Florida, and the Carolinas,-these matters belong rather to the history of the United States, than the sketch of the history of Virginia which we propose to give, we pass at once to the British attempts at colonization in America.

The progress of maritime adventure extended rapidly. The evidence

hæredibus," etc. and again his permission, "tertio die Febuarij, anno 13, licentiam dedit Ioanno Caboto, quod ipse capere possit sex naves Anglicanas, etc." sufficiently prove that John was not dead when Sebastian was seized with a " flame of desire to do some notable thing," and go to discredit the legate of his holiness. For the authority that he was not a Venetian born, but a native of Bristol,-See Bancroft, vol. I. p. 8., note I,- authority of Eden quoted in his history of Travayles in the East and West Indies, "Sebastian Cabot told me that he was born in Brystow," etc."See also Edward Haies' account of Gilbert's voyage in 1583, in Hacklyt, vol. III. 184. He calls him an "En- glishman born." After all it is not wonderful that Sebastian should have carried off most of the credit of this discovery, since he was a young and active mariner, who subsequently distinguished himself not only in England, but in the service of the en- terprizing Ch. V. and thus became known all over Europe to scamen and to literary men in the most advantageous light, whilst his father'probably died soon after his first expedition to this continent.

* See Robert Fabians, Chronicle, quoted, Hacklyt III., 30;

t See memoir of Seb. Cabot, 85, quoted, Bancroft I., 12.

#The diversity among writers upon these matters is astonishing, Baptista Ramusius în the account quoted above in note t-p. 557 of a conversation held between Galeacius Butigarius, and Cabot himself, makes the latter say " I found the land still continent to the 56 degree under our pole. And seeing that there the coast turned toward the east, despairing to find a passage, I turned back again, &c. and came to that part of the coast which is now called Florida, where my victuals failing, I returned to England,. where I found preparation for wars with Scotland, &c. This same Baptista Ramu- sias says in the preface to the third volume of his navigations, that Sebastian'Cabot wrote to him that he sailed beyond the land of New France, at the charge of Henry VII. of England, unto the latitude of 67 degrees and a half under the North Pole, and at the 11th day of June, finding still the open sea without any manner of impediment, he thought to have passed that way to the cast, and would have done it, if the mutiny of the shipmaster and mariners had not hindered him, and made him return homeward from that place. In opposition to this Peter Martyr says in the sixth chapter of his hird Decade, that he was stopped by ice -- et primo tendens ad septentrionem donce

539

HISTORY. OF VIRGINIA,

exists of several English voyages having been made not only to the coast of North America, but the Levant, the harbors of northern Africa and Bra- A. D. 1548. zil. 'The visits to the fisheries of Newfoundland had become

. frequent, and the commerce from that source had become of such importance, and to have been the subject of such long and oppressive exactions, as to require the action of Parliament for their prohibiton. -

India was still the great object with the merchants, and the discovery of

A. D. 1550. a nearer passage than that offered by the Cape of Good Hope, the great desideratum with mariners. The north- western passage had been attempted thrice by the Cabots in vain, a north+ eastern expedition was fitted out, and sailed under the command of Wil- loughby and Chancellor. Willoughby with his ship's company were found in their vessel frozen to death in a Lapland harbor; Chancellor with his A. D. 1554. vessel entered the port of Archangel, and "discovered" the vast

empire of Russia, till then unknown to western Europe .- This discovery led to the hope of establishing an intercourse by means of A. D. 1568, caravans across the continent to Persia, and thence to the distant empire of Cathay.

Elizabeth afforded every encouragement to the maritime enterprises of her subjects, and especially encouraged the newly established intercourse A. D. 1576. with Russia. The hope of discovering a north west passage

was by no means as yet relinquished. Martin: Frobisher, after revolving in his mind the subject for fifteen years, believed that it might be accomplished, and "determined and resolved with himself to go and make full proof thereof," "knowing this to be the only thing in the

etiam JULIO mense vastas repererit glaciales moles pelago natantes, et lucem fere per- petuam, tellure tamen libera, gelu liquefacto: quare COACTUS FUIT uti ait vela vertere et occidentem sequi; tendedit que tantum ad meridiem, ut Herculii freti latitudinis fere gradus aquarit : ad occidentemque profectus tantum est ut Cubam Insulam a læva, longitudine graduum pene parem, habuerit:" The author further says "Fa- miliarem habem domi Cabotum ipsum, et contubernalem interdum," from which one would think he ought to know the truth. Francis Lopez de Gomara, a Spaniard, says that Cabot sailed north 58 degrees, and better, that in the month of July, he was stop- ped by cold and ice, that the days were long, and " in a manner" without any night, and the night they had was very clear, that he sailed west, and south to 38 degrees, : and then returned to England. This Spaniard had probably - an acquaintance also . with Cabot, who resided a long time in Spain, holding the office of Pilot Major, -- These last quoted accounts which seem most credible, are followed by Hacklyt, vol. V. p. 283, Bancroft, vol. I. p. 12.

Holmes in American Annal's, vol. I. p. 18, does not mention the ice, but supposes him to have gone as far N. as 67° 30', and S. as the south of Florida, we find upon re- ference to a note which he makes that he has been struck with the same difficulties with which we have been contending in this, and gets over the difficulty by the extreme age of Cabot at the date of the conversation and the letter, but nothing short of dotage can account for the inconsistences, We see also that he confounds the first and second expeditions of the Cabots by supposing the first was never carried into effect, placing " the second in 1497, and supposing it conducted by both John and Sebastian Cabot. This at first seemed plausible as the date of what we have supposed, the second expedition was 13th of Henry VII. and the battle of Bosworth being fought August 22, 1485, the 13th year might seem to embrace June of 1497, but this hypothesis is exploded by re- · ference to the statement that on the 11th of June Sebastian Cabot was at 67º 30' N. lat. whilst his map states that the first land discovered by John and Sebastian was on the 24th of June, which could not of course have been on the same year. Bancroft's ex- planation of these difficulties seems best, he supposes another voyage to have been made by S. Cabot from England in the reign of Henry VIII. to the north west coast of America, to which he alluded in his conversation and his letter. This idea is strong. ly confirmed by his reference to Hacklyt, v. III. p. 591, 2.

كبرى

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540

HISTORY OF VIRGINIA.

world that 'was left yet undone, whereby a notable mind might be made fa- mous and fortunate."* Frobisher was too poor to supply himself with the means of carrying his designs into execution, but after much solicitation at court he was patronized by Dudley, Earl of Warwick, who supplied him with two small barks, the one of twenty and the other of twenty five tons bur- then, and a pinnace of ten tons. With this little fleet he set sail, the expedi- tion was entirely unfortunate, one of his barks deserted and returned home, the pinnace went down in a storm, " whereby he lost only four men," with such small vessels and crews did the hardy mariners of that day venture to cross the Atlantic. The Admiral's mast was sprung, and the top mast blown overboard by the same storm in which he lost the pinnace, but noth- ing daunted, he persevered, and entered Hudson's bay. The only thing accomplished by the voyage was the taking possession of the cold and bar- ren wilderness in the name of Elizabeth, carrying home some of the gravel and stones, one of the latter of which resembling gold, or probably, having some gold artificially mingled with it after it reached London, caused the gold refiners nearly to go mad, and the merchants to undertake one of the wildest expeditions recorded in the annals of discovery; besides this show of gold, which was pronounced very rich for the quantity, the only other acquisition was a poor native, whose simplicity was imposod upon by the most treacherous devices, until he was decoyed to the English vessel, and then seized by force, and carried away from his friends. He bit off his tongue from despair and died soon after his arrival in England from cold taken on the voyage.

The mania which the story of the little bit of gold produced in London A. D. 1577. caused a fleet, of several vessels to be fitted out, of which the Queen herself furnished one, to bring home the rich produce of these icy mines,-the ships returned with black earth, but no gold.

The spirit of avarice was not to be stopped in her career by a single fai- A. D. 1578. lure, a new fleet of 15 vessels was fitted out, and Martin Frobisher was given the command, a colony was to be plant- ed for the purpose of working the mines, while 12 vessels were to be sent home with ore. After almost incredible difficulties encountered amidst storms and "mountains of floating ice on every side," the loss of some ves- sels, and the disertion of others, they reached the northern Potosi, and the ships were well laden with the black earth, but the colonists being disheart- ened by their hardships declined settling on the coast, and all returned to England,-we are not informed of the value of the proceeds of the cargo.

Whilst the British Queen and her merchants were indulging themselves in fancies as brilliant and as evanescent as the icebergs which encumbered the scene of the delusion, Sir Humphrey Gilbert, a man of insuperable en- ergy and fearless enterprize, formed a design of promoting the fisheries, and engaging in useful colonization.

With this view he obtained a patent of the same character with most of June, 11, 1578. those which were granted to the early promoters of coloni-

`zation in America, conferring unbounded privileges upon the proprietor, and guaranteeing no rights to the colonists. The first expe-

* Hacklyt III. 86,-Bancroft 1. 99. This latter writer does credit to our country by the extent of his research, the soundness of his judgment, and the beauty of his style, we feel no hesitation in taking his opinions whenever the works he quotes are not ac- cessible, or too numerous and voluminous for us to be able to examine them in our ex- ceedingly limited time.

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HISTORY OF VIRGINIA.

A. D. 1579. dition in which Gilbert had expended much of his private fortune failed, from what cause is uncertain.

. The second expedition undertaken four years afterwards, was still more

A. D. 1583. . . unfortunate, for it lost to the world the gallant, and accom, plished projector of the expedition. Five vessels sailed from Plymouth on 'l'uesday the 11th of June 1583; two days afterwards the Vice admiral complained of sickness aboard, and returned with the finest ship in the fleet to Plymouth. The admiral nevertheless continued his course with his little squadron and took possession with the feudal ceremo- ny of Newfoundland, to be held by him as a fief of the crown of England, in accordance with the terms of his charter,

The looseness of morals displayed by the mariners of that day is truly disgusting, and increases our wonder at the daring of men who could ven- ture so far from home, in such frail barks, with almost a certainty of en- countering on the great highway in their fellow-men, greater perils than were presented by all the terrors of the deep. Robbery by sea was too common, and often committed in violation of the most sacred obligations, even upon persons engaged in the very act of relieving the distress of the depredators .* Gilbert seems to have been cursed with a remarkably riotous and insubordinate company. The sick and disaffected were left at New- foundland to be sent home with theSwallow, and the Admiral proceeded with his three remaining barks.

On Tuesday the 20th of August they sailed from the harbor of St. John's and on the 29th in about latitude 44 degrees, the largest remaining vessel, by the carelessness of the crew, struck, and went to pieces, and the other barks were forced by a high sea and a lea shore to struggle for their own preservation, which they accomplished with difficulty; alleging at the same time that they could see none of the crew of the wreck floating upon tim- bers, but all seemed to have gone down, when the ship broke up. A few however escaped to Newfoundland in the ship's pinnace, as was afterwards discovered.

'This calamity followed by continual storms, in an unknown and shoaly sea, enhanced by an extreme scantiness of provisions, and want of clothes and comforts in the two little barks, which yet remained, induced the Admi-

ral, at the carnest solicitation of his men to return home- Aug. 31. wards. Sir Humphrey Gilbert was vehemently persuaded by the crew of the Golden Hind to remain with them during the voyage, but as some malicious taunts had been thrown out by some evil disposed person accusing him of being afraid of the sea, he chose to continue to sail in his little pinnace the Squirrel, which was burthened beyond her strength.

After the vessels had left the Azores to the south, and reached the lati- itude of England, they encountered violent and continued storms. On Mon- day the ninth of September the Squirrel was nearly cast away, but recover- ed, and the Admiral was seen sitting abaft with a book in his hand, and heard to cry out to those in the Hind, " we are as near to heaven by sea as by land." That same night at 12 o'clock, the Squirrel being in advance her light suddenly disappeared, and her hardy crew with their gallant com- mander sleep forever in the deep. The Ilind reached Fal-

A. D. Sep. 22. mouth in safety, but after encountering eminent peril to the last moment t

* See a remarkable instance in Hacklyt, vol. III,, 191, 196, &c.

+ Hacklyt, III., 184 to 202.

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HISTORY OF VIRGINIA.

The daring spirit of the mariners of that day is amazing. Sir Walter Raleigh, the step brother of Sir Humphrey Gilbert, so far from being in- timidated by the melancholy fate of his relative, or disheartened by the un- profitable and disastrous termination of most of the voyages to America, undertook in the very next year, an expedition to the coast

March 25, 1584. of the present United States. He easily obtained one of the usual unlimited patents from Elizabeth, and leaving the cold north with its barren snows, its storms, icebergs, and certain evils, together with its imaginary wealth, he spread his sails for the sweet south, where he was sure to find a fertile soil and a delightful climate, though his ship's compa- ny might not all be enriched by the discovery of gold.

On the second of July they founded shoal water, "and smelt so sweet and strong a smell, as if they had been in the midst of some delicate gar- den abounding with all kinds of odoriferous flowers."

July 2.

On the thirteenth they entered Ocracock inlet, on the coast of the present July 13. state of North Carolina, and landed on Wocoken Island. They commenced an intercourse with the natives, who proved to be bold, confiding, intelligent and honorable,* to their friends, but treacherous, re- vengeful and cruel towards their enemies.

The English explored a little the surrounding islands, and bays, and re- September. turned home in September, carrying with them two native's, Manteo and Wanchese, The glowing description given by the adventurers on their return of the beauty of the country, the fertility of the soil, and pleasantness of the climate delighted the Queen, and induced her to name the country of which she had taken possession, Virginia, in com- memoration of her unmarried life.

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A new and comprehensive gazetteer of Virginia, and the District of Columbia, Part 72

Author: Martin, Joseph. ed. cn; Brockenbrough, William Henry Publication date: 1835 Publisher: Charlottesville, J. Martin Number of Pages: 1278

Author: Martin, Joseph. ed. cn; Brockenbrough, William Henry
Publication date: 1835
Publisher: Charlottesville, J. Martin
Number of Pages: 1278