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Pocahontas and John Smith: The True Story

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The True Story of Pocahontas and John Smith

By Mary Morris

English 201

August 1, 2003

Pocahontas

This picture is from The Biography of Pocahontas.

Pocahontas was born circa 1565 (Von Syp's-Pocahontas and John Smith). Her half brother was Parahunt (Von Syp's-Pocahontas and John Smith). They named her Matoaka, though she is better known as Pocahontas, which means "Little Wanton," playful, frolicsome little girl (Pocahontas). Pocahontas probably saw white men for the first time in May 1607 when Englishmen landed at Jamestown (Pocahontas). The one she found most likable was Captain John Smith (Pocahontas). The first meeting of Pocahontas and John Smith is a legendary story, romanticized (if not entirely invented) by Smith (Pocahontas). He was leading an expedition in December 1607 when he was taken captive by some Indians (Pocahontas). Days later, he was brought to the official residence of Powhatan at Werowocomoco, which was 12 miles from Jamestown (Pocahontas). According to Smith, he was first welcomed by the great chief and offered a feast (Pocahontas). Then he was grabbed and forced to stretch out on two large, flat stones (Pocahontas). Indians stood over him with clubs as though ready to beat him to death if ordered (Pocahontas). Suddenly a little Indian girl rushed in and took Smith's "head in her arms and laid her owne upon his to save him from death (Pocahontas).” The girl, Pocahontas, then pulled him to his feet (Pocahontas). Powhatan said that they were now friends, and he adopted Smith as his son, or a subordinate chief (Pocahontas). Actually, this mock "execution and salvation" ceremony was traditional with the Indians, and if Smith's story is true, Pocahontas' actions were probably one part of a ritual (Pocahontas). At any rate, Pocahontas and Smith soon became friends (Pocahontas). Relations with the Indians continued to be generally friendly for the next year, and Pocahontas was a frequent visitor to Jamestown (Pocahontas). She delivered messages from her father and accompanied Indians bringing food and furs to trade for hatchets and trinkets (Pocahontas). She was a lively young girl, and when the young boys of the colony turned cartwheels, "she would follow and wheele some herself, naked as she was all the fort over (Pocahontas)." She apparently admired John Smith very much and would also chat with him during her visits (Pocahontas). Her lively character and poise made her appearance striking(Pocahontas). Several years after their first meeting, Smith described her: "a child of tenne yeares old, which not only for feature, countenance, and proportion much exceedeth any of the rest of his (Powhatan's) people but for wit and spirit (is) the only non-pariel of his countrie(Pocahontas). Unfortunately, relations with the Powhatans worsened (Pocahontas). Necessary trading still continued, but hostilities became more open (Pocahontas). While before she had been allowed to come and go almost at will, Pocahontas' visits to the fort became much less frequent (Pocahontas). In October 1609, John Smith was badly injured by a gunpowder explosion and was forced to return to England (Pocahontas). When Pocahontas next came to visit the fort, she was told that her friend Smith was dead (Pocahontas).

Pocahontas apparently married an Indian "pryvate Captayne" named Kocoum in 1610 (Pocahontas). She lived in Potomac country among Indians, but her relationship with the Englishmen was not over (Pocahontas). When an energetic and resourceful member of the Jamestown settlement, Captain Samuel Argall, learned where she was, he devised a plan to kidnap her and hold her for ransom (Pocahontas). With the help of Japazaws, lesser chief of the Patowomeck Indians, Argall lured Pocahontas onto his ship (Pocahontas). April 1613 - Pocahontas is kidnapped from her tribe by Captain Samuel Argall and held in captivity for ransom. He used the Potomac Indians to this end(Von Syp's-Pocahontas and John Smith). Her conversion to Chritianity was done by Protestant minster, Rev. Alexander Whitaker, in Spring 1613 (Von Syp's-Pocahontas and John Smith). We do not have proof, but many think this was made to happen, under duress (Von Syp's-Pocahontas and John Smith). Afterall, the mind of the English was to convert as many natives as possible (Von Syp's-Pocahontas and John Smith). Pocahontas' marriage to John Rolfe in April 5, 1614 (Von Syp's-Pocahontas and John Smith).

This picture is from The Four Faces of Pocahontas.

After seven months Rolfe decided to return his family to Virginia, In March 1617 they set sail (Pocahontas). It was soon apparent, however, that Pocahontas would not survive the voyage home (Pocahontas). She was deathly ill from pneumonia or possibly tuberculosis (Pocahontas). She was taken ashore, and, as she lay dying, she comforted her husband, saying, "all must die (Pocahontas). 'Tis enough that the child liveth (Pocahontas)." As she started home, English disease took her life (The Real Pocahontas by David Morenus). She was buried in the church at Gravesend, England (Mar. 17, 1617) age 21 or 22 (The Real Pocahontas by David Morenus). (Her exact birth date is uncertain: roughly 1595 (The Real Pocahontas by David Morenus).)

This picture is from Pocahontas.

This is from Pocahontas and John Smith: a WebQuest.

This picture is from Von Syp's-Pocahontas and John Smith.

The skill, prowess, and forethought of Captain Smith, had secured for the settlers an abundance of food and comfortable dwellings for the winter (Pocahontas and John Smith). The sickly season was over early in November, and nothing but fear of Indian treachery made the emigrants uneasy until their improvidence had again impoverished their stores (Pocahontas and John Smith). Smith had voyaged down the James River to Point Comfort and back, making observations of the people and country, and impressing the former with a sense of the wisdom and strength of the English; and he now proposed to explore the Chickahominy River, a broad stream at its mouth and flowing into the James from the northwest (Pocahontas and John Smith). With singular ignorance of the progress of geographical discovery, and with intense greed for the wealth of India, the Company had given special instructions to the settlers to explore every considerable stream which they should find flowing from the northwest, hoping so to discover a passage to the Indian Ocean and coveted Cathay (Pocahontas and John Smith). Smith did not share the ignorance of his employers, but he gladly made their instructions his warrant for exploring the surrounding country; so, with half a dozen followers, he went up the Chickahominy in an open boat to its shallow waters among the swamps high upon the Virginia peninsula (Pocahontas and John Smith). There, with two others and two Indian guides, he penetrated the dark and tangled forests, leaving the remainder of his company in charge of the vessel with instructions not to go on shore (Pocahontas and John Smith). They disobeyed, and one of them was killed by prowling Indians (Pocahontas and John Smith). Meanwhile, Smith had gone twenty-miles further in a canoe, when he left his two companions and with one guide he went into the woods in search of game (Pocahontas and John Smith). The Indians, under Opechancanough, the king of Pamunkey, had watched the movements of the Englishmen (Pocahontas and John Smith). They slew the two men in charge of the canoe, and then sought their leader (Pocahontas and John Smith). Smith, seeing a large number of assailants, tied his Indian guide to his own body with his long garters, and making him a buckler he fought valiantly and slew several of the Indians, as he moved backward toward his canoe (Pocahontas and John Smith). Falling into a quagmire, after being slightly wounded, he was made prisoner (Pocahontas and John Smith). Death would doubtless have been his immediate fate but for his presence of mind and quickness of thought (Pocahontas and John Smith). He drew from his pocket a compass, and explained to the king its wonderful nature as well as signs could convey the forms of thought (Pocahontas and John Smith). In the same way he told them of the shape of the earth; of the nature of the sun, moon and stars, and "how the sunne chased the night round about the world continually (Pocahontas and John Smith)." The Indians were at once impressed with the idea that he was a superior being, and they regarded him with wonder and awe (Pocahontas and John Smith). Smith was finally brought before the emperor at a great council of full two hundred warriors (Pocahontas and John Smith). Powhatan, wearing a mantle of raccoon skins, and a head-dress of eagle's feathers, sat on a raised framework with a maiden on each side of him, before a fire (Pocahontas and John Smith). From this throne to the other end of the long house neatly made of boughs, the warriors stood in two rows, in their gayest attire, and back of them as many women with their necks and shoulders painted red, their heads covered with the white down of birds, and strings of white beads falling over their bosoms (Pocahontas and John Smith). When the captive was brought in, they all shouted (Pocahontas and John Smith). The Queen of Appomattox brought him water that he might wash his hands, and another woman brought him a bunch of feathers wherewith he might dry them (Pocahontas and John Smith). After this he was feasted, and then a solemn council was held (Pocahontas and John Smith). By that council he was doomed to die (Pocahontas and John Smith). Two huge stones were brought before the emperor, to which the prisoner was dragged and his head laid upon them, whilst two big Indians stood by with clubs ready to beat out his brains (Pocahontas and John Smith). Matoa or Pocahontas, a young daughter of the emperor, begged for the life of the Captain, but in vain, when, just as the clubs were uplifted, she darted from her father's knee, clasped the prisoner's head with her arms and laid her own head upon his (Pocahontas and John Smith). The emperor yielded to the maid, and consented to spare the life of the captive that he might make hatchets for his majesty, and bells and rattles, beads and copper ornaments for his daughter, his favorite child (Pocahontas and John Smith). He did more; he released Captain Smith, sent him with an escort of a dozen men to Jamestown, and he and his people promised to be fast friends of the English (Pocahontas and John Smith). But for the energy and wisdom of Captain Smith and the tender compassion of an Indian maiden, the settlers at Jamestown would have all been murdered or dispersed (Pocahontas and John Smith). They had been reduced to forty persons, and when Smith returned he found the stronger ones on the point of abandoning the place and escaping in the pinnace (Pocahontas and John Smith). By his personal courage and moral force he compelled them to desist, and so, again, he saved the budding colony from ruin (Pocahontas and John Smith). These men, conscious of the purity of Captain Smith and of their own wickedness, now hated him with an intensity of feeling that impelled them to seek his destruction (Pocahontas and John Smith).

Throughout the History and particularly in this excerpt, Smith creates a heroic impression of himself (Introduction to John Smith's General History). He believes that he has been saved, not by Pocahontas, but rather by his own efforts (Introduction to John Smith's General History). He saves himself by bravery and cleverness (Introduction to John Smith's General History). Once captured the first thing he asks to do is to meet with the leader of the Indians (Introduction to John Smith's General History). He amazes the chief by showing him the compass and lecturing about the workings of the world (Introduction to John Smith's General History). Throughout the text he attempts to portray himself and the English as better than the savage Indians (Introduction to John Smith's General History). He depicts the savages dancing wildly around the fire, painted all over their bodies (Introduction to John Smith's General History). Smith writes for his own gratification (Introduction to John Smith's General History). He applauds himself, describing his moments of bravery and heroism (Introduction to John Smith's General History). Even in the story of Pocahontas which may seem to accredit another with his survival, the way in which it is included, lends support to this idea of raising himself to greatness (Introduction to John Smith's General History). The story of Pocahontas is recorded many years after it occurs (Introduction to John Smith's General History). In his True relation of 1608, he does not intimate the account of his rescue by Pocahontas (Introduction to John Smith's General History). It is to his own benefit that the story of Pocahontas becomes a legend (Introduction to John Smith's General History). It gives immortality to Captain John Smith's memory and achievements, knowing this, for such a reason, Smith later adds the episode to his account of captivity (Introduction to John Smith's General History).

This is from Pocahontas and John Smith: a WebQuest.

Their Joint Story.

The traditional story of his rescue, by Captain John Smith, was written in 1624 in a book called John Smith's "General Historie" (Von Syp's-Pocahontas and John Smith). At the time of the rescue, according to Davis' description, Pocahontas would have been twelve and possibly thirteen, and although probably old enough to have a romantic (or even a sexual) response to the handsome captain, she would not have been as nubile as Captain Smith wanted his readers to believe (Von Syp's-Pocahontas and John Smith). It has been pointed out that young Powhatan women begin to wear clothing upon reaching the age of twelve, but this fact did not stop Smith from reporting the naked, cartwheeling Pocahontas(Von Syp's-Pocahontas and John Smith). Smith also described Pocahontas leading a coterie of thirty native women "naked out of the woods, only covered behind and before with a few leaves, their bodies all painted (Von Syp's-Pocahontas and John Smith). A wild orgy-like performance followed (Von Syp's-Pocahontas and John Smith)." They were said to have invited Smith into their lodgings where they "tormented" him with sexual advances (Von Syp's-Pocahontas and John Smith). All this indicating that Indian women lusted to have sex with white men(Von Syp's-Pocahontas and John Smith).

Jamestown was the first permanent settlement of the English in the New World (Pocahontas and John Smith: a WebQuest). It would not have survived, though, if it hadn't been for two people: Pocahontas and John Smith (Pocahontas and John Smith: a WebQuest). Pocahontas and Smith saved the Jamestown colonists from starvation in different ways (Pocahontas and John Smith: a WebQuest). Pocahontas arranged for the colonists to trade with the Powhatan people for food after the supplies brought from England were exhausted (Pocahontas and John Smith: a WebQuest). Smith set up strict rules for the colonists, saying that those who did not work would not eat (Pocahontas and John Smith: a WebQuest). If either one of them had failed, the colony probably would not have survived (Pocahontas and John Smith: a WebQuest).

Useful Links

The Biography of Pocahontas
Introduction to John Smith's General History
The Four Faces of Pocahontas
The Real Pocahontas by David Morenus
Von Syp's-Pocahontas and John Smith
Pocahontas and John Smith
Pocahontas
Pocahontas and John Smith: a WebQuest