Explorers

Explorers

Sources

Jamestown. John Smith never pretended to be a scientist. When the Englishman arrived at the James River in April 1607, Smith and the other 120 colonists were intent on finding a likely spot to camp, build a fort, and begin to trade with the native inhabitants. Some of the English hunted for gold. They soon discovered that a powerful Indian confederation surrounded them. During the first nine months sixty-seven settlers died. They were entirely dependent on the Indians for food. In this increasingly desperate situation, John Smith decided to go exploring.

Journeys. Smith sailed up the James River in search of food. In the process he began to realize the plenty, and potential, of the American wilderness. Smith was one of the first Englishmen to see that success in America would not result from concentrating on discovering gold or a waterway through the continent to China. Smith felt that colonies should be established to cultivate and to harvest the vast resources of the continent: the crops yielded from the land, the fish caught from the sea, and the timber cut from the forests. Determined to discover the true riches of America, he journeyed north by boat to the Chesapeake Bay, where he talked and traded with the Indians, recorded his observations of plant and animal life, took note of regional topography, and made compass readings. Smith took a scientific approach to the New World; knowledge, not ships, guns, or gold, was the key to success in America.

New England. When Smith returned to England in 1608, he began to write. His first publication was A Map of Virginia, a narrative description of the region accompanied by an accurate map of the Chesapeake Bay. Six years later, in 1614, Smith returned to America, this time voyaging along the New England coast. Once again he took accurate compass readings to produce a map. His Description of New England, published in 1616, provided a wealth of concrete data on harbors, islands, bays, and rivers. Smith described animal life, such as the “Moos, a beast bigger than a Stagge.” He described the abundant and various types offish found in the sea and rivers. He discussed the eagle, “diverse sorts of Hawkes,” and other birds. He wrote about soil, vegetation, and the “most pure” waters “proceeding from the intrals of rockie mountaines.” His description of Native American customs showed he had a gift for ethnography.

MAPPING NEW ENGLAND

John Smith produced the first accurate map of the New England coast. It is amazing what Smith accomplished. Not a cartographer by trade, Smith nevertheless made accurate observations using his compass in respect to points of land on the coast. Most of his observations were made from the deck of a bark, a small coastal vessel, during the summer months of 1614. Comparing Smith’s map with a modern map of New England demonstrates that he accurately depicted the coastal topography of the region. However, his map is not precise about inland regions except for the Kennebec River valley in Maine. The Kennebec was the only river Smith explored, sailing fifty miles upriver. He called it the “River Forth.”

Smith did not have as much success naming coastal landmarks as he did mapping them. Few of his names stuck. He unsuccessfully tried to change Cape Cod to Cape James (in honor of the English king). Fortunately for tourists, Americans never used his unlikely name (Trabigzanda) for the beautiful Cape Anne. Smith was successful, however, in providing a name for the entire region: New England.

Source: John Smith, A Description of New England (London: Printed by Humfrey Lownes for Robert Clcrkc, 1616).

Scientists by Default. Smith was neither the first nor the last explorer who would find himself becoming a geographer, cartographer, naturalist, geologist, and ethnographer. Samuel de Champlain was the French counterpart to Smith, fully the Englishman’s equal in his explorations, success at colonizing, and talent for describing the natural history of the New World, especially the Saint Lawrence River valley. Others who explored Virginia and wrote of their travels included John Brereton

(1602), James Rosier (1605), and William Strachey (1609). All of these men were explorers, colonists, and—in their ability to observe, analyze, and record the natural history of America—scientists.

Sources

D. W. Meinig, The Shaping of America: Atlantic America, 1492–1800 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1986);

David B. Quinn, North America from Earliest Discovery to First Settlements: The Norse Voyages to 1612 (New York: Harper & Row, 1977);

John Smith, The Generall Historie of Virginia, New-England, and the Summer Isles... (London: Printed by I. D. & I. H. for Michael Sparks, 1624).