Walking Around Historic Jamestowne, Virginia

May 4, 2022 Update:  Historic Jamestowne is threatened by Climate Change.   Rainfall amounts have increased and wetlands now stretch across seven miles of the 22-mile historic site.  Archaeologists have lost the opportunity to find and preserve artifacts that lay beneath the water, including bodies.

The James River, which surrounds the Jamestowne Colony on three sides, is rising and eroding the riverbanks.  The seawall built in 1895 to protect Jamestown is failing, in need of repairs and constant monitoring.  

Unchecked Climate Change will enlarge the wetlands and the rising waters of the James River will flood across the peninsula.  

Archaeologists are concentrating their efforts to discover and preserve the artifacts that remain accessible in the time that remains.

This monument was erected
in 1907 to commemorate the
300th anniversary of the
founding of Jamestowne.

After failing twice to plant a permanent colony on Roanoke Island, in North Carolina, the English chose to bring colonists north to the James River to settle.  Jamestowne is the first permanent English colony in America.

Jamestown Memorial Church
 was built following excavation
 of the site in 1907.

The Altar

The pews

The church's graveyard

Bones unearthed at Jamestowne have been identified as some of the earliest settlers of the colony.

17th century Jamestowne

Memorial Church Tower
& graves of colonists
dating to 1607.

A statue of Captain 
John Smith faces
the James River.

The James River waterfront became a busy commercial hub with ships bringing goods from England and leaving with tobacco, glass, and other products from the colony.

Eric holds Pocahontas'

hand.

The fort's stockade fence
is seen behind them.

.
Pocahontas' life is in some ways, a legend.  John Smith had been captured by Powhatan Indians in 1607 and was set for execution, which Pocahontas stopped.  As the favored daughter of the Chief of the Powhatan, she had frequent contact with the Jamestown colonists. In 1614 Pocahontas converted to Christianity and was named Rebecca.  Pocahontas (Rebecca) married widower John Rolfe and traveled to England with Powhatan Indians in 1616 to promote Virginia and the Virginia Company. She died in England in 1617.





A scale model of the triangle
shaped fort that was built
on the James River.

The skeleton of the

barracks.

Pelts hang where
the leatherworker
plies his trade.

The Blacksmith's fire

smokes.

The first meetings of Jamestowne's Legislative Assembly were held in the church in 1619.  A statehouse was built in 1665.  It and the rest of Jamestown was burned in 1676 by Nathaniel Bacon and disgruntled colonists.

These bricks show where the
statehouse stood, facing
the James River.







The original brick foundations were excavated, examined, and reburied to preserve the 17th century brick.

The Archaearium Museum

displays artifacts from the

archaeological work

at Jamestown.

In the 1930s, the National Park Service acquired 1,500 acres at Jamestowne.  Excavated foundations were left exposed for visitors to see.  The buildings were not rebuilt because no one knew what they looked like.  The exposed foundations began to erode and the decision was made to rebury them and place modern bricks above them, showing where the buildings once stood.  

Foundations are scattered
around Historic
Jamestowne.
.

The May-Hartwell Site was

identified using land records.

Fences were quickly built
to keep cows, goats, pigs
& sheep out of the crops.







After Jamestown was burned during the Bacon Rebellion in 1676, the town was not rebuilt.  People moved farther inland to Williamsburg.  The farms continued to be worked by their owners.

The ruins of the

Ambler House.

It was built in the 1750s and was the centerpiece of their plantation.

The ruins of Swann's Tavern
& the Jamestowne Monument.

The ruins of the 1608 Glasshouse

were excavated & studied

about one mile from the colony.

Glass was expensive in England.  With plentiful raw materials, glassmaking could prove to be profitable for the colony and less expensive for English buyers.  Germans and Poles were recruited to develop glassmaking in the Jamestown Colony.

The original furnace

 There is a working replica of a

17th century Glasshouse nearby.

Glassblowing

Shaping

I like walking in the footsteps of history at Historic Jamestowne.

May 4, 2022 Update:  I'm glad Eric and I visited Jamestowne in 2015.  The wetlands were smaller then and there was more river shoreline.  

It will take decades for Johnstowne to be swallowed by the waters of the James River.  Go see as much of our first country's first permanent whale you are can...