Within 15 days Dale had impaled 7 acres of ground and then set to work to build at each of the 5 corners of the town "very strong and high commanders or watchtowers, a faire and handsome Church, and storehouses." It was not until then that he turned to the matter of houses and lodgings for "himself and men." Two miles inland he built a strong pale some 2 miles in length which ran from river to river making an island of the neck on which Henrico stood. Presumably this palisade faced a ditch hence the term--"trench and pallizado." Hamor related in 1614 that in 4 months he had made Henrico "much better and of more worth then all the work ever since the Colonie began." His achievements were not come by easily. It was costly in life and in loss of personal freedoms. It was achieved with the full enforcement of the now famous "Dale laws." He moved quickly to punish deserters and law breakers. George Percy related the results in graphic terms. Some "in a moste severe manner [he] cawsed to be executed. Some he appointed to be hanged, some burned, some to be broken upon wheles, others to be staked and some to be shott to deathe; all theis extreme and crewell tortures he used and inflicted upon them to terrefy the reste for attemptinge the like...." These were stern measures that produced results and few of his contemporary associates took issue including John Rolfe, Ralph Hamor, Reverend Alexander Whitaker and even Sir Edwin Sandys. To them, motivated by the spirit of the time, hard conditions required stern handling. Robert Johnson, in 1612, evaluated the new settlement as he saw it: "the colony is removed up the river forescore miles further beyond Jamestown to a place of high ground, strong and defensible by nature, a good air, wholesome and clear, unlike the marshy seat at Jamestown, with fresh and plenty of water springs, much fair and open grounds freed from woods, and wood enough at hand." In 1614 Hamor described the town here as having "3 streets of well framed howses, a hansom Church, and the foundations of a more stately one laid, of brick, in length one hundred foote, and fifty foot wide, beside store houses, watch houses, and such like." Near it, and behind the pale, was a great quantity of corn ground--enough to support the whole Colony and easy for "manuring and husbandry." Two years later it seems evident that the "citty of Henricus" had retrogressed, perhaps, out of emphasis on Bermuda City just down river. At this time there were only 38 men and boys "at _Henrico_ and in the precints." Of these 22 were "Farmors," the rest were "Officers and others." Although it was "our furthest habitacion into the land" it was listed as self sufficient in "food and apparell." Captain Smalley, in the absence of James Davis, was in command and the minister was William Wickham. Wickham "in his life and doctrine gives good examples, and godlie instructions to the people."