The Popham Colony : $b a discussion of its historical claims, with a bibliography of the subjectPoole, William Frederick
History
The Popham Colony : $b a discussion of its historical claims, with a bibliography of the subject
Poole, William Frederick
Maine -- History -- Colonial period, ca. 1600-1775
We have a word to say with regard to this vessel. Writers on New
England have generally stated that the departing colonists took this
craft with them. This, however, is very different from the statements
made above, that she was "fit to cross the ocean," that she made a
"safe voyage to England," _etc._ A part of the company were not over
anxious to revisit their native land. They had saved their necks once
by emigrating, and were not in haste to put them again into the
halter. With this "pretty pynnace" they could catch codfish, and cure
them along shore; barter them for other commodities with some of the
hundreds of vessels from Europe employed in the fisheries on the
coast; harass the Indians; and lead generally a wild and free life,
such as was congenial to their character and dispositions. The
vessels, doubtless, left Sabino at the same time. When the main body
of the colonists departed, it was necessary that all should leave; for
they had so incurred the enmity of the Indians by their barbarities,
that any left behind would have been murdered. Strachey's account is
entirely consistent with this. He says "they all ymbarqued in this new
arrived ship [the 'Mary and John'] and in the new pynnace, the
Virginia, and sett saile for England. And this was the end of that
northerne colony uppon the river Sachadehoc." Brief Relation, 1622,
says, "they built a pretty barke of their owne, which served them a
good purpose, as easing them in their returning." Certainly; but we do
not read that the "new pynnace" arrived in England, and was there an
object of admiration, as a specimen of naval architecture.
The improbability that this "pynnace" was sea-worthy, and made a
voyage across the Atlantic, will appear from the following
considerations;--
1. There was not time between the 15th of December and Spring to build
a sea-worthy vessel. There were but forty-five persons left in the
colony, and this number was reduced before Spring by disease and
squabbles with the Indians. There were probably not ten carpenters in
the company. The Winter, we are told, was unseasonable and intensely
severe. Strachey says, that, "after Capt. Davies's departure they fully
finished the fort, trencht and fortified it with 12 pieces of ordnance,
and built 50 howses, besides a church and a storehouse,"--sufficient
work, we might suppose, to employ forty-five Old Bailey convicts till
Spring, without building a sea-going vessel. If Strachey does not tell
the truth in this matter, we know nothing at all about this vessel.
2. They had no need of a sea-going vessel. These were furnished by the
English undertakers. What they needed was a small craft in which to
take fish along shore. The Huguenots built their vessel in 1563 to
return home in; it being their only means of escaping starvation.
There was no intention of abandoning the Popham settlement till Capt.
Davies returned in the Spring with the news that their patron saint,
Sir John Popham, surnamed "the hangman," was dead.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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