NHD Theme Book 2016 | Page 41

T EXPLORATION, ENCOUNTER, EXCHANGE IN HISTORY he Virginia Company’s goal was for settlers to make permanent homes in Virginia. The shareholders feared that without women, the colony would attract only fortune seekers whose pursuit of short-term interests would sabotage the colony’s long-term prospects. They sought to replicate an English model of society in the New World. Englishwomen were not the only females to establish themselves in the new colony. When the privateer White Lion arrived at Point Comfort, Virginia, in 1619, it carried “20. and odd Negroes” who were quickly exchanged to the fledging colony for food and then resold to other colonists. They were soon followed by others, brought unwillingly to the colony and sold to provide labor. The first Jamestown census, taken in March 1620, listed 17 African females among the settlement’s 928 residents, some of whom were likely brought aboard the White Lion or its sister ship the Treasurer.5 Over the ensuing century, the mingling of men and women from different cultures, socio-economic classes, and conditions of servitude would lead to the development Arrival of the young women at Jamestownn, Howard Pyle, 1882 New York Public Library of cultural and legal systems distinctive from England’s that continue to affect American life today. Questions • What motivated Virginia’s first female settlers? Exploration: • What were the conditions of their travel? Their new homes? Encounter: • How were their lives different than in their native countries? • How were they integrated into Virginia society? Exchange: • What effect did the arrival of women have on the lives of those already living in America, especially Native Americans? Suggested Online Resources: • Encyclopedia of Virginia www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Women_ inColonial_Virginia • National Park Service www.nps.gov/jame/historyculture/ the-indispensible-role-of-women-atjamestown.htm. • National Women’s History Museum www.nwhm.org/online-exhibits/ jamestownwomen/index.htm • How did the legal system and culture adapt to integrate women and especially enslaved women? “Virginia’s First Africans,” Encyclopedia of Virginia, accessed January 6, 2015, www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Virginia_s_First_Africans#start_entry. 5 39