more at http://quickfound.net/links/history_search_and_news.html "Dramatizes the struggles of the men who founded Jamestown, the first permanent English colony in America. Explains how Captain John Smith held the colony together during times of starvation and disease, Indian attacks and internal dissension. Tells how Smith is saved from death by the Indian princess, Pocahontas." Public domain film from the Prelinger Archives, slightly cropped to remove uneven edges, with the aspect ratio corrected, and mild video noise reduction applied. The soundtrack was also processed with volume normalization, noise reduction, clipping reduction, and/or equalization (the resulting sound, though not perfect, is far less noisy than the original). http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Smith_(explorer) John Smith was born in January 1580 and died on 21 June 1631. Admiral of New England was an English soldier, explorer, and author. He was knighted for his services to Sigismund Bathory, Prince of Transylvania and his friend Mózes Székely. He was considered to have played an important part in the establishment of the first permanent English settlement in North America. He was a leader of the Virginia Colony (based at Jamestown) between September 1608 and August 1609, and led an exploration along the rivers of Virginia and the Chesapeake Bay. He was the first English explorer to map the Chesapeake Bay area and New England. Smith's books and maps are considered extremely important in encouraging and supporting English colonisation of the New World. He gave the name New England to the region and noted: "Here every man may be master and owner of his owne labour and land... If he have nothing but his hands, he may...by industrie quickly grow rich." When Jamestown was England's first permanent settlement in the New World, Smith trained the settlers to farm and work, thus saving the colony from early devastation. He publicly stated "he who shall not work, shall not eat". This strength of character and determination overcame problems presented from the hostile native Americans, the wilderness and the troublesome and uncooperative English settlers. Harsh weather, lack of water, living in a swampy wilderness, English unwillingness to work, and attacks from the Powhatan nation almost destroyed the colony... In 1606 Smith became involved with the Virginia Company of London's plan to colonize Virginia for profit; it had been granted a charter by King James. The expedition set sail in three small ships, the Discovery, the Susan Constant and the Godspeed, on 20 December 1606. His page was a 12-year-old boy named Samuel Collier. During the voyage, Smith was charged with mutiny, and Captain Christopher Newport (in charge of the three ships) had planned to execute him. Fortunately for Smith, upon first landing at what is now Cape Henry on 26 April 1607, unsealed orders from the Virginia Company designated Smith to be one of the leaders of the new colony, thus, perhaps, sparing Smith from the gallows. The English arrived at Jamestown in April 1607 and, by summer of that year, the settlers were still living in temporary housing. The search for a suitable site ended on 14 May 1607, when Captain Edward Maria Wingfield, president of the council, chose the Jamestown site as the location for the colony. After the four-month ocean trip, their food stores were sufficient only for each to have a cup or two of grain-meal per day. Due to swampy conditions and widespread disease, someone died almost every day. By September, more than 60 were dead of the 104 brought by Newport. The men may well have died from drinking brackish creek water and from poor nutrition. In early January 1608, nearly 100 new settlers arrived with Captain Newport, and through carelessness the village was set on fire... In December 1607, while seeking food along the Chickahominy River, Smith was captured and taken to meet the chief of the Powhatans at Werowocomoco, the main village of the Powhatan Confederacy. The village was on the north shore of the York River about 15 miles due north of Jamestown and 25 miles downstream from where the river forms from the Pamunkey River and the Mattaponi River at West Point, Virginia. Although he feared for his life, Smith was eventually released without harm and later attributed this in part to the chief's daughter, Pocahontas, who according to Smith, threw herself across his body: "at the minute of my execution, she hazarded [i.e. risked] the beating out of her own brains to save mine; and not only that, but so prevailed with her father, that I was safely conducted to Jamestown"...

• published: 22 Sep 2014
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