Christopher Newport
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| Captain Christopher Newport | |
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 Captain Newport landing on present day Newport News, Virginia to find water, shortly before founding Jamestown, in 1607
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| Born | 1561 St. Nicholas Church, Harwich, England |
| Died | 1617 Bantam, Java |
Christopher Newport (c. 1561–1617) was a British sailor. He is best known as the captain of the Susan Constant, the largest of three ships which carried settlers for the Virginia Company in 1607 on the way to found the settlement at Jamestown in the Virginia Colony, which proved to be the first permanent English settlement in North America.
During the course of making several supply missions between England and Jamestown, in 1609, he became Captain of the new supply ship Sea Venture, which encountered a hurricane and was shipwrecked on Bermuda. That event led to the English claims to that archipelago, which is still a portion of the United Kingdom almost 400 years later.
Christopher Newport University in Newport News, Virginia is named for Newport.
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[edit] Early career
For almost twenty years, Newport worked as a privateer who raided Spanish freighters off and on in the Caribbean. The spoils from these missions was shared with London merchants who funded them. Over the years he commanded a series of privateer ships, including the Little John, the Margaret, and the Golden Dragon. In August 1592, he captured the Spanish ship the Madre de Dios, off the Azores, taking the greatest English plunder of the century. His ship returned to port in England carrying five hundred tons of spices, silks, gemstones, and other treasures.
In 1605, after another mission to the Caribbean, he returned to England with two baby crocodiles and a wild boar to give as gifts to King James I who had a fascination with exotic animals.
[edit] Expedition which established Jamestown
It was Newport's experience as well as his reputation which lead to his hiring in 1606 by the Virginia Company of London. The company had been granted a proprietorship to establish a settlement in the Virginia Colony by King James I.
[edit] Five months at sea
In December 1606, Newport set sail from London for Virginia. After an unusually lengthy trip of 144 days sailing across the Atlantic Ocean from England by way of the Canary Islands, the three ships, the Susan Constant (sometimes known as the Sarah Constant), the Godspeed, and the Discovery (smallest of the three) reached the New World at the southern edge of the mouth of what is now known as the Chesapeake Bay.
[edit] First Landing
With their crews of 105 men and boys, they made landfall at Cape Henry on April 26,1607, at what is now First Landing State Park before heading up to what is now Jamestown. A party of the men led by Newport explored the area, named the southern cape for Henry Frederick, Prince of Wales, the eldest son of King James I and the northern cape for Charles, the younger brother of Prince Henry. It was during this four-day expedition in the New World that the settlers held the first democratic election on what is now American soil and held the first trial by jury, acquitting John Smith of charges of mutiny. They set up a cross near the site of the current Cape Henry Memorial, located at what is now Fort Story. This site came to be known as the "first landing."
[edit] Exploration, seeking a site
As soon as land was in sight, sealed orders from the Virginia Company were opened which named Captain John Smith as one of the "counselors". Smith had been arrested for mutiny on the voyage over by Christopher Newport and was incarcerated aboard one of the ships and had been scheduled to be hanged upon arrival, but was freed after the opening of the orders.
The group then proceeded in their ships into the Chesapeake Bay to what is now called Old Point Comfort in the City of Hampton. In the following days, the ships ventured inland upstream along the James River seeking a suitable location for their settlement as defined in their orders. The James River and the initial settlement they sought to establish, Jamestown (originally called "James Cittie") were named in honor of King James I.
[edit] Selecting Jamestown
Arriving on May 14, 1607, Captain Edward Maria Wingfield, president of the council, chose Jamestown Island for their settlement largely because the Virginia Company advised the colonists to select a location that could be easily defended from ocean-going navies of the other European states that were also establishing New World colonies and were periodically at war with England, notably the Dutch Republic, France and especially Spain. The island fit the criteria as it had excellent visibility up and down what is today called the James River and it was far enough inland to minimize the potential of contact and conflict with enemy ships. The water immediately adjacent to the land was deep enough to permit the colonists to anchor their ships yet have an easy and quick departure if necessary. An additional benefit of the site was that the land was not occupied by Native Americans, most of whom in the area were affiliated with the Powhatan Confederacy.
[edit] Challenging conditions
It soon became apparent why the Native Americans did not occupy the site, and the inhospitable conditions severely challenged the settlers. Jamestown Island is a swampy area, and furthermore, it was isolated from most potential hunting game such as deer and bears which like to forage over much larger areas. The settlers quickly hunted and killed off all the large and smaller game that was to be found on the tiny peninsula. The low, marshy area was infested with mosquitoes and other airborne pests and the brackish water of the tidal James River was not a good source of drinking water.
The settlers who came over on the initial three ships were not well-equipped for the life they found in Jamestown. They consisted mainly of English farmers and Polish woodcutters hired in Royal Prussia. Many suffered from saltwater poisoning which led to infection, fevers and dysentery. As a result of these conditions, most of the early settlers died of disease and starvation.
Despite the immediate area of Jamestown being uninhabited, the settlers were attacked, less than a fortnight after their arrival on May 14, by Paspahegh Indians who succeeded in killing one of the settlers and wounding eleven more. By June 15, the settlers finished the initial triangle James Fort.
[edit] First and Second Supply missions to Jamestown
A week after the initial Fort at Jamestown was completed, Newport sailed back for London in June 1607 on the Susan Constant with a load of pyrite ("fools' gold") and other supposedly precious minerals, leaving behind 104 colonists, and the tiny Discovery for the use of the colonists.
Newport returned twice from England with additional supplies in the following 18 months, leading what was termed the First and Second Supply missions. Despite original intentions to grow food and trade with the Native Americans, the barely surviving colonists became dependent upon the supply missions.
[edit] Third Supply: ill-fated Sea Venture
Newport made a fourth trip to America in 1609, as captain of the Sea Venture and "Vice Admiral" of the Third Supply mission. However, the nine ships encountered a massive three day long storm, and became separated. The flagship of the mission, the Sea Venture was shipwrecked off of Bermuda, in an incident which is often credited as the inspiration for Shakespeare's play The Tempest.
During this time, the English established their claim to the archipelago which became Bermuda. Eventually, the survivors on Bermuda constructed two smaller ships from parts of the Sea Venture and sailed on to Jamestown, leaving behind only a few people to hold the rights of the English claim to Bermuda.
arriving 10 months later than planned. They learned that the failure of the Sea Venture to arrive carrying most of the the Third Supply Mission's supplies, combined with other factors, had resulted in the death of over 80% of the colonists during the Starving Time from the fall of 1609 until their arrival in May 1610.
Newport and the survivors of the Sea Venture had precious few supplies to share with the Jamestown survivors. Both groups felt they had no alternative but to return to England. They boarded the ships, and started to sail downstream and abandon Jamestown.
However, as they approached Mulberry Island, they were met by a new supply mission arriving from England sailing upstream. Heading this group equipped with additional colonists, a doctor, food, supplies was a new governor, Thomas West, Baron De La Warr, who forced the remaining settlers to stay, thwarting their plans to abandon the colony.
[edit] Final arrival at Jamestown
As Christopher Newport arrived once again back at Jamestown for what would prove to be his last time, after so many trips, he also would have had no way of knowing that he was finally bringing ashore the key to Jamestown and the Virginia Colony's permanency.
Among the those colonists with him was a survivor of the Sea Venture's shipwreck whose wife and young son had perished. His name was John Rolfe. In his possession were some untried seeds for a new strain of tobacco and some also untried marketing ideas.
Although his voyage to this arrival at Jamestown with Newport had also followed a long, painful, and most circuitous route, within a short time, John Rolfe would successfully cultivate and export his new, sweeter strains of tobacco. His ideas and work with tobacco resulted in the cash crop which guaranteed the Colony's economic success.
[edit] Later voyages, death
Years later (1613–1614) Newport sailed for the British East India Company to Asia. He died in Java (now part of Indonesia) in 1617 on a voyage to the East Indies.
[edit] Legacy
- Newport News Point, where the mouth of the James River joins the harbor of Hampton Roads, later part of the independent city of Newport News, Virginia, is widely believed to have been named for him, although the exact history of the subject remains in some dispute.
- Christopher Newport University, in Newport News is named in honor of him.
- Christopher Newport is portrayed by actor Christopher Plummer in Terrence Malick's 2005 film The New World.
- In 2005-2006 playwright Steven Breese wrote Actus Fidei (An Act of Faith), based on the life and times of Captain Christopher Newport, as part of the Jamestown 2007 Festival. This play recieved its world premiere in the Spring of 2007 at Christopher Newport University.
- A biography on Captain Newport by A. Bryant Nichols Jr. is due to be published in the spring of 2007.
[edit] Further reading
- A. Bryant Nichols Jr., Captain Christopher Newport: Admiral of Virginia, Sea Venture, 2007 (coming spring 2007)
- David A. Price, Love and Hate in Jamestown: John Smith, Pocahontas, and the Start of A New Nation, Alfred A. Knopf, 2003
- Smith, John, The Generall Historie of Virginia [“G.H.” London, 1623].
- Wingfield, Jocelyn R., Virginia’s True Founder: Edward Maria Wingfield, etc, [Charleston, 2007, ISBN 978-1-4196-6032-0].
