Roanoke is the name of English colony established at similarly named island in 1585 by Sir Walter Raleigh whose purpose was to create a first regular settlement in North America, but colony’s existence did not last long as all of its settlers disappeared under mysterious circumstances and left almost no traces. The history of colony disappearance for centuries has been staying in the focus of attention of sailors, historians, archeologists and mystery fans, but the answer is still not found. For this reason Roanoke went down in history as the “Lost Colony”; its image later served as a basis for many books, movies and even games. This essay will consider the background and history of the colony, as well as the most popular theories of its disappearance.
Development of capitalism caused the need of searching new lands, workers and income sources. By the middle of XVI century Spain was dominating in American continent and receiving vast revenues from its huge controlled territories, preventing other countries from colonies establishment, but the balance of powers in the Old World began to change; as a result, Spain started to lose its status of leading European superpower, and other countries used the opportunity to spread their power in North America by establishing their own colonies.
British Empire initiated the establishment of new British colonies at American continent, and with the purpose of North America colonization two monopolistic trade companies, London and Plymouth, were created. The companies obtained lands for “possession” from the Queen, but they needed a person in charge of colonization process. Sir Humphrey Gilbert headed first sailing to Newfoundland and announced its English colony, but on the way back to England he died in a shipwreck (Wolfe, n.p.). After that, Sir Walter Raleigh being the Queen’s favourite, persuaded her to provide him with the rights for colonization of lands in North America. These events gave rise to the beginning of tragic and mysterious history of Roanoke colony.
The history of Roanoke development can be divided in two stages. The first stage began from formation of settlers group headed by Richard Grenville, who was responsible for land exploration and colony establishment. However, the expedition faced many difficulties, one of which was the shipwreck, food and team part drowning. Due to these events, colony establishment was postponed, but Grenville and the group of people stayed at Virginia coast and got help and food from native people. Two Native Americans joined the settlers in order to study English and European culture. Later, Grenville denounced local tribe in theft of silver cup and destroyed one of the villages (Kupperman 72). North area of Roanoke Island was a chosen as a place for colony, settlers began to build houses and make trenches in order to protect themselves from possible attacks of local tribes. Grenville sailed to England with a promise to return in one year. By the end of that year the colony was close to starvation and death because of lack of food, but the colonists were saved by Francis Drake who agreed to take them to England (Wolfe, n.p.). When Grenville came and found the island empty, he left 15 soldiers on the island to protect the settlement (Wolfe, n.p.). Thus, first expedition failed and did not achieve any success.
Second attempt was taken by Sir Walter Raleigh in July of 1587. The second expedition of colonists was including about 150 persons. John White, an artist, was appointed as Colony Governor (Wolfe, n.p). However, the newcomers found no traces of people in the settlement and decided to stay and develop the land. An important event was the birth of Virginia Dare, granddaughter of John White. Since the food stocks were decreasing, White had to sail back to England. The arrival of ships with food to the colony was planned for the spring of 1588. However, for different reasons including war with Spain and as a result limited sea routes access, the expedition was delayed almost for one year and a half. John White arrived to Roanoke with new expedition three years later, but the settlement was empty. The search of colonists organized by the team did not give any results; they didn’t find any signs of fight or armed conflict. The only sign found was the word “Croatoan”, and letters “Cro” carved in the trees. Before White left the colony three years ago, the people agreed to carve the name of place where they will go to and Maltese cross in case of danger. As the Maltese cross was not carved, it was decided that settlers moved to Croatoan Island located not far from Roanoke, weather conditions were bad and White failed to persuade the team to sail to Croatoan. Third expedition was the shortest; White sailed back to England and never found out what happened with his family.
Mysterious disappearance of the colony produced many different theories supported with arguments in favor of each. The most popular theories are the following:
1) Sailing to Chesapeake Bay: due to the lack of food and unfavorable conditions or threat from Indian tribes, the colonists could decide to sail away to another place in hope for better conditions, but this theory cannot explain why all the staff and boats were left in place;
2) Local tribes attack: another theory suggests that colonists were killed by local tribes from Croatoan island, who were willing to revenge for previous offences. However, this theory cannot explain disappearance of “killed” bodies in such case, as well as the fact that no buildings were destroyed and no signs of fight were observed.
3) Revenge of Spain: some theorists believe that colony was destroyed by Spanish men. That historical period was marked by intense confrontation between England and Spain. Spain was aware of English colonies establishment plan and willing to prevent this. In such case the colonists could be killed or taken hostage by Spanish soldiers, but no direct evidence was found to this fact.
4) Assimilation in local tribes: one of the most widespread, popular and, in my opinion, most probable theory suggests that colonists in their attempts to survive left the settlement and joined friendly Croatoan tribes. In addition, one of the Native Americans, who was studying European culture and English language in the first expedition of Grenville’s and stayed in English settlement, was from Croatoan tribe and might persuade the colonists to join the tribe for survival. The theory of assimilation had many indirect evidences. Hatteras (formerly – Croatoan) island, located near Roanoke, was also occupied by Native Americans tribes, and some of the tribes may be the descendants of Europeans, as in the later period colonists who settled in that area met grey-eyed Natives Americans or some people from tribes speaking old English and well familiar with the Bible. The same idea is also mentioned in the records of English captain, John Smith. According to him, representatives of Tuscarora tribe (or Croatoan) friendly to Europeans told him about their assistance to white people in moving from the island to the mainland. The colonists could also move to Chesapeake Bay and unite with Chesepian tribe; it was confirmed by Chief of the Powhatan tribe who also claimed to have them killed (Casale, n.p.). Another branch of this theory suggests that Indian tribes could kill all the men and take away children and women to live with the tribes but there’s no direct evidence of this fact. It must be noted that exactly this theory with minor variations in the direction chosen or residence area of colonists was supported by most famous theorists such as Lee Miller or James Horn.
Of course, such a strange story of colonists’ disappearance gave rise to many absurd theories such as new, unexplored disease or virus that killed all the colonists or even their kidnapping by UFO. The main problem in revealing the truth still remains due to non-availability of facts, direct evidences and long time period passed.
The latest data received from archeologists shed some new light on disappearance of Roanoke. One of archeological teams working in a close cooperation with First Colony Foundation during the digging works at the site of Hatteras island found many items which might belong to English colonists such as XVI century gold ring with lion carved on it and many household objects. The archeologists believe that the items found could only belong to Roanoke colonists and serve as a reliable evidence of their assimilation with local tribes (Pruitt, n.p.). Another important finding in the history of Roanoke was the analysis of so called La Virginea Pars map drawn by John White back in XVI century; watercolor map analysis was performed by advanced X-ray equipment, in the result a symbol of star-shaped form was found under the patch on the map. The archeologists suggested that this sign could point to the location of inland fort of the colonists (Pruitt, n.p.). Probably, further archeological excavations and careful analysis of findings will contribute to the revelation of colony disappearance.
Roanoke image was widely used in popular culture, often names of Roanoke, Croatoan or Virginia Dare could designate something different from what they really are. For example, in fantastic novel “Dare” by Philip Jose Farmer the colonists were taken by aliens and delivered to another planet. Famous writers, Stephen King and Neil Gaiman, were also inspired by the story and created books on its basis. Videogames, such as Assassin's Creed III or Dead Space 3 used Roanoke story and name in their storylines. The movie “Wraiths of Roanoke” is telling the story of disappeared colonists from mysterious point of view.
The story of Roanoke colonists leaves many questions open, as well as the space for more considerations, speculations and theories since it accounts for many contradicting facts. However, the true answer seems to be hidden and unlikely to be found.
Works Cited
Casale, Steven. America’s First Mystery: The Lost Colony of Roanoke. The Line-Up. N.d. Web. 2 Jan. 2016.
Dunning, Brian. Finding the Lost Colony of Roanoke. Sceptoid podcast. 15 Feb.2011. Web. 4 Jan.2016.
Horn, James. A Kingdom Strange: The Brief and Tragic History of the Lost Colony of Roanoke. Web. Basic Books, 2011. Web. 1 Jan. 2016.
Jones, Justin. What Happened to Roanoke’s “Lost Colonists”?. The Daily Beast. 08 Dec. 2015. Web. 1 Jan. 2016.
Kupperman, Karen. Roanoke: The Abandoned Colony. Web. Rowman & Littlefield, 2007. Web. 1 Jan. 2016.
Pruitt, Sara. Archaeologists Find New Clues to “Lost Colony” Mystery. History.com. 10 Aug.2015. Web. 3 Jan.2015.
Wolfe, Brendan. The Roanoke Colonies. Encyclopedia Virginia. Virginia Foundation for the Humanities, 13 Jun. 2014. Web. 2 Jan. 2015.
