On May 14, he selected a piece of land on a large peninsula some 40 miles (64 km) inland from the Atlantic Ocean as a prime location for a fortified settlement. Captain Edward Maria Wingfield was elected president of the governing council on April 25, 1607. Under orders to select a more secure location, they set about exploring what is now Hampton Roads and an outlet to the Chesapeake Bay which they named the James River in honor of King James I of England. The expedition made landfall on April 26, 1607, at a place which they named Cape Henry. They made a particularly long voyage of four months, including a stop in the Canary Islands, in Spain, and subsequently Puerto Rico, and finally departed for the American mainland on April 10, 1607. The fleet consisted of the ships Susan Constant, Discovery, and Godspeed, all under the leadership of Captain Christopher Newport. Late in 1606, English colonists set sail with a charter from the London Company to establish a colony in the New World. (Modern roads, causeway, and buildings not shown) Map of Jamestown Island, showing the terrain and location of the original 1607 fort. In May 2022, BBC News reported that Jamestown is threatened by climate change. Jamestown Settlement, a living history interpretive site, is operated by the Jamestown Yorktown Foundation, a state agency of the Commonwealth of Virginia. Historic Jamestowne is the archaeological site on Jamestown Island and is a cooperative effort by Jamestown National Historic Site (part of Colonial National Historical Park) and Preservation Virginia. Today, Jamestown is one of three locations composing the Historic Triangle of Colonial Virginia, along with Williamsburg and Yorktown, with two primary heritage sites. In 1699, the colonial capital was moved to what is today Williamsburg, Virginia Jamestown ceased to exist as a settlement, and remains today only as an archaeological site, Jamestown Rediscovery. In 1676, Jamestown was deliberately burned during Bacon's Rebellion, though it was quickly rebuilt. George's, Bermuda, was officially established in 1612 as New London, whereas James Fort in Virginia was not converted into James Towne until 1619, and further did not survive to the present day. The London Company's second settlement in Bermuda claims to be the site of the oldest town in the English New World, as St. The modern conception of slavery in the colonial United States was formalized in 1640 (the John Punch hearing) and was fully entrenched in Virginia by 1660. One of their number included Angela, who was purchased by William Peirce. They most likely worked in the tobacco fields as slaves under a system of race-based indentured servitude. The approximately 20 Africans from the present-day Angola had been removed by the British crew from the Portuguese slave ship São João Bautista. In August 1619, the first recorded slaves from Africa to British North America arrived in what is now Old Point Comfort near the Jamestown colony, on a British privateer ship flying a Dutch flag. In mid-1610, the survivors abandoned Jamestown, though they returned after meeting a resupply convoy in the James River. Jamestown served as the colonial capital from 1616 until 1699.ĭespite the dispatch of more settlers and supplies, including the 1608 arrival of eight Polish and German colonists and the first two European women, more than 80 percent of the colonists died in 1609–10, mostly from starvation and disease. It followed several failed attempts, including the Lost Colony of Roanoke, established in 1585 on Roanoke Island, later part of North Carolina. (N.S.), and was considered permanent after a brief abandonment in 1610. It was established by the Virginia Company of London as "James Fort" on O.S.
It was located on the northeast bank of the James (Powhatan) River about 2.5 mi (4 km) southwest of the center of modern Williamsburg.
The Jamestown settlement in the Colony of Virginia was the first permanent English settlement in the Americas.