John White steps up to assume colonial governorship

Sir Walter Raleigh’s selection in 1587 of John White as his new colonial governor to build a permanent settlement in the New World was an intriguing choice. White was an artist, not a warrior. 

Perhaps having a “nonconfrontational and nonmilitary” leader would lead to better relations with the brown-and-red-skinned natives who the English colonists were sure to encounter in the Chesapeake Bay area.

 

John White

This was the region targeted by Raleigh and White as the place that offered “the best opportunity” to build a successful and sustainable settlement in North America. 

The pilot for the 1587 transatlantic journey was Raleigh’s favorite navigator, Simon Fernandes. The Portuguese ship captain had been hired twice before by Raleigh, leading expeditions in 1584 and 1586 to Roanoke Island. 

White’s first order of business was for Fernandes to carry the sailing party back to Roanoke Island, so the Englishmen could gather up the 15 colonists who were assigned by Sir Richard Grenville to stay behind on the island and hold down the fort in 1856.

 

Simon Fernandes

Upon arriving at Roanoke Island in late July, Fernandes flipped the script and announced his refusal to take White’s party to Chesapeake Bay. 

John D. Neville, a retired history professor from East Carolina University in Greenville, N.C., said: “White and his men found the fort razed and the houses abandoned. Of the 15 men left by Grenville, the only trace was the skeleton of one man.” 

Within the colony, there was a great celebration on Aug. 18, 1587, when Ananias Dare and Elinor White Dare became the proud parents of Virginia Dare. She was the first child born to English parents in the New World. (Elinor was the daughter of governor John White and Thomasine Cooper White.)

 

Yet once again, supplies were running low, so it became obvious that a leader of the colony must return to England in order to obtain badly needed supplies and inform the English authorities that the colonists were back on Roanoke Island, not in the Chesapeake Bay, Neville said. 

Curiously, Fernandes was still anchored offshore. None of the seven assistant governors wanted to go, so “with great reluctance and hesitation,” White agreed to sail with Fernandes, according to Neville. 

Once back in England, White arranged to meet with Raleigh in early November 1587. He learned that two weeks prior, Queen Elizabeth had issued a general “stay of shipping,” preventing any ships from leaving English shores, because of the looming threat of war with Spain. 

White found himself in a scrape, unable to grab supplies and catch a ride back to Roanoke Island.

 

John White’s return to Roanoke Island delayed until 1590

 Sir Walter Raleigh tried his best in 1587 to find some English ships to carry governor John White back to Roanoke Island with supplies for his fellow colonists who were struggling to make a go of it in the New World. 

Queen Elizabeth vetoed the plan, however, because she wanted all British vessels available for combat duty in the looming war with Spain.

 

England would go on to crush the Spanish Armada in 1588, but it was not until 1590 that passage could be arranged by Raleigh for White to travel with privateers. 

An essay published in 1972 by the National Park Service, written by Charles W. Porter III, explained: “Privateering was such a profitable venture at that time that a voyage solely for the relief of a half-forgotten outpost was almost unthinkable.” 

Thus, John White was basically the only passenger on a voyage to “pillage, plunder and profit.” 

Eventually, Capt. Abraham Cocke carried White to Roanoke Island, as promised, but in trying to access the port, a small vessel captained by Edward Spicer crashed in the waves on Aug. 17, 1590. Spicer and six crewmen drowned. 

White was determined to press on. He found the remnants of the colony on Aug. 18; the site was long deserted. The few clues about the colonists’ whereabouts included the letters “CRO” carved into a tree and the word “CROATOAN” carved on a post of the fort.

 

Croatoan was the name of a nearby island (Hatteras), less than 50 miles south of Roanoke Island. The Croatoans who lived there had been friendly toward the settlers, so it was logical that the tribe’s leader, Manteo, would welcome and absorb the English people into his native village. 

White was eager to find them, and the plan was to travel to Croatoan on Aug. 19. 

Historian Dr. James Horn said: “Overnight, a great storm blew up and snapped their anchor cables, nearly driving the (main ship) onto the reefs lining the Outer Banks. With his anchors gone, provisions dwindling and a tempest that showed no signs of abating, Cocke decided to head out to winter in the West Indies, then return in the spring.”

 

“But continuing gales forced the ship far into the ocean, persuading Cocke to set a course for the Azores and then back to England,” Dr. Horn wrote. “The bitterly disappointed White knew that it was highly probable that he would never see his family, friends and fellow venturers again.” 

Scientific evidence shows that severe droughts occurred on Roanoke Island between 1587-90. The weather may have caused any surviving colonists to pack up and leave. 

Some archaeologists digging around the Buxton community on Hatteras Island indicate that their findings support the theory that the people from the “Lost Colony” were “assimilated into the Croatoan people on Hatteras Island” – end of story. 

Other researchers believe that “there was not a likely single large relocation site,” and it is probable that the Roanoke Island colonists “dispersed into numerous small settlement groups.” 

This opens the door to the possibility that some “lost colonists” found their way down to Cedar Island in Carteret County. 

Or an even wilder suggestion is: The entire “Lost Colony” was at Cedar Island.