Roanoke: I left it right HERE Fire - Episode 45

Welcome back to The Day's Dumpster Fire where we don't celebrate humanity's successes but its most fantastic failures.

On today's episode, Kara explores one of America's earliest mysteries dating back to the olden days when America was nothing more than just a couple of colonies. The British colony of Roanoke was designed to be an initial starting point for what was hoped to be the foundation of Britain's next great business venture.

While most of us know that Roanoke was established in 1587 and somehow disappeared by 1590 with hardly a trace, Kara expands the mystery by looping in the British and European happenings and conflicts which may have contributed to the disappearance. She also looks at the status of the Native Americans who, for the most part, surrounded the colony on all sides.

She finishes with a brief discussion as to some of the theories of how the colony could have disappeared, but ultimately, the mystery of Roanoke reflects more of what was happening on the Atlantic seaboard and England's ever growing involvement in world affairs and perhaps sticking her nose where it doesn't need to be stuck.

For more details of this episode and dozens of other dumpster fires in history including images of Kara's doodles and artwork check out The Day's Dumpster Fire website. Be sure to send Kara and Ed an email at thedaysdumpsterfire@gmail.com with your feedback, questions, suggestions, and ideas for future episodes. 

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Transcript

Kara: 0:00

Hey, everybody. That's Kara. And this is an. And this is your days. Dumpster fire. Where we don't celebrate humanity's successes. But its most fantastic failures. I low. Dumpster fire in the morning. This is very rare for us. Usually it's late at night where we're desperately trying to stay awake. Right now we are awake. But I figure this time we have a, uh, we have a nice two week holiday, and we actually get to record in the daylight. It's kind of weird. Look at us. Go.

Know. I know we set like an 8: 0:53

00 record time and an hour and 11 minutes later we.

Kara: 0:59

It's fine. This fine dog's had to pee. I had to pee. Yeah, I'm on a new blood pressure medication, so I have to pee up there to pee, like, ten times. Yeah. It's okay. We're all. So yeah, we've got a, uh, a vastly different episode today compared to what we've done recently. Like, I feel like recently it's been kind of like a mixed bag of just all sorts of stuff. But now we are going back to the good old days to the, to the old American colonies. Yeah. Hit. Not the 1500s. I wanted to go back in time for a little bit because I missed it. I'm also practicing my research practices just because I want to. So I've been wanting to improve my research skills lately, and this is the perfect opportunity to do it. Yeah. When you guys go on to our website, the days of Viacom carrier likes to put up like when she puts up show notes, it is legit show notes like it is everything that we type up in the process of trying to prepare, which I do not know that I'm like, Oh wow, I should have made my notes, make a little bit more sense, but like, you know, you're when Kerry is practicing her research techniques, when you see the work site and pages like properly formatted. A. Yes. The only thing that it's. Next step is to add in text. Oh, yeah. Yeah. In Texas. Footnotes. But that's not MLA if you had footnotes. That's. No, it's Chicago. Chicago. Well, in fact, these are my work site. It is actually in Chicago for about two. Is it really? Oh, that would explain. What? Edit for Chicago. Based. Yeah, I said it first to Chicago and then I just haven't done the context because. I'm working my way up to it. But I guarantee you in the next few episodes, you'll have your footnotes in a whole the whole deal. Well, why not? it's sad because I'm an I'm an English lit major and like, it's so weird that. So like, you have a history background and your history background. Like every you like you've got to have multiple sources and you've got to have everything properly cited and you've got to have supporting evidence and this and that which I have exposure to that I'm definitely I've definitely done that, especially in my education background. But when I got into my English degree. It's like we don't want to see work works at a page. We don't want to see citations. We want you to read of Aaron Angel's by John Donne, and we want you to interpret that thing. And everything has to be completely original and all that stuff. So it's like. It's so rare. I'm so used to, like everyone thinks that, Oh, an English degree. You've got a site, everything that's only like a small part of it. Most of it is like coming up with original ideas. And then when I got an education, that's where we had to do a lot of siting and and stuff like Supporting that. evidence. So like when you look at my notes, it's just like, Oh, I just have a bunch of, uh. Here's a bunch of links. Lynx. Yeah. That's okay. There's nothing wrong with that. I just Yeah. go overboard because I want to practice. Yeah. Better myself. I don't want to get rusty. That makes sense. So. So, yeah, we've got the. The lost colony of Roanoke. Yes, that's how it started, at least. So my original goal was to prove why the colony was a dumpster fire. And obviously, like, the people disappeared. So, yes, it's a dumpster fire, but also it was in my view, it was Queen Elizabeth's personal dumpster fire of trying to colonize. United States before Jamestown. Well, yeah, and it's a hot mess because it's one thing to send out a ship and have it get caught in a hurricane and sink. Okay. That happens, right? It's another thing where you are trying to set up a city and then that whole city disappears like. Like you. You set this colony up, you got to come home. You get stuck at home because of wars, and then you come back and you're like, I left it right here. This whole colony. Hundreds of people. I left them right here, and there's not a trace of it. Like they couldn't even find, like, cabins. Like they couldn't find buildings. They couldn't find anything. Right? There is a few things like there's there are some cannonballs and some metal bars and stuff like that. Heavy things that can't be carried. There was a rock, wasn't there? Like it was a weird inscription on it. That was found later and turned out to be fake. Oh. The dare. The dare Stones. Oh, that's disappointing. Oh, yeah, it's really interesting. There is one rock that was found that they think was engraved by Eleanor Adair later on, but the other ones, because there was a set of other ones that were found. Okay. In like the thirties, I think it was. And those turned out to be fakes. Yeah, I guess they would sell. Now that would leave it to America to find a way to profit off of hundreds of people disappearing. Well, you know, I have my own opinions of what I think happened to the people, but we're not going to hit that too much today. I want to mainly focus on Elizabeth's attempts to colonize in the New World and her competition with Spain in this period. Because I know, like her father, her father, like Henry, the supreme douchebag that he was. He did have enough vision to be like that. America is where it's at. Like the future of Europe is going to play out in in the Americas. And I feel like he was real big on that. And he did spend a lot of time like building the shipyards and everything like that that England would later on use to build their massive navy that would then colonize America. And like I said, a khakis lose a couple of those colonies. It happens. Especially your first try. Crash car. So we're going to talk about how she crushed the car the first time. Okay. Well, it wasn't really her fault, but it's. It's fine. She gave the keys to somebody else and they crashed it. That's exactly what happened. So we will start in England in the 1500s. So just to set the stage a little bit, Elizabeth, the first kind of throne after the death of her half sister, Bloody Mary in 1558, Mary was staunchly Catholic, making Catholicism the primary religion in England during her reign. And she was married to Philip, the second of Spain at the time of her death. So this is important. Mary, Super Catholic, married to Philip of Spain, super Catholic, and Elizabeth first took the throne. She put in policies in favour of Protestantism and reinstated the Church of England after Mary died. At first, Philip, Mary's husband from Spain, asked Elizabeth for her hand in marriage, thinking Politically, it makes sense, and he wanted to make sure that Spain and England had some sort of relationship. But it didn't pan out that way. He wanted her to now to Nat to denounce her Protestant religion. And she was like, I'm not doing that. He was the first of many suitors that she would ultimately deny marrying during her reign. And she was a single lady for the rest of her days. Well, I feel like Elizabeth. Like I feel like she would not have had an issue getting married, but she was not going to let her husband tell her what to do. Yeah. No, she was not dumb. She was very, very intelligent, and she wanted to make sure that she had full control of England while Yeah. she was alive. If a suitor came along like, Hey, you know, I. I'm on board with everything. I'll be a prince and. I would do that. I don't have a problem being a stay at home parents like Right. nice lifestyle. But but but we're also living in a time, though, where men were it was a very male dominated society and every guy was like, Oh, I'm going to marry Queen Elizabeth and I'm going to make her bake me pies in the kitchen. And that that that That was a good a flight. Yeah. No. She ain't that terrible, Eddie. Yeah. So by 1560, Philip the second struggled financially in Spain due to multiple conflicts in Europe to stay in their powerful position. So right now they are a world superpower. They're getting a lot of financial gain from the Caribbean and their other colonies in the new world. These included these conflicts included not just revolts and rebellions over land, but they were also overt religious ideologies, primarily from the Protestants. So he's putting down religion, religious revolts across Europe, as well as revolts over land. At the same time in England. Elizabeth decided her best move was to stay out of it. She she didn't want anything to do with Spain's issues. She's like, That's not my problem. But that didn't mean that she wouldn't get involved in Spanish affairs entirely. By the 1570s, Elizabeth was sending out ships to loot, pillage and annoy Spanish fleets in Europe and in the New World. And while she was doing this, she was also playing dumb. She was like, I don't know why those guys took your ship. What do you mean your ship was pillaged? I don't know what you mean. She knew. Meanwhile, she's promoting Raleigh like a nice job in sinking all these Spanish. Yeah. And then turning around like Verrilli, who. I don't know anybody here by the name of Rawley. Like what? What's he doing? I'll. I'll. I'll investigate. And if I find something, I'll stop him. And then, like, she turns around and tells him, Oh, there's going to be 50 more ships out there. Take them all down. Yes, exactly. So she never admitted publicly that she had any involvement in any of these activities on the world stage. But in all reality, she was the one calling the shots. It was. Yeah. She, she was much you know, she was doing all right. Let's get into it. 1577 Queen Elizabeth first receives a document entitled A Discourse How Her Majesty May annoy the King of Spain by fitting out ships of war on. Tenths of letters patent to discover and inhabit strange places. That is the official title. I love those titles. It's so great a discourse. How Her Majesty may annoy the King of Spain By fitting out ships of war under the pretense of letters patent to discover and inhabit strange places. Titles back then. They were. They were something else. They're not like today words like The Hunger Games. Or The Lord of the Rings? No, Back then the title, if it didn't, it consumed the whole front like cover of the Thesis book. statement. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's just like, Oh, I could just read the title and it's like it's on Cliff Notes. Amazing. In other words, this document was used in his excuse for the Queen's plans to sabotage Spain. The document stated that the Queen granted permission for Sir Humphrey, Gilbert and other English explorers to explore and discover areas of the new world. And in all reality, the Queen wanted her men to go out and loot Spanish ships under the guise of exploration. So officially on paper, she is sending out these explorers to explore new land. But in all real life, she just wanted to loot and pillage Spanish ships. It's like. But she knew nothing about. No, no, no. She didn't know. She's just exploring. Explore She can't control these. exploring the cargo holds of Spanish ships which. Correct. She is. She just wanted. She does. She can't control these men. Oh, little old Elizabeth. Oh, I. Old lady. I can't control these guys. They're so manly and unwieldy. By 1578, the Queen was granting patents for explorers to the New world or around the new world. She did this for several reasons. Britain's presence in the New World would bring the country trade, resources, money, and it would be a step in the right direction in terms of the conflict with Spain. So resource wise, economically, it makes a lot of sense to have some sort of either military or civil colony in the new world, because that would bring in resource assist for England and not for Spain. patent was granted to explore Sir Humphrey Gilbert Explorer Sir Humphrey Gilbert, who had made two voyages to. We're not. We're not going to explore. Sir Humphrey. Gilbert. I mean, I'm not down. But you do. He made two voyages to the New World. But he didn't settle there. He didn't make any attempt to put a military settlement there or anything. Gilbert had six years to pillage and then find a place to settle. So he used most of that time to pillage Spanish ships. Because, you know, whatever. Yeah. Yep. And he realized he was running out of time to satisfy the Queen's goals here. Like, yeah, we got a lot of money for the Queen, but we didn't get any resource or settlement or gain from the new world itself. By 1583, Gilbert set sail for the New World, a third time with five different ships. One of those five ships was under the command of Sir Walter Raleigh. I will pronounce his name right, I promise. Raleigh was an interesting tune and a personal favorite of the queen after a successful run in the military. Back in Europe, he was a distinguished writer, statesman, military man, and he was an explorer making himself indispensable to Queen Elizabeth. So he was the queen's right hand man. She loved him. The 1583 voyage was a hot mess. It was a bad deal. Raleigh and his ship was forced to turn back early because they didn't have enough for resources to make trip. Gilbert and everyone else perished in a storm. Oh. It was believed that everybody died on that voyage except for Raleigh, because he had to turn back for resources. Interesting. Was this like, done by like Florida or. No, it was closer to Europe, I think. Okay. I know there's a lot of like a lot of these ships would leave Europe at, say, spring time. But then they would they would land in the south eastern parts of America right around like August, September. And that's like hurricane season. Yeah, they tried to time. It's where they could get around hurricane season, but sometimes it just didn't work out. Yeah. Yeah. And there's a Bermuda Triangle thing with aliens and all that stuff. Yeah. I'm not even going to touch that. On the bright side of this failed voyage, the Queen had Raleigh overtake the operations of settling a colony or a settlement in the new world. Raleigh, as new shiny Charter had his name on it and everything. It was super special and it was set to march for it was set for March of 1584 to leave England. So it was originally Gilbert's mission. And then because Gilbert and everybody died, the queens like, All right, Raleigh, here you go. You can have this. Raleigh's task was to organize a voyage to settle in the new world and use a settlement as a British military base. Queen Elizabeth wanted to compete and pillage the Spanish while benefiting from local tribes like trade in resources. While there, the potential site had to be able to fulfill all of these things. So it had to be a place where you could potentially have soldiers there for a long period of time while settlement while trading and making positive relations with the native people in the new world. That's that's a tall order when you when you think think about that those orders like. It's intimidating enough as it is to just try to set a colony Oh, yeah. in a land that's trying to kill you, let alone make sure that a strategic. As well as in a position where it can be on the offensive. And oh yeah, and you need to be able to trade with the locals. Like, especially if you've never been there before. That's just it's just crazy, too. Like, where do you even begin on something like that? Well, I did want to know that the English knew and understood the Spanish. What's the word? The Spanish way of dealing with the local people in a new world. Okay. So basically Spain's Spain's ability to socio economic strategy of Native Americans. Yeah, they were very violent. They didn't want to have anything to do with the native culture. They wanted the natives to assimilate into their Catholic religion or they were going to die. But that's how Spain went about it. Yeah, that's what I like. England. Southwest Native Americans is why in Arizona there is those Catholic missions set up from way back when and all that kind of stuff. Conquistadors and. Mhm. They were very violent about it, very forceful about it. England took a different, a very different approach. They went the opposite way. England had the approach of okay, we are going to treat. They called him Savages. I don't like using that word, but we are going to treat these people like people. We're going to be friendly. We are going to try to learn their culture. We'll try to learn their language, and we're going to try to have a positive relationship with the natives there. That was the English approach, and it always has been. Yeah. So I do want to make that clarification that Spanish had one approach to handle their relationships with the native people while the English took a very different approach. While the other English English saw everything as like an investment. Whereas. Yeah. Whereas Spain, they didn't see things at that time. And I'm talking about Spain today, I'm talking about Spain back then, Spain, they just saw everything is a resource. For example, Mm. like when they pulled slaves out of Africa to go to Brazil, like in your life expecting see was like seven months. Whereas if you are a slave, then I'm not saying this is any better or appropriate, but if you were if you were going to be a slave, you would want to be on a British ship because the British were like, we and and I'm using this very loosely because the way that these slaves were transported on British ships were absolutely deplorable. But once they actually got to the destination and the slaves were sold, they were treated as an investment. You want to. You want to take care of them because they can make you a lot of money the same way like the Native Americans. Let's not just get off the boat and shoot everybody. Let's let's see what they have to offer. And and Try to work with them. and a lot of the early British interactions with the Native Americans, it was very peaceful like. It was very peaceful, very positive. There is a lot of sources. That threw a lot of assimilation into native tribes. So you had a lot of white European colonists assimilating with the tribe, taking on the tribe's culture, their foods, their language, basically integrating themselves with the Native American culture, not the other way around. And then hit the 1800s and they try to cover all that up. I would even say more like the 16 going into the 1700s. That's where it all kind of fell apart. No. Yeah. And then I would love to get a Native American history professor on here that I think talking about. That would be. That'd be really great. And that would be a fascinating conversation to find out. Why? Why did that break down? Yeah, that would be an interesting conversation for sure. I have to send out an email. Anyway, I just wanted to make that clarification is they really tried to think about this and how they could handle this goal of theirs. They really try to plan it out. Raleigh organized a recon team to find the perfect location per Elizabeth's requests. He sent out two ships with two captains, Philip morris and Arthur Barlow and the Crews that left the New World in April of 1584. Raleigh did not go himself. The Queen felt he was too important. And also, I learned this this morning. The queen also knew that Raleigh had dreams, big, big dreams of him founding a city in the new world, calling it calling it after him, like naming it after him and essentially like being the king of the sea or in the new world. It was. I'm not doing all that. You're staying here with me. Plus, you're like I. Keep an eye on Or a. keep an eye on him. He's. He's really handy to have around anyway. The voyage itself was difficult. It took a little over four months. There were little provisions and only officers got a hammock. So think about this. You're a sailor or an artist or a scientist or whatever, because we didn't have just soldiers going on the strip. There was also artists and stuff like only your officer got a hammock. Everybody else got to sleep on the floor. People were frequently sick. People were getting sick all the time. Food. Food would spoil quickly. There are even sources that say that the water would spoil because it was so hot on board. It's just overall, it's not great. It's not a good time. And these voyages would last about four months, a little bit more than four months. So that's what that's what you get. That's a long time on a boat. And these boats weren't like what we are used to seeing. And like the British fleet, like in the 1800s, uh, they were way shorter or they were very top heavy. So they bobbed around in the water a lot. They didn't have a lot of room for storage. So like, I know and this is I don't want to say this in the early days of exploration, but it's pretty early on. The big thing was nutrition. They just didn't know what a human being had to have and what they could live without. Like a lot of them thought like, well, you have to have sugar, but you don't have to have salt or you have to have potatoes, but you don't you don't need oranges or anything like that. Like kids had no idea of vitamin C and stuff like that. There was a lot of discussion and a lot of research back then. Like, we only have so much room we've got to put on the bare necessities. Turns out humans need a lot of crap to be healthy. Yeah, which explains all the sickness going on. Oh, yeah. Scurvy. Like everybody. Like those sailors back then, they a lot of them had scurvy, they were bow legged and all that stuff. But, hey, you got to learn somehow. It's a good time. This trip will be the first of five Elizabethan voyages to North America during this period. So we're going to talk about five different voyages back and forth. is the first of five. Okay. Right? Yeah. So the first one, 1584. The British knew that the Spanish ships would follow the sea current when travelling from Europe to the colonies near the Caribbean on their way back, they would travel up the Gulf Stream, going north up to Cairo, to an iron island and through the Outer banks of what is now North Carolina. I have handy maps here, so if you want to pop on to our website, check out the show notes. You can see what I'm talking about. The Outer Banks of North Carolina were right in the path of the Spanish ships going back to Europe, likely full of goods and gold. Seems like it seems like a good spot. Understanding the different current systems in the ocean, Raleigh and his team determined that anywhere just north of the Capital Tone Islands, which are now called the Hatteras Islands, if you're ever looking for it on a map, we're a prime place to have a Navy settlement and maybe even a colony in the future. The two captains landed in the new world to scout the area. They were there for about six weeks, checking on resources and the native population to see if they were willing to trade and have a relationship with the English. Impressed with the land, the location and the native population. The men returned to Britain after six weeks of travel, and Raleigh would call the land Virginia after his queen, so that good old Raleigh, he knew how to. Oh, is it like the Virgin Queen? That's what Virginia is named after. So. Yeah. Because I guess like Elizabeth the. Yeah, that's a little. Little weird. Virginia is a lot. It rolls off Yeah. the. Little bit more. Yeah. Another interesting fact, these these captains, when they came back to Britain, they brought two native men back with them to Europe. One chiefs and Mentale, once you cemented, would stay in Britain before returning on the voyage. And I did some extra research on this because I just thought it was interesting. Mantell was the chief of the Croatoan tribe and once he was a Roanoke tribesman, the two men primarily stayed as guests of Raleigh in London while they were there. Why don't you use them and say you would share information about the land and native culture of the New World before Raleigh sends an exhibition there to establish a Navy post? He went so far as to have Thomas Harriot create a right, create and write down an entire dictionary of the Algonquian language to help the English communicate with it. Teams in the area. Raleigh also felt it was good PR to have one chief some intaglio there to speak to people in Europe, so he would like dress them up in European clothing and just take him down the street to talk with Europeans, which. It's not great. Yeah. But we are. That's not a good look. Now, at least one if you're looking at it through a 2024 lens. But then again, no, it's not like they could have really taken him to England wearing their normal Their traditional tyre. outfit. Because people would be like, well, there were literally aliens. Yeah, They were they're they. very different. Viewed as like somebody from another planet. And so, like I'm certain by dressing him up in British attire that it would help with some of that that shock of like you're not from around these parts, are you? Yeah. Yeah, that's true. We also don't have any source that talks about how they made this friendship with Matteo and when she is and how that decision was made to get them to come on to the British ship. But it would be interesting to read. That would be an interesting read. Yeah. Yeah, I wish. I wish there was like a, like a, first person essay or whatever or something that. That talked about, Hey, we got these two guys on the boat. We're taking them to England. Should be interesting. Overall, the 1584 voyage was considered to be a raving success in the eyes of the Queen, and Raleigh was able to get enough investors for a second voyage in 1585. So we did it. That one not as much of a dumpster fire as it could have been, primarily its success. But it's also important to understand that this is a starting off point for our five Voyage series here. The 1585 voyage was made up of 600 men under Sir Richard Grenville and Ralph Lane. Grenville was in charge of the seven ships on the journey and everybody on board. An interesting note only one ship out of the seven belonged to the Queen. All of the other ships belong to private investors. Her ship was the largest built by her father and named the Tiger. The Queen sent this ship under the terms of receiving a percentage of any profits made from plundering Spanish ships. This is going to be a pattern like this all the time. He doesn't know anything about. Yeah. She. Yes. She also said that this is the best part. She also said £400 of gunpowder, not for use against the Native Americans, but it was meant as a special gift to the Spanish. I like that special gift. Yes. This is It for the. is going to give them £400 of gunpowder and a bunch of cannonballs. Yep. That's what. In fact, they don't even have to hand him over shoulders. Launch him over there. She'll do it for him. Yeah. Like here. Catch this. You know, there's £40 cannon ball and moving it like, you know, 500 feet per second. boy's voyage where once you swim in teo, they were aboard the tiger to go home about a week in a storm blew through and scattered all over seven ships. Those on board the tiger, including Grenville, had no idea what happened to the other ships. There's no way to communicate with them after being scattered. them, one of his ships, which I just thought this was funny, ended up landing in Portugal. And they stayed there. They never. The voyage. They were like, Screw this, I'm out. So they lost the ship. That. Portugal. Oh, that's funny. Get off. Like, I can just imagine these guys, like, they're all sick and everything and they just get off and the captain just throws the keys at some Portugal guard and like, here, it's all yours. We're out. By the time the tiger reached the Outer Banks, they were able to rendezvous with one other ship, the Elizabeth. They also raided three Spanish ships, scoring lots of money and men, and they sent two of them back to England for the queen. So good for them. But by the time the tiger reached the Outer Banks in June of 1585, they were the last of the seven ships to arrive, probably due to all the fun they were having rating Spanish ships. 011 historian I was listening to about this when I was initially starting was a he explained that as he called it, terrorism against the Spanish. It's just a variable, but it's just pretty funny to me. Now, now, looking back with the hundreds of years behind us, it's funny. Yeah. Yeah. It's just like I feel like the Spanish were kind of like the brunt of a lot of Oh, I'm. I'm sure and. Philip was getting so annoyed. Well, the thing is, it wasn't like the Spanish fleet was something to Bulgaria. Like it was a pretty. was a very impressive suite. Yeah. Like they were a viable threat. Yeah. Like, if not the most viable threat. And I do remember and I read this reading, um, some firsthand accounts in my early American lit classes as well as even in the 1800s. They could always tell they could always find the Spanish ships before they could even see them via the smell. I guess like Spanish ships were notorious for smelling really, really bad, especially slave ships. I was just going to say the slave ships during this time period had that reputation as well. Everybody knew like a day or two before the ship got there because of the smell. Oh. Oh, that's. For. What a what a reputation to have. Awful. World's biggest smelliest navy. Well, despite all this fun that the English were having with the Spanish ships and good fortune, the tiger, the ship carrying a majority of the resources like food and beauty that came from the Spanish, ran aground off the. Oh. Ocracoke and. Ocracoke Walker, Cochran Island. Okay, cool. Or what? Cocaine. Well, cocaine. I'm so sorry if I butchered that. I really trying. Anyway, this means that the ship got stuck because the water was too shallow, so the bottom of the ship got stuck in the sand. For. For the listeners who don't know what running high ground means, and it's essentially, you could call it a shipwreck and this was an absolute disaster. This happened right when they got there, maybe a couple of days in. Men had to throw resources and supplies overboard to try and lighten the load. There are even stories of men throwing horses overboard to try and lighten the load, to try to get the ship free. It was it was awful. So they lost all of these resources. And they had to wait for a high tide because that's all. A lot of times they would crash. They would run aground on low tide. But it's not like they had a lot of experience with this coastline. So they didn't know if it was low tide or high tide. And so they would have to wait till high tide. So it could be stuck there for like two weeks. You would have men in these rowboat with a rope attached to them. All this like trying to rope backwards. Like, running aground is probably next to a fire. I think running aground is probably the next worst thing because Yeah, you it was are a. literally a sitting duck. Yeah. The only the only hope you would have is that you couldn't be boarded. You couldn't be easily bordered by another ship. Because if they tried to sell it next to you, then they would run aground. Yeah, that's true. That was that's the only saving grace. But otherwise, you're just. It's kind of there until you get on. Waiting to be shot. Yeah. Yeah. So Grenville understood that his friends would never survive after losing so much, so many resources and gold and all of the stuff. Most of it was ruined because they had to throw under the water. he decided that he was going to take all the really big ships back, minus the tiger, to raid the Spanish. Of course, like you needed the big ships to read the Spanish. And he also took 495 out of the 600 men back to England for more supplies. He also sent word to Sir Walter Raleigh ahead of time to send more surprise supplies over there. Hopefully, that ship would get there before Grenville could get back. And he left Commander Ralph Lane in charge of the 105 men who remained in the Outer Banks and eventually establishing Fort Raleigh on Roanoke Island. A word on Lane. He was not exactly a nice person. Or so it would seem, in the sources that we have available. He was a harsh commander with a strong military background. Diplomacy just wasn't his thing. He was organized. He knew what he was doing in a military sense. But he was. He's not very tactful. No, no. He was very harsh, very violent. He was one of those guys who thinks you could solve the world's problems with violence. Oh, those guys. Yeah. They really move humanity forward. Oh, yeah, yeah. It's a it's a good time because diplomacy wasn't really laine's thing. The relationship with the Native Americans began to sour. This isn't great. I'm not sure if Laine understood or not, but he and his men depended on the native support and sounded like he was a real jerk bass or really impatient with them. Or both. At any rate, the English were beginning to distrust the native populations that surrounded them, while at the same time the Americans, the Native Americans, were growing impatient with English, especially considering that the English were consuming a lot of resources in the area. Not to mention the diseases that spread wherever the English went. I've often wondered, did the Native Americans understand, like the diseases were coming from the Europeans? Yes. I think they caught on to the pattern of, you know, wherever you see a white man, people get sick shortly after that. I also wanted to note here, too, it's important, really, really important to understand when we're talking about the Native American tribes, it's their tribes, multiple different tribes. It's not just one large group of people. You have different tribes or clans or whatever of different people. And those tribes don't always get along. You have warring tribes. You have tribes that get along together great, and you have this complex network of people who have their own problems in the world. So when the English arrived and the relationship started to sour. The relationship wasn't souring with all of the Native American people. It was starting to sour with one local tribe while the other local tribe they had good relations with, Yeah. which will dive further into that right now. But I just wanted to make sure that that was understood, that when you're talking about Native Americans, you can't really lump them all together. Yeah, well, I had a, uh. I had a, uh, a history professor in college. That that that was what he did. His PhD thesis on was all the Native American tribes. And he said that, like, on the Eastern seaboard alone, uh, before Europeans got heavily involved, there were over 400 major tribes. And hundreds more smaller ones. And there was like. Like you could have like, say, like the Cherokee, but the Cherokee could be broken up into like 15. Like it. It's just there are so many. Yeah. Little Nations. Yeah, exactly. So you can imagine the complexities of, I guess, diplomacy within North America, amongst the Native American tribes. So I don't think. When people look back at this time period, they think about that. But it's important to note when you're talking about especially this story in particular, it's important to understand. So if I'm going to give you a little bit of the story because it's ridiculous. Here's how it went in a nutshell. For those who want to know more trust issues between the natives and the English to begin with. tone in a certain village called I'm going to butcher it. go garlic. Ga, ga, ga. Skarsgard. Yeah, I got that. Coolest it. Back in 1584, the Englishman visiting the village noticed a Ceylon silver cup. As punishment for the stolen cup. Philip morris and 16 men burned down the village and grain fields, making themselves rivals to the sycophant tribe. Good Lord. A brief note. The secretary and we're rivals of the Croatoan tribe. The Croatoan tribe was Mateo's tribe. English were told by the natives that their chief melatonin had been wounded fighting the sick. Its own tribe's chief named when wing China. Okay, so we have two competing tribes here. The English had their friend Mateo on one side of the tribe, and they just burned down the village of the other tribe. So they just got themselves in the middle of two warring tribes. Probably a conflict that's been going on for some time now over a. Oh, boy. And this isn't the last time. White men messed up everything. Well, you know, after the burning of the village over a cup on top of growing frustrations already mentioned above, Lane found himself in the middle of an old tribal war on the site of the Croatoan. But in deep doo doo with the sexton in the midst of this conflict, Lane Manteo and his men ended up in a battle with the Sexton and the Croatoan, ending with Lane and in possession of Wooden Geithner's head. not great. Oh. It's not great. Oh. Imagine being a PR guy back then. He is terrible. Like, just like having to, like, explain to everybody, like, what's going on. And the poor PR person is like, yeah. So, uh, the silver lining is that we're not dead yet. You can read it. Yeah. Wrote to Raleigh on his way back to Britain and told him about all of this. You can read it. I actually have it sighted on the bottom there. So if you do want to read it, you. Yeah, I may have to look that up. That's a good primary source. Oh, it's amazing. I was reading it last night just like, wow, this guy. Oh, it's not great. Overall, Lane, it is 100 ish men were in Roanoke for about ten months. By the later months, the men were starving and they were desperate for resources. They they did have some help from the Croatoan tribe. But with the psychos and warring with the Croatoan, resources were very scarce, and it was hard to come by. Out of desperation, Lane sent one of his captains, Edward Stafford, and 20 men to the Croatoan Islands to give to live with the natives there while keeping an eye on the long gone Grenville with supplies. So they're still waiting for Grenville to come back. And it's been ten months and they're like, Where is this guy? We're getting really hungry. Like this is a problem. Meanwhile, Lane is screaming at everybody. I'm sure in June of 1586, about one year after the shipwreck, Stafford's shot saw an English fleet of ships heading through the Outer Banks. And it was very exciting. This fleet. Did not belong to Grenville, but it belonged to Sir Francis Drake. Yes. That Sir Francis Drake, the guy who sailed around the world, gave one of the first English sailors to make money from the slave trade. Bu famous for his Spanish pillaging and eventual involvement in the famous Spanish Armada battles on the English side in 1588. Look at their. But seriously, if you want to look up Sir Francis Drake facts or trivia. It's really funny. I found a list from one of the museums in GREENE, which is like a list of Chuck Norris jokes like. It's wonderful. I highly suggest you do that. It's one. Yeah. Drake is a fascinating. He's interesting. Drake is interesting. Yeah. So I didn't go too much into his background. But if you do want to do a deep dive, I highly suggest it. Drake was on his way back to England after a hard day's work, pillaging Spanish ships, probably in Florida when he landed in Croatoan for a resupply. Because. We are still pillaging ships that Elizabeth doesn't know about. Because, you know, priorities. Yes. Lane met with Drake and asked for help. He requested a ship to get back to England with enough supplies for 105 soldiers to get home. Drake gave everything to Lane that he requested, plus some extra men. And Lane and his men eventually joined Drake's fleet back to England on a ship backed. Back to England on a ship ending the second voyage. And They got on a British ship from Britain to go to Britain yes. on a British trip from New Britain. Thanks. That's the. But it ended the second voyage in any attempt to build a lasting settlement in the new world. Oh, that's. This is just the second one. I know. I'm telling you this great dumpster lot of fire. crap went down. Dumpster fires and dumpster fires. This is the stuff people don't talk about. And I just thought it was so interesting. It's. So in layman. Turning into a landfill fire. Oh, it's terrible. When Lane returned back to England and he had to face all of these people who paid him to try to stay there. He said that the voyage failed due to the lack of food and supplies. Many other people from the outside looking in blamed Lane's mistreatment of the native people. Just. Noting that. Yes, supplies were an issue. But you're also an ass. And that probably was the catalyst that made things go south quicker. Yes. Remember that ship that Grenville was supposed to come back with on top of the one sent by railroad? Oh, yeah? Yeah. The wayward supply ship. Uh huh. Well, it did arrive at Roanoke Island. One week after Lane and his men left. Beautiful. Talk about missing each other on the way returned to England when they came across an empty military base and then they just turned around and left. They're like, this is stupid. And then they went back to one. And then. So there's a lot of connections here to like trucking like. It never changes. You get to the consignee, you ring the doorbell, nobody answers. You just get in your truck and just go back. So that was Raleigh's ship. And then two weeks after that ship came through, when Greenville finally returned to Roanoke with three more ships full of supplies. Like he was ready. He was just late. To be fair to Granville, and he's not the best guy either. He doesn't have a great track record, but he's definitely better than Lane. He came back and communication is trash. I want you to remember this. He had no idea what he was walking into when he got to Roanoke Island. He was unaware of the damage done by Lane in terms of the natives relationships, the beheading, the diseases, the starvation heat. It was a lot. He didn't know about it. He just showed up one day to help his men out and found that nobody was there. Not wanting to give up the land that they had already settled and thinking that things were good with the locals in Roanoke, when in reality the locals that were friendly to the English were not on Roanoke but on Crow Croatoan. South of Roanoke, Greenville left 15 guys on the island with supplies less than two years, thinking that everything was good. Do I want to lose the land? He was like, This island is beautiful and we like it. And I'm just going to leave these guys here and I'll. That's just a long time to be hanging out with 15 burros. Oh, yeah, I like it. It's. It's fun. Yeah, it's going to turn into, like, a college dorm party, like. You know, that's usually. You know. These early colonies. Yeah. 15 dudes left to their own devices for two years. Nothing good is going to come out of that. Oh, no, no. It's going to be an absolute. This is another fire. Grenville left for England, but first made sure to stop by the Azores, held by the Spanish to pillage and raid. Of course. He was very successful. He brought lots of money back for the queen. And this was especially famous because they took everything off of visas, everything, even door hinges, which I just they took. Pretty much. Meanwhile, the 15 men were attacked by 6 seconds and warriors. They wanted revenge for the deaths of those who died by disease. And they were beheaded. Chief Fair. The men highlighted out the man who hightailed it. There we go. The men hightail it out of there in a tiny, tiny boat east of Roanoke Island. And they were never seen or heard from again. The 15 burros that were left there to Yep. conquer America. The 15 burros that were left there. As of today, it we don't we still don't really know what happened to them. It could probably be chalked up to they were lost at sea in their very tiny boat. But we. I would assume they died. I don't think any of them are alive today, so I think they died. Well, wasn't that. That was fun, wasn't it? It was a good time. We haven't even gotten to the colony yet. Like this is. This is great. So far, the queen hasn't had much luck in finding a good place to settle. But her guys have made a lot of money from raiding and pillaging Spanish ships. Why were the Spanish men? So that's a plus. Whew. That brings us to the 1587 voyage. Voyage number four. This voyage was the one, the one that everybody had been waiting for. The voyage that would put England on the map in the new world in terms of a colony. The previous voyages purpose was military and trade. And make sure we understand that those those previous ones were all for military. This one was a more permanent mission in terms of England's goal to keep up with the Spanish. The 1587 voyage was the first English voyage with women and children set to sail alongside the men, which is what makes it different, which means that they are planning to settle. Well, and it's it's important to note, too, like they were setting up all these colonies and like, these colonies were failing, like they weren't growing and they literally had to bear in mind that in order to make more humans, you, you have to have both men and women. Yeah. They literally could not they did not think of that. And they're like, why are these colonies just just withering away? Well. You need women. Yeah. Sorry. They, they Yeah, they, they need you need you need the. You need the oven. If you don't have the oven, you can't bake more babies, I guess. We're going to lay out the plan here. All right. dumpster fire fashion. to sail to the Outer Banks, stop at Roanoke to pick up those 15 guys that Granville left there in 1586, then head further north up to Chesapeake Bay and settle there. White to be the governor of the new Colony. A captain was hired and everything was good to set sail. March of 1587. Plans are set put in place. Sounds good. Can't fail. Right. John White was a. Famous last words. Right. John White was a painter, a cartographer and explorer. So he made maps. He had gone to the New World before in 1577. That expedition had different goals, but White took the opportunity to sketch out the land and the people he encountered there on his trip. He was also on Grenville, a 1585 voyage to Roanoke, where he did the same thing before returning to England in 1586 with Leighton. Why? It seemed like a good choice as the governor for the new colony with previous experience, had a good sense of the land. Plus, he probably had an idea of how to create greenery friendly relationships with the natives there, especially after seeing how bad it can go if it's done improperly. Mhm. Like, do everything this guy didn't do and don't do anything that this previous guy did and you'll be just fine. Correct. I also wanted to note you can look at White's illustrations and maps. They're actually pretty cool. Yeah. You can go and check those out. I was looking at them the other day. But yeah, I highly recommend. The captain of this trip was Simon Fernando. Good ole Fernando. This guy is a piece of work. So Fernando is a former pirate, which is a good start. Who took the. And the queen took a liking to him because he had a reputation of pillaging Spanish ships. She has a type. It's fine. The English sailors, however, did not like this guy at all. I don't know if it was the pirate thing. Maybe he was a big jerk face. Just something was off about him. My guess it's the pirate thing because. Likely the pirate thing. They kind of had a bad reputation. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, fair. But also, what are they doing to the Spanish? Just saying throwing it out there. You're saying this is a two way road like. I mean, everything. But it's fine. The total number of colonies was about 117 men, women and children. Today, historians really don't know much about the people who were on board, aside from their names. Some of them may have been on board to start a new life. Maybe they went because they wanted some adventure. Maybe they thought they could make a lot of money in the new world. We don't really know. But we do have their lists, a list of their names, which I thought was interesting. I also noted that the excited page, if you want to go check that out. Yes. That's called the manifest. Yes, it's interesting. Or if you really want to get specific, the bill of lading. Ill. That's where the term comes from. I know, but you. Paper. For those of you who don't know in truck driving, a truck driver picks up a load and they get what's known as the bill of lading, which is like all the paperwork associated with that load. And it seems like every single time they go deliver that load, that paperwork is lost. And it is an account manager's nightmare to try to track down missing paperwork. Amazing. We still have this paperwork from Roanoke, but we can't find the other anyway. So we know some general managers that really we can find Roanoke, but we can't find your paperwork from yesterday anyways. Anyway, John White was bringing his pregnant daughter and her husband with them on the trip. So how bad could could this grow? I mean, we got to be confident we're bringing a pregnant lady, Mateo was also a passenger on this voyage back to the New world, which I thought was interesting at this point. He was an acting translator and probably something of an ambassador for the English when they go back to the New World. So he is making himself known with the English When White and the colonists arrived at Roanoke to pick up the 15 extra men as part of the plan. They found it abandoned with a skeleton and a fort. It was reported to white that the sick, its own tribe, or the second tribe. Sorry, I keep doing that. The second tent tribe killed two of the 15, and the rest escaped on a little tiny boat. They didn't know what happened to them after that. After finding out that the men were gone. The pirate captain, Fernando, did not want to wait for white whale as Carlos went to look for the men. He left them on Roanoke without taking him to Chesapeake Bay, as per the plan, claiming it would take too much time. And if they waited any longer, the weather would not permit the captain to leave the area until winter was over. This guy. Left 117 colonists with women and children on Roanoke Island and seduces. He also had the nerve to hire an Irishman to go and tell the Spanish in the Caribbean that the English had set up a colony on Roanoke Island. Oh. Yep. Isn't he fun? Uh. Yeah, that's great. So now, instead of settling on Shell in Chesapeake Bay, which correct me if I'm wrong, Chesapeake Bay was later colonized successfully. Like, very successfully. Yes. So this could have been a super successful trip. Yes. Like this could have worked. But here we are. I just. I just want everybody to be aware this could work. And Fernando messed it up. Yeah, I completely I, I didn't realize the role that Fernando played. Oh, yeah, he. This. Screwed everybody. Nice. Well, I mean, that's what you get for hiring a pilot. That's fair. not long after arriving on Roanoke Island, a colonist named George Howell was by himself crab fishing. was attacked while he was fishing, being shot with sticks, arrows. So not only are we stuck on Roanoke Island with a second tribe, really, really mad at English settlers for understandable reasons, but now we have caught us being attacked by that same tribe. It's concerning. It's. And the Spanish know and everybody knows. Yes. That it's their. The colonists didn't know that the Spanish knew, but the Spanish knew. So this is a problem. Yeah. The con isn't meant to meet up with the friendly Croatoan tribe for trade news and help. They figured, All right, we're being attacked this second. And Tribe is super mad at us. We're basically stuck here. We need some help. So they went to the Croatoan for help. They held a feast together, and White was told how, And two of his soldiers from the year before were killed by the psychos. And so they just confirmed what their suspicions were, essentially. John White wrote in his own accounts that they were happy to integrate with the Friendly Tribe and excited to work with them to create a new settlement. He made the best of it. I mean, I can't knock him for that. actually really interesting. So not only read his paintings, but read his his accounts, his primary resources, their public domain. You can go find them and read them. You do have to get past the old English or the middle English. But it is an interesting read. I read some of it. I like the. very, um. It's like. Everything like starts. Like with our Lord, our Lord, Lord, this God. It's like they were very, very, very religious folks. Yes. Remember the time period we were in? We were in Elizabethan England in 15, 1600s. So that is a big thing. We have not hit the Enlightenment yet. It is true. But yeah. Read it. It's cool. Um. The colonists attempted to make peace with the cyclotron while they were there, and they failed. Kind of. It's weird. So this attempt, they sent out a letter to the secretary and chief, and they were like, Hey, we want to try to negotiate some peace with you guys with the Croatoan. Meet us in a week at this place. If you don't meet us to try to make peace, then we're going to have to come after you so we can use this land safely. Like we just needed to defend ourselves at that point with violence. Let's meet up for a peaceful meeting. And if you don't show up, we're going to kill you. That's pretty much what it was. It's interesting, especially considering that they had the Croatoan tribe backing them on this. I thought that was an interesting thing as well. And to be fair, like the Croatoan did not like to suck its own tribe, so I understand it, but I just thought it was an interesting dynamic. John White and his daughter were in Roanoke for a few weeks. Oh. Sorry, I skipped. So anyway, they sent out this peace treaty. The Scottish tribe never came So what they did was they went the English and the Croatoan went to go attack the sexton. when they got there, the circuits had had a head start. They were gone. They left. They were like, We're out because you guys have guns and you also have a tribe backing you. So it's not worth it. So at least the rival tribe were at it. They were out of the area and the Crotone people were very supportive of the colonists and all of that. So but the peace treaty didn't really work. But at the same time, we don't we're not being attacked every day. Yeah. So it's like a compromise. You know, we're not everybody's happy, but it works. John White and his daughter, we're in Roanoke for a few weeks when her baby arrived. Her name was Virginia Dare, and she is the first English child born in the New world. So that's what she's famous for, for just being born. Good for her. When. No, She has an interesting history to her, even though we don't really know what happened to her as a real person. What happened to her reputation and why is is really interesting. And yeah, it's a really interesting story. I don't want to get into it here because it's a rabbit hole that you could go down for a long period of time, but you now look into it. It's it's conflicting and interesting. Um, yeah. Anyway, yeah. Look that up. Yeah, I'll have to look that up, because all I remember is that. Oh, first the first, you know, basically first American. And that was it. I didn't know, like there was a lot of back story and. There is a lot of, um, there's a lot of things that people did with her story in terms of. Like race and religion and that type of thing. Especially, especially when you get to like the 1940s and fifties or even in the early 1800s. You get a lot of interesting things with that. But yeah, look into that area over the weeks the colonists arrived over, so over the few weeks they were there. John White in the Colonies began to realize that resources were becoming really scarce. And then with winter coming, they wouldn't last long on their own, and they knew that they needed resupply from England. It was decided by the leaders of the colony that White was the man for the job. He didn't like it, but he agreed. Before leaving, he told the colonists that if they needed to relocate while he was gone, they were to carve into a tree a name of where they were going to go. If they were leaving because they were in danger or it was an emergency, they would put a cross underneath the name. So the point of this was. John White is leaving and he is going to come back if anything happens. They're going to write down somewhere, carve it so it doesn't go away, not on a piece of paper, but carve it. Write down where you're going to go. And the cross was something that native tribes were not familiar with. It was a very English thing. It's a it's a very particular. I honestly don't remember the name of that particular cross. It's in the primary resource. I could probably go and find it. But if that there were any danger, that's what they were supposed to put. So just keep that in mind. So in other words, if he comes back and he says, Hey, we went this way with lacrosse, I know that he knows the kind of like proceed with caution because. Proceed with caution. We were in danger. We were fleeing for our lives. You. Got it. That's pretty clever. It's real smart. He's not a dumb guy. So White also buried some of his personal belongings on the island for himself. Like books and records and things for for him to get back when he came. When he returned with his resupply. farewell to his daughter, son in law's granddaughter, along with all of the other colonists before leaving the island. He didn't know it would take it three years to get back during the three years like Europe just like, fell apart. Like a lot of wars, naval wars, all that kind of stuff just kind of came to a head, if I remember correctly. I'm going to touch on it right now. No. Yeah, I'm not going to go into deep detail, but it is a part of the story and I wanted to make sure that, you know, it's understood that this is a very European story. Yes, it's part of American history as well. But at this point, Europe and the new world are very much tied together. Yeah. In February of. very strong umbilical cord between the two. Yes, very much so. It was not clipped until 1778 1778 1778 anyway. In February 1587, only a month or so before the colonists left for Roanoke. By the way, this is Europe. Meanwhile, in Europe, in February, Queen Elizabeth had her half sister, Mary, Queen of Scots, executed. Mary was the heir to the throne and a staunch Catholic queen ruling in Scotland. She was executed with evidence found against her of conspiring against Elizabeth Mosby of the second of Spain. Philip, the second took this execution personally, took it as a personal offense. And that's that that is the straw that broke the camel's back. That is the thing that did it. He began planning out an all out. He began planning an all out invasion in England that included 130 ships. Strong Spanish Armada. Yay! In April of 1587, Spies for England got word that the Crown got word to the crown that Philip was planning his attack. Sir Francis Drake, the same guy from earlier left for Spain in an attack that would surprise Philip the second and delayed the armada for a full year before it arrived in English waters. I think that's the thing that got him knighted. Drake was a hero for England and gave Elizabeth ample time to prepare for her defense. So. April 1587 Our colonists are on their way to Roanoke, while at the same time Philip the second is planning his Spanish armada to go and attack England. Drake bought her a year and here we are in 1588, the big year. Philip sent his impressive armada to England and was famously defended well under Queen Elizabeth's leadership. I'll even argue that this could be our own show in terms of Philip, the second perspective of things, because that was another one where he had it all planned out. It was not a good plan, but he had it all planned out and it went horribly wrong. Yeah, Cause, I mean, he had em outgunned, outmanned out ships like. But. Oh, yeah. But he. British. The British just know how to run a boat. Yep. was a whole thing. So the Anglo Spanish War is what it was eventually called. It lasted from 1588 to 1603 at about the Queen's death. Meanwhile. It's a pretty long war. It was pretty long. It lasted a little while during this time. Meanwhile, at the same time, our little buddy, he seems so small now that you're talking about Philip, the second Queen Elizabeth. Our little buddy John White. He did make it back to England right around the same time the war blew everything up, like literally and figuratively. He. This. This poor man. So John tried to get back to Roanoke on a resupply mission multiple times, only to be turned down because the war was more important to the ground, which I mean there. Yeah. Priorities. Yeah, I get it. This is especially true in 1588 with the Armada and all of that stuff. Like I said, I can't blame her, but those are some really bad circumstances for John and his colonists over in Roanoke. That's a bad deal. In 1589, he made another attempt, and it was approved. Which. Awesome. Thank you. But a few miles from England. White ship was ambushed by the French. The English defended the ship well, and it took it took a lot out of them and they could not move forward with that voyage. So. Yeah. I actually found this account to be interesting. This is White's own words of that particular ambush. He said, I myself was wounded twice in the head, once with a sword, and another time with us with a pike and hurt also in the side of the buttocks with a shot. So two was. head wounds and he got shot in the butt. Yep. You made it out alive. But, man, this poor this poor guy. Finally, in 1590, Wyatt found a way back. He hitched a ride with his widow with an old friend, Captain Spicer, who was headed back to the Caribbean to pillage Spanish ships. And he agreed to take white with them and check in on Roanoke on their way back to England. finally catches it. Break this for you. All right. This is the last one. The 1590 voyage. Voyage number five. So John White was stuck in England, away from his daughter and granddaughter with little to no communication for three years. The 1590 voyage back was full of raiding and pillaging and excitement because that's what they do. There is a war happening after all. It's not forget that this did take a lot of time, and I can imagine how antsy it was. Like, Guys, Yeah. we just need to get back. Stop. They keep. I feel like. like he was like, kind of like Cooper from Interstellar. Yeah, I could see Like, that. Hey, let's go, let's go, let's go. Like, I've got I got family waiting for me. Why do we. What's up with the side trips here? Like, do we really have to take out that Spanish dinghy? Like, can we? Yeah, I could totally see Right. his his standpoint here. I could, too. When the ship finally arrived at the Outer Banks, so they hit up the Caribbean first, remember? And then they went back up. They hit a rough spot of water. So like maybe 20 miles before they hit Roanoke, they hit a rough. What does a rough spot of water like with the rains that. I guess, a super strong current to the point where it causes seven men to drown, including the captain. Like I shouldn't laugh, but it's just. It's such an understatement. I know. That's what I read. I was like rosewater water. But then people drowned. Okay, I'll use that wording because it's funny, but. It's like I've heard like a rough patch of the road or whatnot, but when you think of water, it just sits there. I don't know. Maybe. Maybe Titanic hit the Titanic, hit a rough spot of water Yeah. The like. Titanic hit a rough spot of cold water. It's fine. Yeah. We are this that this a rough spot of water. Seven men drowned just trying to get to Roanoke Island, and that included his friend Spicer. This caused a lot of argument, as you can imagine. Salt Lake Spicer's crew no longer had a captain. They lost seven men just trying to get the stupid little island. And there was a lot of argument amongst the crew and white to even think that it was worth it to stop there, like. Why are we doing this? And at the same time, you have White who hasn't seen his family in three years trying to get them to stop. So the larger ship would wait off the coast while White and 19 men would go to Roanoke on a smaller boat to check in on the colony. WHITE The men had attempted to signal the English colony before they got there by playing familiar English songs. I guess they had some instruments on board. I don't know. I just thought that was fairly interesting. Make their presence known. Yeah. And they were shooting shots in the air trying to get attention, but they received no response from any of this. They landed on the northeast end of the island and began to walk south where the colony was located, about a quarter mile north of where the settlement was. Right. And the men stumbled upon a large tree with the letters acr0 carved into it. Later, after this whole thing went down, he wrote that he thought the letters meant that the colonists went to Croatoan. So they kept walking and they kept walking south towards the colony. And when they got there, it was empty. The houses that were once there were all taken down, dismantled, moved. There was no sign of a struggle, no burned down buildings or splintered lumber or anything like that. No bodies. Only a few heavy iron bars, some LEDs, some tools, some cannonballs. Note Those are heavy things. So if you're going to travel anywhere, you're going to want to take your wooden houses and not your iron bars. I get that. We'd even still like these wooden houses or like cabins. It's not like you can just. Yeah. Tear it down and move like these were heavy things in the fact that he left a cannonballs tells me that like they they one public left in a hurry, but two they left in a way that it wasn't necessarily a defensive move. Yeah. And. It would have taken the artillery and all that kind of stuff with them. Mm hmm. One interesting thing I read, too, is that the houses were put together in, like, joints. So if you think about how East Asia made makes their homes. It's like. Intricate wooden joints. It wasn't as intricate, intricate as they had in Asia, but here it was. It was the same idea where it was easy to put together and easy to pull apart, but strong enough to keep it together when you're using it. So I thought that was. So like IKEA houses. Yeah, exactly. They're pulled a little Eleanor, and they're, like, taking apart their house. Right. They also noticed that carved on a large tree at the entrance of the site was the word croatoan. bark had been peeled from the tree to make it easier to carve, and notably there is no cross underneath the word signaling that the colonist did not leave by force. Interesting. White later wrote that he believed the colonists left for the Croatoan, people looking for protection and assistance from their native allies. He wrote that in his journals not long after this. The next morning, White and his 19 men planned to sail to the Croatoan Island the next day because naturally, he wanted to go and make sure. Yeah. Croton was about 50 miles south down the coast from Roanoke. Unfortunately, this work, unfortunately for white. As soon as they set sail, a storm hit. Of course. Though wind and bad weather push White and his band about 23 miles out to sea. All those rough waters. almost all of their anchors so they couldn't safely anchor anymore. And the mood instantly turned sour. Amongst the 19 men, remember. They kept arguing about whether to do this at all. So then when this happened, they're just they're not having it. They refused to return to Croton, and they all sailed back to the giant ship waiting for them in. White was taken with them, forced to return to England. So poor dude, he tried. He really did try. I mean, that's just got to be, you know, as a father of like two daughters married and stuff like that, that's going to be awful to just lose all of that. And you have no idea what happened and you never will have an idea of what happened. That's that's got to take a toll on on your mental state. Yeah, it's, um. It's rough. The ship that he went home on. Fun fact it wrecked in Ireland Course. on the return trip. Which John White was on. So he got to experience one last shipwreck before he went home and Ireland. After he was home and safe just before he died, John wrote to the Queens historian saying, I greatly joyed that I found a certain token of their safe being at Croatoan, which is the place where I meant where Manteo was born, and the savages of the island are our friends. So up until the day he died, John White believed that the colonists went in, assimilated with the Croatoan natives there, and he took solace in that. John Wight died in 1593 without seeing his daughter or his granddaughter ever again. She's that. That sucks. I know it's a myth. Then later on, the English did eventually colonize a little bit further north, and it worked out great. If we're in Jamestown, that is a successful story, So we won't talk about that here. But this is the first attempt that just didn't. It was not it didn't work. As far as Roanoke is concerned, there have been numerous series to explain what happened to the colonists in Roanoke. A popular bit of propaganda that entered its way into myth territory was that the colonists were attacked by Native Americans. I take this as propaganda because this this came out of, I think, Jamestown. And that was a group of colonists who were racist and negative towards the American people at the time period. being something that was spread to sway the opinion of people. This has been debunked, debunked and proven false over and over again. There is no such evidence at all anywhere to prove that the colonists were attacked by Native Americans. Yeah, I feel like there would have been like, White would have seen some something. Yeah. And he would have noted it. Yeah, I no, they definitely they've definitely packed up and relocated. It's just where and for what reasons. Yeah, well, I think the reasons are kind of clear, and I think they tried to say where they carved it into a. Yeah, that's true. Yeah. Yeah, they did. They didn't leave a note. So. But. Well, I do know, like, um, they did, uh, tree ring studies. And they noticed that when they when you look at a tree ring, the closer they are together, that that means that there's less growth. And usually it's because of, uh, of a drought. And they noticed that right around this time, the whole Roanoke thing, they noticed that the tree rings were a lot closer together and they and one theory is that, yeah, there was probably a massive drought and they were starving and they had no choice but to partner up with a group of people that knew how to survive. Those those types of settings. Now, today, historians have some pretty solid theories as to what happened. They vary from a simulation with the crotone people to finding a boat and getting lost at sea, which is also one that can be valid because. Yeah. When you go and say go out into the ocean with a wooden boat, usually you don't have any remnants of it after a while. Especially if that boat isn't very big and they're trying to use that boat to get to the girl which owns. Yeah, that's also a theory. I could see it capsizing, especially if they've got like, a bunch of log cabins. A bunch of rough water. Pieces. Yeah. Yeah. They hit some rough water. And then that was it. They're gone. There are also some really wild theories involving like aliens and time machines and really stupid ones that I don't care for. So History Channel stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because that that's what the History Channel does now is. So used to Ancient be. aliens. Well, their website's not bad, but I mean. Yeah. Anyway. It really depends. Like during the daytime, like if you watch

it around like 11: 1:20:00

00, it's not so bad. But yeah, lately I've seen it and it's just like everything is just like ancient aliens or really weird conspiracy theories. I'm like, Can we just get back to, like.

Kara: 1:20:13

Regular Dreamlike like war factual. documentaries and. Yeah, I don't. Right now. That's another episode. Altogether. But currently, right now as we speak, there's a project going on amongst scientists, archaeologists, historians. They're working on finding DNA sets amongst the population in North Carolina to see if they can prove through DNA use resource research that the colonists assimilated with the Croatoan people. I thought that was really interesting. We haven't had any theory like set in stone. This is fact and this has been decided. But I think historians or people who really, really study this have their opinion pretty set on what they believe it was. One thing that I'll say for certain is that the founding of the first English colony in America was an absolute dumpster fire. Yeah, and it wasn't the last one either. There is, though, those early attempts. They were. They were brutal. And it's like, John Smith, he he wrote like. Everything. This land has everything that you possibly could want, but you have to work for it. And this land will try to kill you. He also wrote in the third person what makes them look like a total? Yes. Yes. He was. It's infuriating to read his writing. Yes. Yeah, he's definitely a little, uh, a little out there. And I would say shady in a lot of respects, but he he was the one that that wrote back to England and said, That guy's everything you could possibly want is in this land. But just be prepared. It's not easy to take. And I feel like those first colonies that were set up just did not. They were not prepared. Yeah, they were. They were not prepared for what? For what America had to offer, so to speak, in terms of like, you know, the weather and the natives and disease and and all that kind of stuff. was a good time. yeah, that's it. That's what I got. Okay. My. So, yeah. How to lose a colony one on one. You go. That's it. And I could guarantee you when White got to where he knew the colony was, I guarantee you he turned around and looked at those those other guys. And he's like, guys, I left it right here. I'm telling you, it's. It's right here. Like it, you know? It's almost like Jeeps, I think, would have fixed a lot of things. Yeah, maps are pretty good too, but there Man. Like, could you imagine if he's like somebody like, say, his daughter had like an iPhone or something like that and like he could look on the map and see, Oh, she's traveling this way with this group of people. Cool. And then, like, there would be there would be no episode. are even. It would. Give her a call. Yeah. Yeah. Send her a text message when you're about 200 miles out from the coast line. Hey. Hey, I'm on my way. I'll be there soon. 200 miles out. I'll be there in, like, four weeks. Yeah. Oh, boy. Yeah. No, that's, that's, that's a good one. I know the Roanoke one has always been. It's always fun. Interesting. And I think really the heart of it is like, okay, what is the simplest solution or what is the simplest reason why are they left? And and I think it really this should be like logically, they were probably running out of resources given the history of this colony prior. They're running out of resources and like, who knows what other tribes are around there that were hostile towards them? It would make sense like, okay, let's pack up, let's go with the protons. We have a partnership with them and move on. Yeah. To me, that's that, that is the thing that makes the most logical sense and the one that I subscribe to. But, you know, I'm just. I'm just me. But that's so. I'm totally down for aliens. I think that'd be so funny if that's. You know, I can't rule it out, I guess, mathematically speaking. Who was it? Was it Winthrop? He wrote, like, basically, I have to look it up. But he wrote the first account of, like, a UFO sighting in America. he was walking by a lake. He saw a giant bright light in the middle of the lake. And then he wrote as though this bright light. Then they shot off to the sky and disappeared. Sick. And it's considered to be like the first, you know, air quote, like alien sighting. Well, that's fun. In America. But it could also been a dream and a lot of things, too. It's like we given how religious these people were lying was a pretty serious sin. When you are dealing with like an Old Testament God, like an angry God, where God is looking for reasons to kill you, kind of like in the Puritan society. Lying was not necessarily something that they did all that often. John Smith Perhaps he did a lot of shady stuff, but like I feel as though when you're reading these primary sources. I kind of believe them. Like, I don't think they're hiding much. I don't think that they're trying to deceive the reader at all. degree of genuineness in these sources. I think when you're reading primary sources, the thing to keep in mind is the time period and who's writing it and the circumstances, right? So you always want to have some sort of you want to hold yourself back a little bit and understand like, okay, this person that I'm reading about, I don't know, like maybe. They're looking at things through this specific lens. So and they don't know about this or they don't know about that current thing that's happening over there. So we want to make sure that you take all of those facts into consideration while you're reading a primary source. Yes, because, I mean, well, it goes back to the argument, like I knew people who who fought in World War Two and they were in a battle. They were part of a platoon and some part of a larger campaign. Like, they could tell you everything that happened that day. But to be truthful, they had no idea what the status of the war was. Yeah. They just don't know, like they don't have visibility into it, whereas somebody like Eisenhower would have a better understanding of war as a whole, but not necessarily what's going on in the trenches. Right. So ultimately, that's the job of the historian is to gather all of these different primary resources, look for patterns, look for things that are the same, look for the things that are different. Think about the circumstances involved, and then put all of that together to make it make sense. To paint an accurate picture of what's what actually happened and why. Which So speaking of, uh, speaking of pictures, don't forget to check out our Web site. Yeah, it's updated. Kara Yeah. Kara. Kara updated it. We are up to the very recent now. Be sure to check out the days of Safaricom because there you'll find our detailed notes, our research methodologies if you're into that sort of thing. But yeah, there will be, like, pictures. We put maps up there, especially when we're talking about, uh, anything involving a lot of human movement, uh, stuff like that. So we'll, we have maps up there, we've got you're still putting up, I'm assuming, your artwork. Yeah, I got to get that up, but I will put it up. Yep. Yeah. So be sure to check out Kerry's artwork. I do have a, uh, an original, uh, Keira picture of a tiny, little angry Napoleon staring off at, like, burning Moscow. I'll put that one up as a good one. Yeah, that one or the one where he's standing in, like, this frozen woods. Like, just everything is kind of, like, desolate. So be sure to check out her stuff. Uh, she's also on Instagram. Yes. Uh, what's the handle for that? It's. K m Smalls. Like you're killing me. Smalls. Cam Smalls. Dot draws. So yeah, be sure to check her out on there are de some sapphires. Also on Instagram, we will be updating that as well once I figure out how to log on to it and yeah, don't be afraid to send us an email of the day's items via gmail.com. Uh, we are always looking for more ideas. also totally open to like, suggestions, recommendations, ways to improve the show. I saw one recommendations. Yeah, I like the show. Just get rid of that guy that's on there all the time. Okay, So will this be the Kara show? I suppose. I'll make it work. I'll make it work. I guess that annoying. But, um. But yeah, I know. Like, feel free to reach out to us. You can also, if you go to our website, uh, we have a link as well as in the show notes. We have a link to this ability where you can send us a text message, which is kind of cool. be a it's a great way to if you just want to get a hold of us, like directly and you don't want to type up like a giant email or anything. But yeah, feel free to send us a message. Hit us up on social media, hit us up on the website, Email us however you want to get a hold of us. Um, so don't be afraid to, uh, to share. Ah, a little show. Uh, I've gotten a couple of subscribers just because it's like, it's, it's a great conversation starter, right? To be able to be talking about, like, their cars and I'll throw in like, Hey, I have a podcast, and then all of a sudden they're asking me questions about it and like, Oh, where can we find out? How can we, how do we get it? And yeah, just tell them like, pull out your phone and then go to where be your podcast like Spotify or uh, Apple has their own podcasting thing now. They actually have a website. I think it's like podcast Apple dot com where you can actually stream podcasts, uh, via that route. Ah, we're on YouTube, we're on Podcast Addict and we are pretty much everywhere. Uh, so yeah, don't be afraid to like, grab people's phones and sign them up. Um, you said before, it's a great conversation starter, but yeah, that's pretty much all I got. Uh, did you need to add anything on Kara? Did I miss anything? Okay. I know I've got an episode that we're going to try to record here. I've been working on probably one of the worst deep sea diving like saturation diving disasters in recorded history. Cool. That one is going to be a little graphic. But, hey, to talk about it because I think it's the fastest dumpster fire that we've ever had where start to finish a took like 0.1 1 seconds. Nice. While mine. And there's a dude who gets extruded through like a five inch hole. So. Yeah. But. But, yeah, no. Great episode. Uh, Kara, that was thoroughly enjoyable. I actually. I learned a lot from it, so. Yeah. In the meantime, I will catch you on the next episode and keep it a hot mess. By.