Source: Philip L. Barbour, ed., The Complete Works of John Smith (1580-1631) in Three Volumes. Published for The Institute of Early American History and Culture, Williamsburg, Virginia by the University of North Carolina Press (1986), Vol. 1, pp. 298-303.
| Capts. Bartholomew Gosnold and Bartholomew Gilbert (cousins by marriage, and unrelated to Sir Humphrey) set out to establish a small colony, explored part of the coast of Maine and Massachusetts, named Cape Cod, and built a small redoubt on Cuttyhunk Island near Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts. Lack of provisions forced them to return to England on June 18/28, after a short stay. |
| Capt. Martin Pring, on a trading voyage backed by Richard Hakluyt and others, explored Cape Cod Bay and settled briefly near the mouth of the Pamet River on Cape Cod. There were also French explorations around Nova Scotia in this year. |
| Samuel de Champlain, in the pay of Pierre Du Gua de Monts, explored Nova Scotia and established a post on modern St. Croix Island, near the mouth of the St. Croix River, New Brunswick. From there he surveyed the coast as far as Pemaquid Point, Maine. |
| May | Sir Thomas Arundell's expedition under Capt. George Waymouth arrived at Monhegan Island to explore the coast and to look for a site for a Catholic colony. |
| July 18/28 | Arundell's expeditions returned to England, with five Abenaki Indians, three of whom Waymouth soon gave to Sir Ferdinando Gorges, then captain of Plymouth Fort. |
| Aug. | De Monts founded the first permanent settlement in Canada at Port Royal, near Annapolis, Nova Scotia. |
| Apr. 10/20 | Letters patent (the first charter) issued to two groups to "deduce" colonies in North America: the first, sponsored by London, for what is today Virginia; the second, by the West Country (Bristol, Exeter, Plymouth, etc.), for New England. Sir John Popham, lord chief justice of the king's bench, and Gorges were the paramount backers of the latter. |
| Aug. 12/22 | The first of two ships sent by Popham and Gorges to establish a colony in "North Virginia" sailed, with two of Waymouth's five Indians on board, but was captured by Spaniards in the Straits of Florida and eventually sank in the Guadalquivir River in Spain. The second, which sailed shortly after the first, reached New England safely, with Popham's son-in-law Thomas Hanham as captain, and Martin Pring as pilot. One more Indian was on this ship. |
| Dec. 15/25? | When the first ship failed to arrive, Hanham left the Indian behind to help the next body of settlers and set sail for England. |
| May 13/23 | Jamestown founded in Virginia. |
| May 31/June 10 | Two vessels were sent by Popham and Gorges to settle on the Maine coast. This time the leaders were Raleigh Gilbert, son of Sir Humphrey, and George Popham, a kinsman of the lord chief justice; the fourth of the Indians was with them. |
| June 10/20 | Sir John Popham died. His son Sir Francis took over the management of the colonial enterprise. |
| Aug. 20/30 | Capt. George Popham began the building of St. George's Fort at Sagadahoc. The next day the carpenters began work on the pinnace that was later named Virginia. |
| June 23/July 3 | Champlain founded Quebec, on his third voyage to "New France" (Canada). |
| spring-winter | The Sagadahoc colony had suffered from bitter cold weather, George Popham had died, and Gilbert had to return to England. Thus it was decided to abandon the settlement, although it is not known just when. Certainly the colonists were back in England before George Popham's will was probated on Dec. 2/12. |
| May 23/June 2 | By this date, when the Virginia Company was reorganized under a second charter to provide broader financial backing, the Sagadahoc experiment had lapsed into inactivity. |
| c. Oct. 4/14 | Smith left Jamestown forever. |
| May 11/21 | Champlain returned to Quebec for a stay of three months. |
| Nov. | Champlain was appointed lieutenant to the first viceroy of Canada, the prince de Condé. |
| Mar. 19/29 | Champlain arrived at Tadoussac, and from there went W and up the Ottawa River to the Huron country, thereby opening the French route W. He soon returned to France, however, and did not continue his Canadian explorations until the spring of 1615, after Smith had come and gone from New England. |
| May 6/16 | René Le Coq de la Saussaye landed in Nova Scotia on behalf of a wealthy French noblewoman, Madame Antoinette de Pons, marquise de Guercheville, wife of Charles du Plessis, duc de Liancourt and governor of Paris. La Saussaye was to establish a new French colony in "Acadia." Having done this, in name, in Nova Scotia, he promptly sailed to Mount Desert Island, Maine, where he went to work on an agricultural project. |
| June 22/July 2 | Samuel Argall, who was fishing in the neighborhood of Mount Desert Island, having heard of the Frenchmen from local Indians, arrived to investigate. While the Frenchmen were ashore, Argall seized their ship. La Saussaye fled into the forest and Argall in the meantime pilfered all his papers. When the two finally confronted one another, La Saussaye was forced to sail off with half of his men, while the other half were taken aboard Argall's ship to go to Jamestown for questioning. The upshot was that the acting governor of Virginia, Sir Thomas Dale, commanded Argall to return to Nova Scotia or Maine and wipe out the French colony (or colonies). This Argall did, quickly and efficiently, having caught the French commander in Port Royal completely unawares. |
| Oct. 30/Nov. 9 | Argall sailed back to Jamestown, having purged America S of 45° N latitude of all French intruders. |
| Mar. 3/13 | Smith sailed for New England. |
| June | Gorges sent Capt. Nicholas Hobson on a bootless voyage to New England. |
| late Aug. | Smith returned to England, having made at least a small profit, through furs and fishing. |
| Mar. | Smith started for New England again, but had to turn back for repairs; his second ship went on and came home "well fraught" in Aug. |
| May 15/25 | Champlain landed at Tadoussac once more, only to set out for the Indian village at modern Lachine Rapids. |
| June 24/July 4 | Smith sailed from Plymouth heading to New England again, but ran afoul of pirates and a French privateer. |
| July-Oct. | Champlain undertook his great voyage up the Ottawa River and by portages reached Lake Huron |
| June 18/28 | Printing of the Description of N.E. finished. |
| July-Dec. | Gorges sent Richard Vines to New England for trade and discovery; he wintered at or near Smith's Sowocatuck ("Ipswich," now Biddeford, Maine), living with the Indians. It is probable that such contacts with Europeans fresh from abroad produced the epidemic that decimated the Indian population in 1617. |
| Aug. 31-Sept. 10 | Champlain returned to France, to learn that the viceroy of Canada, the prince de Condé, had been arrested. |
| Dec. | A letter from the Spanish ambassador to London stated that Smith had offered to accompany a whaling expedition "in the region of the North" and had given him a book, probably the Description of N.E. |
| Jan. | Smith was promised a large fleet for New England, which turned out to be three ships. |
| Mar. | Smith's ships were pinned in Plymouth harbor by a southwester that blew for three months. (That same spring Sir Walter Ralegh entered Plymouth harbor early in Apr. and could not get away until June 12.) Smith abandoned his plans and returned to London. |
| Nov.-Dec. | The Pilgrims, in the Netherlands, began to interest themselves seriously in migrating to America and conferred with Sir Edwin Sandys of the Council for Virginia. |
| Jan. 4/14 | Sir Francis Bacon was named lord chancellor. |
| Apr. | Powhatan died in Virginia. |
| May 14/24 | Champlain sailed back to Canada with plans for colonization on a large scale. |
| July 12/22 | Bacon was raised to the peerage as Baron Verulam. Not long thereafter, both Smith and William Strachey addressed manuscripts to him: Smith with his first draft of what was to be New Englands Trials; Strachey with the third copy of his Historie. Both men hoped to get some sort of reward, and both failed. |
| Aug. 18/28 | By this date Champlain was again in France, where he soon ran into political and legal trouble. Obliged to remain there until May 1620, he could then sail only as the administrator of an established colony. It was the end of his career as an explorer. |
| Oct. 29/Nov. 8 | Sir Walter Ralegh, perhaps England's greatest colonial promoter, was beheaded. |
| Apr. 28/May 8 | Sir Edwin Sandys was made treasurer of the Virginia Company, replacing Sir Thomas Smythe. |
| May | Argall returned to England, after two years as acting governor of Virginia. |
| June 9/19 | A patent for the Pilgrims to settle in Virginia was granted by the Virginia Company. |
| Aug. | First Africans brought to Virginia. About this time Capt. Thomas Dermer was exploring the NE coast of America for Gorges. He wintered in Virginia. |
| Mar. 3/13 | Gorges and his associates applied to the Privy Council for renewal of the rights of the "northern colony." |
| July 21/31 | A reorganization of the "northern colony" was approved. |
| July 22/Aug. 1 | The Pilgrims sailed from the Netherlands. |
| Nov. 3/13 | A charter for the "Council for New England" was signed in England, giving Gorges and his associates jurisdiction over all of America between 40° and 48° N latitude. |
| Nov. 9/19 | The Pilgrims accidentally ended up on Cape Cod. |
| Nov. 11/21 | The Mayflower Compact was signed. |
| Dec. 11/21 | Smith's New Englands Trials was entered for publication. |
1. Norman Egbert McClure, ed., The Letters of John Chamberlain (Philadelphia, 1939), I, 367.
2. See Smith's appeal for some sort of "reward" for
his services in Virginia as late as May 2,
1621, in Susan Myra Kingsbury, ed., The Records of the Virginia Company of
London (Washington,
D.C., 1906-1935), I, 474.
3. Three of these Indians were given to Gorges by Capt. George
Waymouth, who was returning
to Dartmouth in July 1605 from an expedition to Monhegan Island. (Though Plymouth
is
only 30-odd mi. from Dartmouth, the reason for the gift is not known.) "This
accident," Gorges
later wrote, "must be acknowledged the means under God of putting on foot
and giving life to all
our plantations" (Sir Ferdinando Gorges, A Briefe Narration of the Originall
Undertakings of the
Advancement of Plantations into the Parts of America ... [London, 1658] [Massachusetts
Historical
Society, Collections, 3d Ser., VI (Boston, 1837)], 51). See also David B. Quinn
and Alison M. Quinn,
eds., The English New England Voyages, 1602-1608 (Hakluyt Society, 2d Ser.,
CLXI (London, 1983).
4. Richard Arthur Preston, Gorges of Plymouth Fort: A Life of
Sir Ferdinando Gorges, Captain of
Plymouth Fort, Governor of New England, and Lord of the Province of Maine (Toronto,
1953), 159.
5. For these and other versifiers, see the Biographical Directory.
6. Thomas Fuller, The History of the Worthies of England, new
ed. (London, 1840 [orig. publ.
1744]), I, 276.
7. See the two "relations" mentioned on p. 4, below.
8. E.g., see p. 12n, below, and the highly probable debt to Tobias
Gentleman's study of the
fishing industry mentioned on p. 20n, below.
9. See p. 52, below.
10. See the True Travels, 23, for borrowings from Italian; Smith's
preference for Spanish forms
rather than French (e.g., "ambuscado," ibid., 12) seems significant.
* In this chronology both Old Style and New Style dates are given,
since the English were using
the Julian (O.S.) calendar and the French the Gregorian (N.S.).