True History - Veritas Card # 7 (Red Card) - Jamestown is Founded in Virginia

Jamestown is Founded in Virginia - 1607


   "If anyone would not work, neither would he eat." are the words of John Smith, who helped the people of this colony to understand the value of hard work and the reward of being able to eat. The people that settled in Jamestown did not come to this country because they wanted religious freedom, but rather, they were seeking after gold. They were not used to doing the hard work that needs to be done for people to survive.
   It all started when 120 men from London boarded three different ships and took a four month journey across the ocean. Unlike the Pilgrims, who came over a little later, these men were adventurers. They were not used to gardening and farming and they spent a lot of time quarreling.
   The colony really struggled the first year, and only forty men survived. John Smith was the third leader of these men and he insisted that they work if they wanted to eat. This agrees with what the Bible says. People need to be responsible for themselves and not try to take the easy way out. Life is hard and requires a lot of work.
   So, from 1609 - 1610, became known as the 'starving time'. For the following seventeen years, five thousand- five hundred more people would come to this colony, but only a little over a thousand survived.
  Jamestown was the first colony in this country that was permanent. The colony was named after James I of England. John Rolfe learned how to cultivate tobacco from the Indians, and he was able to grow tobacco in such a way that it flourished and became Jamestown's much needed 'pay crop'.
  For more information on John Rolfe and Pocahontas, go to the blog page here: John Rolfe and Pocahontas