America. In - Chesapeake Bay Company - Virginiajamestownechesapeakebaycompany.com/PDF/Pocahontas...•Virginia and sharing Virginia's fortunes from the founding of Jamestown to this

Traditional evidence has painted a prettypicture of a little Princess of Virginia'sprimeval forests playing on the Streets ofJamestown with the children of the settlers,teaching them the calls of the Wild things, theuse of the bow, and turning handspringssimply for the joy of living. Perhaps historianshave done the reputation of Pocahontas aviolence by attributing to her heroics of whichthe artless Indian maid could hardly havebeen guilty and which really added little ornothing to her stature as a courageous andremarkable woman. The purpose of thispaper, however, is not to dwell on Pocahontasbut rather to call attention to three otherlittle girls of her same age who, in the Fortand on the Island, must have sometimes beenher companions. It is interesting that allfour little girls have had descendants living in•Virginia and sharing Virginia's fortunes fromthe founding of Jamestown to this date. It isinteresting that the three little white girlslie buried in Pocahontas' native land andPocahontas lies at. Graves End in an Englishchurchyard.

Ann Burrus. age 13, arrived in Jamestownin 1608 aboard the Mary and Margaret asmaid to Mrs. Forrest, wife of Thomas Forrest,Gentleman. The little ship carried a distinguished company including two members of theCouncil, Francis West, the brother of LordDe La Warr, fourteen tradesmen, twelvelaborers, and some Dutchmen. Neither thenames of Mrs. Forrest nor that of her husbandappear again in the available records. but thechild, Ann Burros, married John Laydon, acarpenter who had come over on the SusanConstant in the spring of 1607. This was the

first marriage of English in America. In duecourse it was blessed with the arrival of alit tle girl whom they named Virginia.

What an American story there must be inthat of the Laydons! The record of theirparticular deeds and adventures is lost. Theylived through all the tribulations of the earlyyears—epidemics, starvation, and massacres.They conquered the wilderness about them,and they prospered. 'their four daughters,Virginia, Katherine, Alice, and Margaret, arelisted in the census of 1625, and in 1636 Johnand Ann, as a ncient planters, were granted" ...... an additional 1250 acres inWarrick River County'''. it is probable thatJohn survived all the original company whocame to Jamestown in 1607.

Whatever privileges the Laydons enjoyedas ancient adventurers they most certainlyearned. The chroniclers of their times didnot record the modest. part John took inbuilding and defending the Fort and theChurch in which the Rev. Robert. Huntmarried him and Ann and which he must haveloved. Doubtless, as a laborer, he had novoice in the decision to abandon the ColonyWhen only John Martin is recorded as voting"Nay". But he and Ann turned again up thegreat River with Lord De La Warr and neverin their lives left. Virginia. Thu historians ofthat era did not. record Ann's services to thesick and dying during the starving time northe heroism of a teenage girl in the raw andtragic wilderness, but they did recite punishment meted out to her for a breach of discipline,probably in 1611 or 1612.

Ann Laydon, Jane Wright, and other womenwere assigned the task of making shirts for

the colonists. If they exceeded their allotment of material they lost their allowance offood. Other deficiencies incurred variouspunishments. The record reads: "Becausetheir thread was naught and would not. serve,they took out a ravel in the lower part of theshirt to make an end of the work so the shirtsof those that had raveled out part provedshorter than the rest, for which fact AnnLaydon and Jane Wright were whipped andAnn being with child miscarried".

At the other end of the English social ladderthere was another young lady, another girl of13 years who had felt the strong appeal ofthe New World of opportunity. Her name wasTemperance Flowerdieu. Tradition has it thateven then she was susceptible to the charm ofa young soldier, possibly a cousin, whosename was George Yeardley. Their dreamstoo are not recorded but there remains abundant evidence of their courage. They leftEngland in the spring of 1609 in a convoy ofnine ships with 500 passengers, all under thecommand of Sir George Sommers. Temperance was on the Falcon, the Vice Admiral ofthe fleet, and George was on the Sea Venture,the Admiral. "A most terrible hurricanestruck the fleet and scattered it." The SeaVenture was wrecked on Bermuda, two of theships were never heard of again, and JohnMartin, the ancient adventurer who had alsosailed around the world with Drake, broughtthe Falcon, the Blessing, the Lion, and theUnity to Jamestown. Yeardley, John Rolfeand his first wife, Newport, and other survivorsreached Jamestown almost a year later on theDeliverance and the Patience: little ships thathad been built from the wreckage of the SeaVenture and Bermuda. Cedars. Strachey, whowrote the letter to the "Noble Lady", whichwas the inspiration of Shakespeare's The

Tempest, was on the Deliverance. Could it bethat Ferdinand and Miranda were akin toTemperance and George Yeardley? Theywere the same age.

This was in 1610. Temperance was 1.4years old. Other women were in the Colony.John Smith had been sent home as GeorgePercy wrote "with other unruly youths, noneof whom were desired". John Rolfe's wifedied. Life was confronted by harsh realities.Men and women survived by their fortitudeand faith in their destiny. If anyone knew thePocahontas-Smith legend nothing was said orwritten about it, then or later. However,there is a record of an intriguing ballet whichthe Indian Princess and her maidens, as nakedas Diana, performed midst autumn leaves forthe entertainment of Newport., Smith, andother dignitaries while the Great Chief laybefore them the finest fowls the forests andrivers could yield.

There is no adequate record of those wholived and those who died and lie in the unmarked graves around the cross which waserected two years ago. How long Temperancestayed in Jamestown and how many tripsacross the great ocean were made by Georgeis not recorded. However, in 1618 they weremarried in London. George was knighted byKing James and returned on his honeymoonto Virginia as its Royal Governor with hisLady. Their flesh and blood and that of theirdescendants are forever a part of Virginia.

It was Sir George Yeardley who broughtthe great charter to Virginia and called thefirst free election in the New World for legislative representatives. He encouraged his andTemperance's relatives to come to Virginia.

Their names appear on the land and on thehonor rolls of the Colony. The Yeardleys sethigh standards of public service and community responsibility which at a later datebecame a characteristic of the landed gentryand the plantation aristocracy. Sir Georgedied in :1627 and lies buried in the Church atJamestown. He was survived by Temperance,two sons, Argall and Francis, and a daughterElizabeth. The communion service he left tothe Church at South Hampton is now atSaint John's Church, Hampton, Virginia. Hiswill provided for liberal legacies to the charitiesof the day and the remainder of his estate hedivided among his family.

In those days attractive women did not longremain unmarried; so, in some haste Temperance deeded all the property she had inheritedfrom Sir George to the i r children and marriedprobably the most prominent man in theColony, Francis West, erstwhile Governor andbrother of Lord De La Warr.

There were many women at. Jamestown inthose days who had fitted into England'sstratified social structure somewhere betweenAnn Burros and Temperance Flowerdieu.Nothing is known of Ann's antecedents. OfTemperence's much is known. She was of thegentry of Norfolk County. Her mother wasthe daughter and heiress of John Stanley.Her paternal grandparents were related toRobert Dudley. Earl of Leicester. Her familyconnections were prominent and their positionfirmly established.

The little Indian Princess must have hadother playmates on the streets of Jamestown.Sisley Jordan came over on the Swan. in 1610.She was then 9 years old and so far as is known

never left Virginia, She is listed on the musterof 1625 -26 as 24 years old, a widow living withher three children on her deceased husband'splantation known as Jordan's Journey, CharlesCity County. The plantation was overrun byIndians during the Massacre of 1622. Whatdeeds of heroism were performed by Sisley indefense of her little family are not known. Herhusband, who had also come to Virginia inI610, had been a member of the first House ofBurgesses and was a member of the committeeto review the first four books of the CroatCharter.

Sisley must have been fair to behold, inaddition to being an heiress, for two days afterSamuel Jordan died the Reverend GreevillePooley of the Established Church ardentlysought her hand in matrimony. Sisleysuccumbed to his entreaties but insisted thatthe ceremonies be delayed until after thearrival of her unborn Jordan baby. Thisconcession to propriety cost Pooley his bride.In the meantime. Willam Farrar who hadqualified as administrator of Samue l Jordan'sestate apparently felt that he. could the betterperform his fiduciary duties by moving intothe Jordan household, for the muster recordsreveal that Sisley Jordan and William Farrar"maintained a joint household". This romantic arrangement culminated in their marriage, but not. before the discarded lover, theRev. Pooley, had instituted breach of promiseproceedings in the General Court seekingspecific performance. The, contestwas referredto the Council of the Virginia Company inLondon who tactfully returned the snit toJamestown with the notation that they knew not how to decide so

nice a difference''.

In the first 10 years of the Colony therewere all told several hundred women at

Jamestown. There were the "maids" whowere shipped over to become the wives of theplanters, there were the three daughters ofSir Thos. Gates, Margaret, May, and Elizabeth,whose mother had died on the voyage over.There were the young, sometimes beautiful,wives of adventurous young men from everywalk of English life, and there were theindentured servants.

Ann Burrus, Temperance Flowerdieu andSisley Jordan can represent all the unsungheroines of that heroic age. They possessedthat courage, stamina, and faith in the newland characteristic of all their "sisters", thosewho were the silent partners of the masteradventurers in the New World who founded anew nation and whose blood is the strength ofthe backbone of America today. Ann, Tem-perance, and Sisley can represent them all.They were contemporaries of Pocahontas butunlike Pocahontas their bodies are forever apart of Virginia's soil.