Love and Hate in Jamestown: John Smith, Pocahontas, and the Start of a New Nation - Paperback

by David A. Price (Author)

A New York Times Notable Book and aSan Jose Mercury News Top 20 Nonfiction Book of 2003In 1606, approximately 105 British colonists sailed to America, seeking gold and a trade route to the Pacific. Instead, they found disease, hunger, and hostile natives. Ill prepared for such hardship, the men responded with incompetence and infighting; only the leadership of Captain John Smith averted doom for the first permanent English settlement in the New World.The Jamestown colony is one of the great survival stories of American history, and this book brings it fully to life for the first time. Drawing on extensive original documents, David A. Price paints intimate portraits of the major figures from the formidable monarch Chief Powhatan, to the resourceful but unpopular leader John Smith, to the spirited Pocahontas, who twice saved Smith's life. He also gives a rare balanced view of relations between the settlers and the natives and debunks popular myths about the colony. This is a superb work of history, reminding us of the horrors and heroism that marked the dawning of our nation.

Front Jacket

A gripping narrative of one of the great survival stories of American history: the opening of the first permanent English settlement in the New World. Drawing on period letters and chronicles, and on the papers of the Virginia Company-which financed the settlement of Jamestown-David Price tells a tale of cowardice and courage, stupidity and brilliance, tragedy and costly triumph. He takes us into the day-to-day existence of the English men and women whose charge was to find gold and a route to the Orient, and who found, instead, hardship and wretched misery. Death, in fact, became the settlers' most faithful companion, and their infighting was ceaseless.
Price offers a rare balanced view of the relationship between the settlers and the natives. He unravels the crucial role of Pocahontas, a young woman whose reality has been obscured by centuries of legend and misinformation (and, more recently, animation). He paints indelible portraits of Chief Powhatan, the aged monarch who came close to ending the colony's existence, and Captain John Smith, the former mercenary and slave, whose disdain for class distinctions infuriated many around him-even as his resourcefulness made him essential to the colony's success.
"Love and Hate in Jamestown is a superb work of popular history, reminding us of the horrors and heroism that marked the dawning of our nation.

Author Biography

David A. Price has written for The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, USA Today, Forbes, and Business 2.0. He was formerly a reporter in the Washington, D.C., bureau of Investor's Business Daily. He holds degrees from Harvard Law School, Cambridge University, and the College of William and Mary. He was raised in Richmond, Virginia, and now lives with his wife and their two sons in Washington, D.C.