History announcement....
Jere Dennison
Well, perhaps the title is a bit hyperbolic, but read on. I had earlier thought that I would not get caught up in the Jamestown 400th Anniversary mania with my mostly grade school knowledge of Virginias founding. Surely, much of what we had learned was fantasy and legend with few reliable sources. Was John Smith really in danger of decapitation before the timely intervention of a beautiful Indian princess? Makes for a good story and maybe even the basis for Disney movie, but in reality no way! But being advised to peruse a copy of a recently published and meticulously documented book titled Love & Hate in Jamestown by David Price, I am persuaded that Capn Smith was singularly responsible for the preservation of the Jamestown colony and, without him, we might be Spanish-speaking citizens of an empire ruled from Madrid.
John Smith, adventurer and soldier, was chosen by the Virginia Company to be the only commoner on its ruling Jamestown council and, over time, was elevated to its president as its nobility either failed, departed, or died. Thankfully so, because his leadership style, which falls somewhere between Indiana Jones and George Patton, was directly responsible for saving the colony from an early demise.
Narrowly escaping execution several times at the hands of Chief Powhatan and well as his own colonists, Smiths diplomacy with the Indians insured their survival with food obtained through a fair system of bartering, augmented by the strict discipline he imposed on the English settlers. And his platonic friendship cultivated with the teen-aged Pocahontas ultimately led to her conversion to Christianity and later marriage to the colonist John Rolfe, thereby ushering in a peaceful coexistence with the natives that persisted until after Powhatans death when the Indian Massacre of 1622 occurred, led by his brother, Opechancanough. But, by then, the colony was too well established and dispersed to fail.
True, but where does FBYC fit in here. Be patient
I am getting there. The overachieving Smith found the time during this period of hair-raising exploits and political dissension, disease, and mortality within his own ranks to personally lead 12 to 14 of his men on four voyages of discovery in an open shallop or barge covering over 3,000 miles around the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries between 1607 and 1609. Primarily he was searching for the mythical passage to the Pacific but, more importantly, was making contact with about a hundred native tribes, both inside and outside the Powhatan Confederation, to establish trading relationships. The result was his publication in 1612 of the first detailed map of the Chesapeake, remarkably accurate considering the crude navigational tools of the day.
Based on his travels, Congress is establishing The Captain John Smith Chesapeake National Historic Water Trail around the Chesapeake. On the National Geographic website, you can find two interactive maps of the Chesapeake trail then and now, illustrating the routes of his voyages. Look closely at the trail as it winds around Stingray Point (where we all know Smith was speared by a stingray) and follows the contours of Stove Point, Fishing Bay, and up the Piankatank River to its headwaters in Dragon Run. Could he have stepped ashore at the site of the present day FBYC? Possibly, but we will never know for certain unless Dixon unearths some historic relic during one of his excavations of the club grounds.
But we do know for certain that FBYC will participate in a Rendezvous of the John Smith Shallops 400th Anniversary Celebration over the weekend of August 25-26, 2007. The celebration to be hosted on club grounds by FBYC and the Deltaville Community Association is being sponsored by the Deltaville Maritime Museum, the Reedville Fishermens Museum, and the Captain John Smith Four Hundred Project of Chestertown, Md., all in conjunction with the National Geographic Magazine. During these two days, the John Smith shallop from Chestertown, while retracing Smiths first voyage around the Bay, will rendezvous with shallop replicas from Deltaville and Reedville. There will be interactive displays and a reception for visitors and participants. More details about this important event were featured within pages of the February Log and are accessible on our website and within the 2007 Sailing Events Book. This should be an unforgettable educational experience. Lets all dress ship and be there.
And speaking of voyages, ponder the following wisdom from Tristan Jones book, The Improbable Voyage (coincidentally available in the Austin Library in the main clubhouse):
For the average small-craft voyager three things are certain: if he waits until his boat is one hundred percent ready, or if he waits until he has enough money for the whole voyage, or if he listens to most sensible people, hell never get away from the dock.