In 1587, John White, the governor of the struggling colony of Roanoke Island, sailed to England in order to get badly needed supplies and reinforcements.
The Spanish fleet that sailed to northern Europe with the intention of invading England delayed his return in 1588, requiring the English government to use all available ships to combat the threat. The colony was abandoned when White got back to the island in 1590. White was forced to return to England after a storm prevented him from reaching Hatteras Island, which he thought was where they had gone. The fate of the colonists has remained a mystery since he was unable to raise the money for another rescue mission.
Do historians have any idea what happened to the vanished colonists?
Did any 'witches' burn at Salem?
There were more searches for survivors when the English settlement of Jamestown was founded in 1607. According to modern day historians, some English records claim that the chief Powhatan, who led many of the Native Americans who lived in what is now eastern Virginia, confessed that he had killed many of the colonists.
White's daughter and son-in-law, as well as his granddaughter, Virginia Dare, were among the 115 colonists who vanished after landing at Roanoke. The fate of the colonists is the biggest unsolved mystery in American history, according to William Kelso, the former director of archaeology and research at the Jamestown Rediscovery Foundation.
We don't know where they went or where they started. Charles Ewen, director of the Phelps Archaeology Laboratory at East Carolina University, told Live Science in an email that the main settlement has not been found. The idea that the colony was located at Fort Raleigh has been called into question because some of the artifacts found at the site are not related to the colony. According to the National Park Service, the remains of the colony may be underwater because of the extensive erosion over the past 400 years.
Looking for clues.
There are many theories as to what happened to the colonists, including being attacked by Native Americans or the Spanish, who were at war with England at the time. The colonists died of disease or starvation, according to one idea. The colonists might have joined a Native American group that they had children with. Some of the survivors tried to return to England by boat, but failed.
Dennis Blanton, an associate professor of anthropology at James Madison University, said in an email that attempts to solve the mystery are likely to hinge on multiple lines of archaeological evidence. Scientists are trying to find evidence of intermarriage between the Native Americans who lived in the area and the lost colonists.
Archaeological research over the past two decades has provided some clues about the fate of the colonists. A University of Bristol archaeology team is working with a local archaeology society to uncover artifacts that may be from the Roanoke colonists. The Nuremberg counter and German pottery are similar to ones found at Roanoke Island. According to a statement released by the archaeologists in 2015, these finds suggest that some of the colonists may have married into the Native American population on the island.
Archaeologists with the First Colony Foundation have been excavating two sites called "site x" and "site y" on the mainland in North Carolina, where 16th-century European ceramics were found, which could be from the lost colonists. The British Museum in London has a map from the 16th century that shows two fort symbols near where the two sites are located, suggesting that the Roanoke colonists may have been aware of these locations and hoped to build forts there in the future. The First Colony Foundation said in a 2012 statement that the fort symbols are not visible to the naked eye.
Researchers think that the native people living in the village may have been protecting survivors from the colony. James Horn, president and chief officer of the Jamestown Rediscovery Foundation, told Live Science in an email that he believed the settlers were protected by the powerful Chowanoacs.
Blanton speculated that the survivors may have splintered into different groups after the collapse of the colony. Blanton told Live Science that it is not uncommon for struggling colonial groups to have competing groups emerge.
Live Science published the original article.
