Part 1: The Croatoan Chronicle

We've all heard of the Roanoke story, known to generations of American school children as the infamous "Lost Colony". An early English colonizing effort in the New World financed by Sir Walter Raleigh that went terribly wrong...somehow. For none of the 117 colonists left behind by their supply ship in 1587 were ever seen again to tell the tale. By the time the ship finally returned in 1590, the colony was found deserted. For over 400 years now, explorers and historians from Captain John Smith (of Jamestown fame) to myself (of yet no discernible fame), have sought a reason and means for what anthropologist and author Lee Miller calls a massive missing persons case (1). And the theories for the colonists' disappearance have ranged from attacks by hostile Native Americans, to the colonists' abandonment and migration to a different place, mass death of starvation (2), and even to assaults by Spanish raiders.

I recently visited the site of the Roanoke Island colony, now a National Park called Fort Raleigh (photos coming soon). And aptly named--for the small reconstructed earthwork fort built in the 1580s is the only visible evidence that a human settlement was ever there. Excavations taking place for the last 70 years or so have recovered only a few hundred European artifacts from the 1580s, and any evidence of buildings has yet to be found.

Archaeologist Scott Dawson believes the true answer to the mystery will be found 35 miles south of Roanoke Island, down the Outer Banks on Hatteras Island. He has written a book to lay out his theory (3). Founder of the Croatoan Archaeological Society (CAS) and collaborator with the Lost Colony Research Group (4), Dawson theorizes that the Roanoke colonists moved south to Hatteras Island, and coexisted with their friends, the Croatoans. Curiously, John White's 1584 watercolor map of the Carolina coast depicts most land colored in a light hue, while Hatteras Island is conspicuously red (5).


Indeed, the words "CROATOAN" and "CRO" were found carved into a tree and palisade post at Roanoke when the English supply ships returned in 1590. Governor John White had requested before he departed for England that if the colonists needed to move somewhere else in his absence, they should leave written record of their whereabouts. Croatoan happened to be the home village of their loyal friend and benefactor Manteo, the son of the queen of Croatoan. Since 1983, Dawson has been excavating a "workshop" site in what he believes to be the capital town of Croatoan on Hatteras Island, where some English artifacts dating from ca.1580-1700 have been found in levels contemporaneous with Native American cultural materials. Dawson believes this could represent English colonists' cohabitation with the Croatoans. Here are some of the primary diagnostic English artifacts found at the site:

--Two English copper coins bearing the bust of King Charles II (1660-1685). One coin has two holes punched in it--one at each end of the face--suggesting it had been worn on a string. This affords strong proof of the item's adapted use by Native Americans as jewelry.

--A gold signet ring, oval face, with intaglio inscription of an abstracted lion passant (as found on the English coat of arms). Could be associated with an individual's family crest; possibly belonged to a member of English nobility, or some other representative to the English crown.
--An iron lockplate to a musket of European manufacture.

--Iron square nails.

Though these finds certainly prove Croatoan contact with Englishmen by as early as 1660, the "workshop" site has not yet yielded proof that the colonists of Roanoke--or any English for that matter--ever cohabited this site with the Croatoans. Though the CAS has dated this site to the 1600-1675 range (6), the two coins are much later in that sequence and could not have been owned by members of the Roanoke colony. Rather, this points to Croatoan contact with the English long after the Roanoke colonists would have moved from Roanoke. Indeed, English colonists began settling the North Carolina coast again in 1664 under patents granted by the new king, Charles II (who is depicted on the two coins). And though the CAS believes the gold signet ring to originate from the late-16th century, I have not seen any comparative evidence of similar rings to suggest this specific date range. The soil context where the ring was found represents the aforementioned date range, though it is an estimate that could vary plus or minus 50 years. The ring, along with the coins and lockplate (estimated manufacture from 1610-1620) may very have well been associated with the post-1663 English colonization efforts in Carolina. The ring may have predated its last owner; if it was a family crest, its ownership could have been passed down through generations.

And yet, the theory for Hatteras cohabitation is said to be strengthened in a few tantalizing passages from a travel account by John Lawson. In 1701, Lawson visited what is now North Carolina for a census survey, and found what many believe to be evidence that the Roanoke colonists had intermarried among the Croatoans at Hatteras:

“These tell us, that several of their Ancestors were white People, and could talk in a Book [read], as we do; the Truth of which is confirm’d by gray Eyes being found frequently amongst these Indians, and no others. They value themselves extremely for their Affinity to the English, and are ready to do them all friendly Offices.” (7).


By the time of Lawson's 1701 visit to Hatteras, it is probable that English colonists from Cape Fear (or from any of the other English Carolina colonies established after 1663) had already made contact and likely traded with the Croatoans, a known English ally since the time of the Roanoke colony. It is not impossible that some of the same English could have also intermarried and reproduced with Croatoans. In fact, Captain William Hilton who explored the inland North Carolina coast in 1663, noted one Native American society's eagerness to present two respectable women to the English explorers as wives:

"And for a farther Testimony of their Love and Good-Will towards us, they presented us with two very handsome, proper, young Indian Women, the tallest that ever we saw in this Country; which we suppos’d to be the King’s Daughters, or Persons of Distinction amongst them" (8).




Further, the English settlement of the North Carolina coast had expanded to the Albemarle River--just across the channel from Roanoke Island--by 1676, putting the Croatoans within 5 miles'  sailing distance (9).

To determine whether some North Carolina Native Americans are descended from English colonists from the Roanoke colony, the Lost Colony DNA project is seeking samples (10). One of the challenges will be to find DNA lines of the Roanoke settlers' descendants from England, to provide a basis for testing among those of Native American descent in North Carolina. This research group is not looking for Native Americans with just any English ancestry, but specifically that of the Roanoke colonists. Though we know the full names of all but one of the 117 colonists, the genealogical trail of their family lines back in England has proven difficult to trace. Therefore it is not known how many surviving male heirs the male colonists left behind in England to begin with. A through understanding of the colonists' genealogical lines must be fully realized in order to obtain a complete English sample set.

Conclusion

At this point, I believe that the colonists most likely left Roanoke for another place. In my mind it would have been most logical for the colonists to move southward to Hatteras Island at that time, given the bridge of friendship with the Croatoans afforded by their friend and diplomat Manteo. The Lane expedition of 1587 had made nothing but mortal enemies among the inland tribes on their silver-hunting forays into the interior of North Carolina--this would have been an unlikely, and foolhardy, destination. If Governor White's account of his untimely return to Roanoke is to be believed, the colonists at least intended to leave for the land of the Croatoan. Barring any unlikely discoveries in British archives that lend more evidence as to the colonists' fate, it remains possible that The Croatoan Project's archaeological excavations at the Croatoan site (11) will yield some proof to the Roanoke colonists' presence among Manteo's people. As the gold signet ring seems to represent the most likely diagnostic for a Roanoke-era artifact at the Croatoan site, I plan to establish a probable date range by conducting a comparative study of other European signet rings of the 1400-1700 period. The hope is to find a perfect match whose date of origin is known.

However, other theories abound yet that must also be considered. The fact that Governor White never found any of the colonists dead on Roanoke (and no subsequent archaeological excavations have either), does not rule out the possibility that the colonists could have moved or had been picked up and taken elsewhere, by any of a variety of likely players. Other possible culprits include Spanish raiders (who were at war with England in the 1580s and knew the location of the Roanoke colony by 1588); another Native American group, either perpetrating a hostile kidnapping or enabling a friendly transport of the colonists; or perhaps the colonists attempted to return to England on their own small ship only to be lost at sea.

Before exploring these possibilities, I will focus on the possibility that the colonists were massacred.


RJF.


*for Further Reading*

Dawson, Scott. Croatoan: Birthplace of America.  

Horn, James. A Kingdom Strange.

Miller, Lee. Roanoke: Solving the Mystery of the Lost Colony.

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1.   Miller, Lee. "Roanoke: Solving the Mystery of the Lost Colony" (2000).

2.   Hawks, Francis Lister (1857).

3.   Dawson, Scott. "Croatoan: Birthplace of America".

4.   Lost Colony Research Group:  http://the-lost-colony.blogspot.com/
5.   John White, Map of North Carolina coast (1584).

6.   News Article:  http://www.lost-colony.com/Buxtoncrew.html 

7.   Lawson, John. "A New Voyage to Carolina" (1709).

8.   Captain William Hilton, 1663. 

9.   Thomas Basset, "Map of the Carolinas (London, 1676).

10.   Lost Colony DNA project:  http://www.lost-colony.com/DNAproj.html

11.   The Croatoan Project:  http://www.outer-banks.com/hatteras-school/dig.html