Essay About Drought In Jamestown

Jamestown should have been called Jamesdown, because of all of the colonists that died from 1607-1611. There were over 100 colonists that died in Jamestown. There were three major things that led to the deaths of the Jamestown colonists. They were: starvation, lack of people to fill occupations and drought. The Jamestown colonists didn’t bring enough food. This led to starvation which killed a lot of people. Some of the most important occupations that they needed to survive, they either only had one person to do the job or none. The drought was a very big problem too. Because there was no rain there was no water, meaning dehydration. This killed many. Because of these three things, starvation, lack of people to fill occupations, and drought, the colonists suffered a great deal.

It a very big reason that so many colonists died. Ivor Noel Hume, says “Though Francis West was able to load his small ship with grain, the success involved some harsh and cruel dealing by cutting off two of the Salvages heads and other extremities.” (Hume 61) So not only did they not have enough food, but they had to cut off two people’s heads to load it. There was also not enough food for all of the colonists. Quoting Dennis B. Blanton, she says “The island is not situated at a point of great natural food abundance. Fish are present in local streams but only in the spring and early summer.”(55)This was a big problem because in the winter they would not have any food. Plus because of the drought, there was no rain which meant no water to water the crops. They also died because they only had one farmer (Smith 59). Because they had only one farmer they didn’t have enough food.There were many reasons that there was no food, but one was that there was only one farmer. If this farmer happen to have an accident or die, then there would be no one to plant crops and provide food. This is one of the reasons that so many colonists died from