CAPTAIN JOHN SMITH, ADVENTURER: Piracy, Pocahontas

John Smith was born in 1580 in Lincolnshire, where he attended Louth grammar school, and as a boy he would hear about the defeat of the Spanish Armada and expeditions to the New World by Sir Francis Drake. At the age of 16 Smith enlisted as a soldier, learnt the arts of horsemanship at Tattershall Castle, and after a variety of adventures including more than one shipwreck, he eventually took up with some Jesuits and ended up in Italy, where he enlisted with the imperial army in a holy war against the Turks. As a result he found himself in a Protestant Hungarian regiment, was captured by the Turks and was sold into slavery. Bound for the Crimea with a nefarious group of other captives, he managed to make a run for it and sailed for Spain. Eventually finding his way home, Smith had not lost his appetite for adventure and joined an expedition to the New World, where he became one of the founders of Jamestown, Virginia. The intrepid colonisers found a suitable site for a settlement by following instructions supplied by the London Council. Having sworn in their governing body they prepared to build by cutting wood and setting up a palisade. The local Native American chief, Wowinchopunck, sent 100 men with two fat deer, inviting the colonists to lay down their weapons, which they declined to do. The paramount chief, Powhatan, was less friendly, and when Smith was captured he only escaped with his life by showing them the workings of a compass. At this point he first made the acquaintance of Powhatan's daughter Pocahontas, who later married one of the settlers and was taken to England, where she caused a sensation but could not survive the climate. The story of the Jamestown settlement is largely based on Smith's own account, and makes fascinating reading. 202pp, black and white reproductions.