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Bartholomew Gosnold
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Bartholomew Gosnold (1572–August 22, 1607) was an English lawyer, explorer, and privateer, instrumental in founding the Virginia Company of London, and Jamestown, Virginia. He is considered by the Association for the Preservation of Virginia Antiquities (APVA) to be the "prime mover of the colonization of Virginia." Gosnold also led the first recorded European expedition to visit Cape Cod, on May 15, 1602.
as born in Grundisburgh in Suffolk, England in 1572, and his family seat was at Otley, Suffolk.
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Encyclopedia
Bartholomew Gosnold (1572–August 22, 1607) was an English lawyer, explorer, and privateer, instrumental in founding the Virginia Company of London, and Jamestown, Virginia. He is considered by the Association for the Preservation of Virginia Antiquities (APVA) to be the "prime mover of the colonization of Virginia." Gosnold also led the first recorded European expedition to visit Cape Cod, on May 15, 1602.
Early life
He was born in Grundisburgh in Suffolk, England in 1572, and his family seat was at Otley, Suffolk. His parents were Anthony Gosnold and Dorothy Bacon. He graduated from the University of Cambridge and studied law at Middle Temple.
Gosnold was a friend of Richard Hakluyt and sailed with Walter Raleigh. He obtained backing to attempt a colony in the New World and in 1602 he sailed from Falmouth in a small Dartmouth bark, the Concord, with thirty-two on board. They intended to establish a colony in New England, which was then known as Northern Virginia.
Bartholomew Gosnold pioneered a direct sailing route due west from the Azores to New England, arriving in May 1602 at Cape Elizabeth in Maine (Lat 43 degrees). He skirted the coastline for several days before anchoring in York Harbor, Maine, on May 14, 1602.
The next day, he sailed into Provincetown Harbor, where he is credited with naming Cape Cod. Following the coastline for several days, he discovered Martha's Vineyard and named it after his daughter, Martha . He established a small post on Elizabeth's Island, which is now called Cuttyhunk Island and is part of the town of Gosnold. The post was abandoned when intending settlers decided to return on the ship to England since they had insufficient provisions to overwinter.
A notable account of the voyage, written by John Brereton, one of the gentlemen adventurers, was published in 1602, and this helped in popularising subsequent voyages of exploration and colonisation of the northeast seaboard of America. A second account by Gabriel Archer was not published until over 20 years later, after Gosnold's death.
Virginia Company, Jamestown
Gosnold spent several years after his return to England promoting a more ambitious attempt; he obtained from King James I an exclusive charter for a Virginia Company to settle Virginia. To form the core of what would become the Virginia Colony at Jamestown, he recruited his cousin-by-marriage Edward Maria Wingfield, as well as John Smith, his brother and a cousin, in addition to members of his 1602 expedition. Gosnold himself served as vice-admiral of the expedition, and captain of the Godspeed (one of the three ships of the expedition; the other two being the Susan Constant, uneder Captain Christoper Newport, and the Discovery, under Captain John Ratcliffe ).
Gosnold also solicited the support of Matthew Scrivener, cousin of Edward Maria Wingfield. Scrivener became Acting Governor of the new Colony, but drowned in a tragic accident in 1609 along with Anthony Gosnold, Bartholomew's brother, while trying to cross to Hog Island in a storm. (Ironically, Scrivener's brother Nicholas had also drowned while a student at Eton.)
Gosnold was popular among the colonists and opposed the location of the colony at Jamestown Island; he also helped design the fort that held the initial colony. He died of dysentery and scurvy only four months after they landed, on August 22, 1607. George Percy's 'Discourse' that was printed in the fourth volume of Purchas His Pilgrimes (1625) records Gosnold's death (...Captain Bartholomew Gosnold one of Councile, he was buryed thereupon having all the ordinance in the Fourt shote offwith manye vollyes of small shot...) and then sayse "...Oure men were destroyed with cruel dyseases as swellings, fluxes, burning fevers, and by wars and some exyted souddenlye, but for the moste part they dyeth of mere famine..."
Possible discovery of his grave
In 2005, the APVA announced that its archaeological dig at Jamestown had likely discovered the explorer's grave, and that it had begun genetic fingerprinting to verify Gosnold's identity. By June researchers had received the approval of the Church of England to take DNA samples from the remains of his sister, located in an English church, the first exemption granted for such purposes. However, in November 2005 the APVA announced that while they remained confident her remains were beneath the church floor, they had been unable to locate them.
The DNA analysis will be conducted by the Smithsonian Institution. The skeletal remains of what is believed to be Gosnold are currently on public display in the Smithsonian Natural History Museum in Washington, D.C.
Further reading
- David A. Price, Love and Hate in Jamestown (Alfred A. Knopf, 2003: ISBN 0-375-41541-6)
- David R. Ransome, ‘Gosnold, Bartholomew (d. 1607)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004
External links
- - An excellent Gosnold overview -
- , from an APVA website
- , a June 2002 article from a BBC Suffolk website
- , a January 2005 article from the BBC
- , a June 2005 article from The Times of London
- , a 2007-2008 (open in the summer) exhibit at the Cuttyhunk Historical Society
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