Jamestown Day – May 8, 2027

Expected Jamestown Day Deals

For Jamestown Day, focus shifts from commercial deals to educational and commemorative programs. Organizations like the Jamestown-Yorktown Foundation and National Park Service often host special events, lectures, and living history demonstrations. Local Virginia businesses, especially those near Williamsburg and Jamestown, may offer themed experiences or discounts on historical tours. Bookstores might feature promotions on early American history titles. We will update this page with confirmed live events and educational opportunities as May 8 approaches.

History of Jamestown Day

In 1606, English colonists set sail to establish a colony in the New World. The fleet consisted of the ships Susan Constant, Discovery, and Godspeed. There were no women on the first ships. They made landfall on April 26, 1607, at a place they named Cape Henry. The men had a small skirmish with natives in the area. On May 17, Captain E.M. Wingfield decided on an uninhabited piece of land on a large peninsula as the location for a fortified settlement. Since it had a channel to the James River, they named this settlement “Jamestown.”

Things were very tough there. Many of the first settlers were gentlemen, unaccustomed to manual labor or farming, and they found the going difficult. The site was plagued by mosquitoes which gave them malaria. There was very little wild game on the peninsula, and they were all hunted out. The water was undrinkable. The land was too poor for farming, and the local tribes continuously attacked them. It was Captain John Smith’s leadership that kept them going. In December 1607, while gathering food, Smith’s men were killed by the Powhatan tribe, but he escaped by tying their guide to himself as a shield. The accounts he gave of his relationship with “Pocahontas” were disputed as he only spoke of it 17 years after the so-called incidents. She did bring food and aid to the settlement and procured the release of captured Indians. Smith’s leadership led to artisans and workers from different nations being sent to the new colony.

In 1609, Smith suffered a serious injury in an explosion and was sent back to England. Without him, a harsh winter followed. The colony fell into what is known as Starving Time. When help finally arrived, only 60 out of 500 settlers remained in Jamestown. Jamestown seemed doomed, but things changed drastically in 1614 when John Rolfe started exporting new tobacco seeds he had brought from Bermuda. It was a success in London, and the demand grew exponentially. Rolfe, now wealthy, married Pocahontas. She had been abducted by the colonists and had converted to Christianity. Her name was changed to Rebecca. This brought several years of peace between the English and the Powhatan. Tobacco became popular all over Europe, and by 1619, Jamestown was booming. The first representative assembly in America, the General Assembly, convened that year in the Jamestown Church, “to establish one equal and uniform government over all Virginia” which would provide “just laws for the happy guiding and governing of the people there inhabiting.”