Smithsonian scientists have identified the remains of four men who were among the early leaders of Virginia’s Jamestown, the first permanent British settlement in what would become the United States.
The bodies were exhumed in November 2013 in the church where Pocahontas married Captain John Rolfe in 1614. It took two years of detective work and the latest scientific techniques to identify the badly preserved bones.
It is now known the remains belong to important figures who lived in Jamestown between 1607 and 1610 when the colony almost collapsed.
The four men were:
Captain Gabriel Archer who was deeply involved in the colony’s politics and led some of the first expeditions up the James river seeking gold and silver.
Sir Ferdinando Wainman, the first English knight to be buried in America. He went to America as part of the expedition led by Lord De La Warr, which arrived in 1610 with fresh supplies and is credited with saving the colony from abandonment.
Captain William West who was a relative of Sir Ferdinando and arrived on the same ship. He was killed by Native Americans near the location of present-day Richmond.
Reverend Robert Hunt who was the first Anglican minister in America and arrived with the founding expedition in 1607.
Read more about this discover in the BBC report, Remains of English Jamestown colony leaders discovered and in the Smithsonian Magazine‘s New Jamestown Discovery Reveals the Identities of Four Prominent Settlers.
