Cannibalism in Colonial America

Details
Title
Cannibalism in Colonial America
Usage & Reproduction Rights
http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
Type
Video recordings
URI / Handle
http://hdl.handle.net/1961/muislandora:2973
Geographic Subject
Jamestown Island (Va.)
Abstract
I plan on focusing on the hardships and cannibalism that took place in Early Jamestown during the starving time. This is an important topic due to the fact that the bones of “Jane” a fifteen-year-old girl found cannibalized in Jamestown was only found in 2010. Since being unearthed, “Jane” has undergone the best science has to offer in order to find her origination and how she came to have tooth marks on her bones. There has been little recognition for this young girl and I would like to bring her story to the surface. Many people think of Pocahontas running through the forest singing to John Smith and showing him the way of the New World when they think about Jamestown and the first colonists. However, what historically happened in the early years of Jamestown is much darker. Young bones found in an excavated cellar tell the story of a fifteen-year-old Jamestown transplant. Jane, as she would be called, shows just how dark and desperate the early colonists in 1609 Jamestown really were and to what ends human beings would fall in the evolutionary spectrum to survive. Could this darkness be avoided? Research shows the starving time as a test on humanity that George Percy is to trudge through with his dwindling number of colonists. Was the starving time an inevitability that nature played on these men and women or would John Smith have been a better alternative, had he not been injured? Nearly every important event that happened in Jamestown was well documented by the governing force or a bystander in their journal; except for Smith’s incident. Could the lack of information prove foul play? Nature, circumstances, fate, and leadership play key roles in the travesty that was the starving time and the tragic end to Jane’s life. The evidence found at Jamestown and the journals and research on the topic, all point to the starving time as preventable, but how? I would like to teach seventh or eleventh grade history; both of which involve Jamestown and colonial America. This topic is also one that I find interesting; therefore, it makes teaching our youth a pleasure.

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