All --

In my capacity as one of the employee/representatives
of the Governor of North Carolina in Washington, DC,
one of my tasks (and a person passion) is working for
federal recognition of the Lumbee Indians. I was
reared in Bladen County, a few miles from their
principal residence in Robeson County, North Carolina.
As a teenager, I became friends of some Lumbees and
now work closely with their leaders.

From my experience and study, the only thing that can
be said with certainty about the Lost Colony is that
no one knows. There are numerous theories with varying
degrees of circumstantial proof, but no hard evidence
-- what lawyers call "direct evidence," meaning
physical evidence (such as archaeological findings,
contemporary writings and eye-witness accounts).

Seminal works were done in the 20th century by David
Beers Quinn (sometimes in collaboration with his
wife), but books about the Lost Colony seem to come
out nearly every year.

Perhaps the most troubling theory was written recently
by Ms. Lee G. Miller ("Roanoke: Solving the Mystery of
the Lost Colony") in which she claimed that the Lost
Colony split into one large and one small group. She
cites facts (not new, just reevaluated and newly
interpreted by her) in the context of contemporary
English politics that the larger group affiliated with
relatively friendly tribe/s along the Chowan River,
only to be virtually wiped out (along with their
Indian friends) by a war-like tribe from west of the
Chowan -- perhaps as far inland as current Randolph
County where it is thought that the copper mines of
Ritanoe were situated. It is a fact that 7 of the
colonists are reported a couple of time to have been
held as captives in a place named Ritano even after
the English had settled at Jamestown. This would have
been a gruesome end to their lives. This account is
certainly at odds with the hope of almost everyone
that the Lost Colonists were at least able to
integrate with their neighbors and live out a
relatively happy pastoral existence. But, Lee Miller's
argument is quite good, I am sad to say. The outcome
she suggests -- not a pastoral among benign Aborigines
-- seems to me to be closer to the truth.

As for the smaller part of the LC -- perhaps only 20
or so people -- Ms. Miller does no more than to say
that they probably did go off to Croatan Island,
presumably with Manteo who was of that island and its
tribe. Curious as to why Ms. Miller neither speculated
about that group nor discussed the Lumbees, I have
written to her but have not yet received a reply.

I do not believe Lumbees have special knowledge about
the Lost Colony, although it continues to be an oral
tradition among them. I have never heard them claim to
have any physical evidence other than the old stories
of racial anomalies that are now probably incapable of
proof even using genealogical DNA. But, who knows what
future research (especially archaeological) will
produce and DNA technology will make possible.

Suffice it to say that for the moment the Lumbees are
focused with laser-like precision on the issue of
federal recognition, for which they first petitioned
in 1888 but have so far still been denied.

As for oral history in general, it is not always
unreliable, but it is always questionable because it
is hardest to prove, especially when the people
repeating the tales were not witnesses to the events
they are telling. Oral accounts may not even be
reliable enough to merit the observation made about
the Soviet Union by President Reagan, "trust but
verify." But, there is probably just enough accuracy
is most oral tales that they have some basis in fact,
although often (and perhaps usually) not especially
accurate. It is wrong to assume that they are true
until disproved; that's not the way sound reasoning
works. The burden is ALWAYS on the person asserting a
thing to be true to produce proof of the affirmative;
the defense (the negative) is never required to go
first.

jc


--- Anita Wills <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> That makes more sense, then the story about them
> vanishing without a 
> trace. However, folks do love a good mystic mystery
> (smile). 
> 
> Anita 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> -- [log in to unmask] wrote:
> The girl who used to cut my hair was a Lumbee Indian
> and she told me 
> that
> present day Lumbees know exactly and without a doubt
> that the Roanoke 
> Island
> colonists simply wandered off and joined the local
> Indian tribes and 
> became
> part of  their culture and life and families. She
> said that it had 
> always
> been a "Duh" issue and that if "white folk" hadn't
> been so disdainful 
> of the
> opinions of the Indians who have tried, repeatedly,
> over the years to 
> tell
> the stories of  what happened then there would be no
> "mystery".
> Makes sense to me.
> DFM
> in York County
> 
> 
> 
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Sunshine49" <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Sunday, January 14, 2007 9:08 AM
> Subject: Re: Virginia Librarians and Literary Tour
> to England
> 
> 
> > Can you let us know when and where this will be
> available? I love
> > period music [from many periods]; I have the new
> Sting CD "Songs from
> > the Labyrinth", lute music of Elizabethan musician
> John Dowland, I
> > love it, listen to it in my car all the time.
> Thanks. I'd really love
> > to hear the song played on Roanoke Island when
> they returned to find
> > the colony gone. My parents retired there and I
> owned a house there
> > for 4 years. This may go beyond the interest of
> anyone in this group
> > [or it may open up a new topic, who knows?] but I
> once saw a ghost of
> > one of the colonists down there, a woman; I have
> been unable to find
> > out anything else about ghostly sightings other
> than the white deer
> > that was Virginia Dare. Personally, I think the
> bulk of the settlers
> > were taken away to live with friendly tribes, in
> safety, and a
> > skeleton crew of men stayed behind, in case the
> ships returned. It
> > was probably these that Powhatan said his men
> killed, and not all the
> > colonists. I think their genes live on in the
> Lumbee Indians on the
> > mainland. The gold gentleman's ring that was
> recently found at
> > Hatteras was quite interesting. The Hattorask
> Indians were a friendly
> > tribe.
> >
> > Nancy
> >
> > -------
> > I was never lost, but I was bewildered once for
> three days.
> >
> > --Daniel Boone
> >
> >
> >
> > On Jan 14, 2007, at 7:14 AM, Randy Cabell wrote:
> >
> >> Sounds great to me.  Don't forget to take as
> gifts the upcoming CD -
> >> "Jamestowne Jubilee 1807 1907 and 2007."
> >>
> >> The keynote track is "The Trumpeter of Jamestown
> March" which
> >> features two
> >> favorite English tunes of that Day.
> >>
> >> THE HUNT IS UP, which per an account in Samuel
> Elliot Morrisons
> >> tome on
> >> 'European Discovery of America' MAY have been
> played of the coast
> >> of North
> >> Carolina when the English FINALLY returned to
> find the Colony
> >> Lost.  He
> >> notes that "... they sounded trumpets and played
> popular tunes of 
> the
> >> day...", hoping Colonists would hear and run out
> on the beach.
> >>
> >> LUSTY GALLANT.  The second strain of the march
> was a popular lute
> >> tune of
> >> the day and had words written to extol the
> virtues of the Virginia
> >> Lottery.
> >>
> >> The third tune in the march -- the 'piece
> d'resistance' -- is not
> >> an English
> >> tune, but it was heard by Sir Francis Drake
> >> in Florida in 1585.  It is the ONLY tune that I
> have found so far
> >> (one year
> >> of searching) that we KNOW was played in this
> neck of the words --
> >> America -- before Jamestown.  It is WILLEAMUS and
> Dutch.  Very, very
> >> stirring and except for a couple of pesky notes
> at the very end of
> >> it, can
> >> be played on a Trumpet by a trumpeter who has far
> better chops than
> >> I do.
> >> Given the strong anti-Spanish association of the
> tune and the
> >> words, and the
> >> fact that Capt. John Smith no doubt heard it
> played everywhere when 
> he
> >> fought in The Netherlands, it could well have
> been played at
> >> Jamestown by
> >> the unknown trumpeter.
> >>
> >> Toward the end of the CD is David Diggs suite of
> music from the 
> James
> >> Horner's score for the movie THE NEW WORLD.  Its
> opening, with
> >> chirping
> >> crickets and birds (you had to see the Lehigh
> percussion section in
> >> the
> >> recording session all blowing on these bubbly
> little bird whistles
> >> to really
> >> appreacate it), and the soaring French Horn with
> lower brass
> >> anchoring it is
> >> to-die-for.  James Horner himself after hearing
> Diggs' work called 
> it
> >> 'thrilling.'
> >>
> >> So....... a nice gift for our English Friends. 
> Available in two 
> short
> >> weeks.
> >>
> >> Available now, and already has been given to
> nearly three dozen
> >> bands, is a
> >> full band version of the march The Trumpeter of
> Jamestowne.
> >> Companies of
> >> The Jamestowne Society itself have given away
> nearly 20 copies to
> >> bands
> >> around America -- school, civic, military,
> college.  One person
> >> even gave it
> >> to an English school in Oxford, UK.  And I
> personally gave a copy
> >> to the
> >> commandant of the Fire Brigade in Krakow, Poland.
>  I don't keep up
> >> with when
> >> and where it will be perfomed but have been told
> that the
> >> Charolttesville
> >> High School Band will do it this spring, and The
> Stonewall Brigade
> >> Band will
> >> make it part of their Jamestown concert in early
> summer.
> >>
> >> Anybody out there reading  this -- not just the
> group going to
> >> England --
> >> can be a part of the sharing.  It costs you
> nothing.  Just pick a
> >> worthy
> >> band, talk to the director to ascertain his/her
> interest in playing
> >> the
> >> march, send me his/her name, the name of the band
> and your mailing
> >> address.
> >> I make a nice dedicatory cover sheet, bind the
> march, send it to
> >> you, and
> >> you create a "press event" and present it to the
> band.  You
> >> responsibility
> >> is the generate pulicity for the greater glory of
> Jamestown.
> >>
> >> Randy Cabell
> >> The (21st Century) Trumpeter of Jamestowne
> >>
> >
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> 
>
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