Recently I became aware of an observation/theory that one reason that Jamestowne is downgraded by historians in favor of those latecomers (Puritans) up in New England, was the Civil War.  e.g. Nothing good could come out of the South, so the first permanent English settlement in the New World is ignored.

This may also explain a puzzle that I found a few years ago when doing a booket of our family in the Civil War.  On March 9, 1862 the Monitor and the Merrimac (aka Virginia) fought their classic battle in Hampton Roads.  Every account that I have read concludes that it was a draw, each returning to its port, of of course some months later the Virginia was destroyed before the Union Army could take it.  But I found a letter written over a month later, an excerpt below......

"....We have just received news from the Merrimac now called the Virginia. She left Norfolk this morning at 6 o'clock and returned about one o'clock with three Yankee vessels, two brigs and a schooner, one of them heavily loaded. This she accomplished without firing a gun. The Monitor kept under the protection of the guns at Fortress Monroe, being afraid to meet the Virginia."  Part of a letter from Robert Brown to his wife, 11 April 1862

To paraphrase Gen. Buck Turgidson in that classic "Dr. Strangelove", I hesitate to draw any conclusions before the all the facts are in, but it appears that the Virginia emerged at least once, and maybe more, AFTER the battle and proceeded to do what it started out to do the day before the Monitor appeared on the scene -- wreak havoc among the Union fleet.  --AND the Monitor did not set forth to stop her.  If that is indeed true, then it looks like to me that the Virginia deserves a bit more credit.  It lived and fought another day, returning to the at the site of the battle -- and was unchallenged.  Of course the letter may be based only on rumors and wishes, but am I missing something?

Randy Cabell




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