A WHILE BACK THERE WAS A PROGRAM ON THE DISCOVERY CHANNEL, I THINK, THAT
ATTRIBUTED THE DEATH OF THE COLONISTS TO POISONING BY A SPANISH "MOLE".....
PLANTED BY SPAIN TO WIPE OUT THE COLONY SO THAT SPAIN COULD TAKE THE LAND.
DOES ANYONE GIVE CREDENCE TO THAT THEORY?
DFM
YORK COUNT, VA
----- Original Message -----
From: "Jon Kukla" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Saturday, December 03, 2005 11:27 AM
Subject: Re: Starving time
> Though, personally, I regard Carville Earle's argument for the effects of
> salt-poisoning from the shallow wells in a time (as Dennis Blanton's team
> has demonstrated more strongly since Earl published in the Tate and
> Ammerman volume of Chesapeake essays) of the worst drought in 500 years as
> a somewhat more persuasive corrective to a solely psychological
> explanation of the seemingly pathological behaviour....
> Jon Kukla
>
> > The best explanation for the "starving time" is : Kupperman, Karen
> > Ordahl. "Apathy and Death in Early Jamestown." Journal of American
> > History 66, no. 1 (1979): 24-40. She links the failure of will to live
> > in part to the "alien-ness" of America, and the traumatizing conditions
> > of being trapped among enemies.
> >
> > David Kiracofe
> >
> > David Kiracofe
> > History
> > Tidewater Community College
> > Chesapeake Campus
> > 1428 Cedar Road
> > Chesapeake, Va 23322
> >>>> [log in to unmask] 12/03/05 10:09 AM >>>
> > I can't remember the citations but years ago I read an article that
> > compared
> > the "starving time" in colonial Virginia with the strange atrophy of US
> > prisoners of war in Korea circa 1950-1953. The thesis of the article
> > was
> > that cultural alienation produced a psychological lethargy that
> > literally
> > killed the settlers and prisoners. For the Korea situation I have
> > gathered
> > plenty of anecdotal evidence, because many of my teachers from grade
> > school
> > to college where Korean War vets. The one that is most memorable was
> > told
> > to me by an older student, a Cherokee who joined the Marines, was
> > seriously
> > wounded in Korea and captured by the Chinese. He told me that he had
> > three
> > bullets in him and had perotenitus (sp?) and swore that he would stay
> > alive,
> > accept Chinese medical aid, and just keep his mind focused on staying
> > alert
> > and alive. And as he healed he noticed that all around him his
> > unwounded
> > comrades began to fade, stop eating, and thus die.
> > Edmund Morgan more than suggests (in American Slavery, American
> > Freedom)
> > that the colonists, unsophisticated in intercultural relations,
> > similarly
> > atrophied, at least until they discovered the commerical value of
> > tobacco
> > and focused on getting rich.
> >
> > Harold S. Forsythe
> > Visiting Fellow (2005-2006)
> > Program in Agrarian Studies
> > Yale University
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: <[log in to unmask]>
> > To: <[log in to unmask]>
> > Sent: Friday, December 02, 2005 11:31 PM
> > Subject: Re: northern bias
> >
> >
> >> HELLO,
> >> COULD YOU GIVE THE TITLE OF THE BOOK ON JAMESTOWN THAT SHORTO WAS
> >> REVIEWING?
> >> THANKS.
> >> DFM
> >> PS.
> >> WHILST ON THE SUBJECT OF COLONIAL VIRGINIA AND JAMESTOWN, I WOULD
> > LOOOOVE
> >> TO
> >> SEE A DISCUSSION ON THE STARVING TIME. THERE SEEM TO BE SEVERAL
> > DIFFERENT
> >> IDEAS EMERGING ABOUT WHAT ACTUALLY KILLED ALL THOSE POOR SOULS....I'VE
> >> LONG
> >> WONDERED HOW ON EARTH ALL THOSE FOLKS COULD HAVE DIED OF STARVATION
> > WHEN
> >> THE
> >> WOODS AND WATERS AROUND JAMESTOWN WERE TEEMNG WITH WILDLIFE. YES, THE
> >> INDIANS WERE LURKING, PERHAPS, READY TO PICK THEM OFF IF THEY LEFT THE
> >> SECURITY OF THE FORT BUT SURELY A DEATH BY INDIAN ATTACK WOULD HAVE
> > BEEN
> >> PREFERABLE TO DEATH BY STARVATION.
> >> ----- Original Message -----
> >> From: "Louise Bernikow" <[log in to unmask]>
> >> To: <>
> >> Sent: Friday, December 02, 2005 12:32 PM
> >> Subject: northern bias
> >>
> >>
> >>> i take it from the discussion so far that no one saw Russell Shorto's
> >> review
> >>> of a book about Jamestown some weeks ago in the NYTimes Book Review.
> >> Shorto
> >>> says the bias that has made "colonial American history" synonymous
> > with
> >> New
> >>> England for so long arose because NE is "easier to sanitize" and fits
> >>> more
> >> neatly
> >>> the myth of America's founding. I agree and have been provoked by the
> >>> "sanitizing" to work on a historical fiction about tobacco brides and
> > the
> >> 17th
> >>> century= for which I have fruitfully been picking all your brains for
> >>> some
> >> time now,
> >>> gratefully. Louise Bernikow
> >>>
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>
>
> Dr. Jon Kukla, Executive Vice-President
> Red Hill - The Patrick Henry National Memorial
> 1250 Red Hill Road
> Brookneal, Virginia 24528
> www.redhill.org
> Phone 434-376-2044 or 800-514-7463
>
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