Pocahontas: Native Ambassador
Ancestor’s Almanac / by GAY PASLEY, Virginia Society and descendant of Pocahontas
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n 2007, our country marked the 400th anniversary of the first permanent English settlement in 1607. One woman, Pocahontas, a Native American princess, was among the first to welcome the settlers. Despite her short life (15961617), she left an impression well beyond these 400 years. To leave such an impression is remarkable, considering “none of her thoughts or feelings were ever recorded.”
The walls on the east side of the U.S. Capitol Rotunda are decorated with eight monumental oil paintings that, together, depict the early history of our nation’s founding. One of these paintings, the “Baptism of Pocahontas,” shows the significance of the 1613 religious event to the founding of this nation. The English saw the conversion of Native Americans to Christianity as the ultimate justification for their subjugation. One official English publication noted Pocahontas’ baptism as “the blessing of Christianity among heathen savages.” Unfortunately, the English never acknowledged their eventual destruction of over 90 percent of Pocahontas’ Algonquin people over the next half century. Why did this Indian princess fascinate the English invaders? Pocahontas showed a deep interest in the English and played an increasingly critical role of Native ambassador to the first permanent English settlement in America. Since 1607, Americans and English have held many memorial celebrations of the founding of Jamestown, the restoration of the Jamestown Fort, the marriage of Pocahontas and John Rolfe, and her much celebrated trip to England as an ambassador of her Native people. Tragically, she died on this trip at the age of 21, in 1617, leaving her son, Thomas, as her only heir. He grew up in England, but, when he returned to Virginia, he continued to try to improve the relations between his mother’s people and the colonists. In 1619, Pocahontas’ widower, John Rolfe, became a representative to the colony’s first General Assembly. To have died so young was a sad loss for both her Native people and Jamestown, but Pocahontas was a remarkable woman, and her accomplishments extend well beyond her lifetime. As the Reverend Ben Campbell wrote in his book, Richmond’s Unhealed History, “She lived the first two-thirds of her life in the language, religion, and culture of the Algonquins and the last third in the language, religion, and culture of the English.” She was regarded with great respect for her commitment to her role as an ambassador of both nations. Photo credit: Architect of the Capitol 8
Dames Discovery | Fall 2020
