Jamestowne (Tesla's Time Travelers, #3) by Tim Black

Author:Tim Black [Black, Tim]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Young Adult Fiction
Publisher: Untreed Reads
Published: 2018-11-15T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 9

While Nikola Tesla had the cloaking device operating, the students sat strapped into their desks inside the portable classroom expecting any moment to depart from 1607 for 1609. Mr. Greene, still standing, addressed his class.

“We are going to go to December 1609 to visit Jamestowne again. My plan is to arrive at noon of a selected day when there is a modicum of warmth, perhaps with a temperature in the forties. We may have to try a few different days. And then I am going to send Professor Bridenbaugh out to see that our way to Jamestowne is not blocked by the Powhatan warriors. You see by December of 1609 relations between the English and the Powhatan Confederacy had grown hostile and the English were under siege inside their fort. Stepping outside Fort James became perilous, for the colonists were never certain if the Natives were waiting to ambush them. Sometimes they were there, but other times the Natives were not. But the settlers never knew for sure. John Smith was gone, back to England to seek medical treatment for his wounds from an explosion, which I have said I firmly believe was an assassination attempt by disgruntled colonists forced to work for a living….”

Mr. Greene continued. “We have some warmer clothes back in the closet and I want everyone to be comfortable, but I don’t want to stay more than a few hours. We just want to observe the conditions in late 1609 and early 1610 that nearly doomed the colony. Only sixty of the three hundred people will survive the winter, and the survivors will resort to cannibalism. In August of 1609, the first group of women arrived at Jamestowne. A few hundred people landed, although some of the ships were wrecked in a hurricane off the then uninhabited island of Bermuda. The hurricane and the shipwreck inspired William Shakespeare to write The Tempest. When the new colonists came ashore in the summer of 1609, their arrival strained the resources of the colony, and after Smith returned to England, Jamestowne lacked strong leadership just at a time when it was most needed. Did any of you read Elizabeth’s Diary, the Starving Time in elementary school?”

“I did, Mr. Greene,” Minerva said. There was a time when children’s author Patricia Hermes had been Minerva’s favorite author and she read all the author’s books on Jamestowne. The Starving Time was the second volume of her Jamestowne series.

“Yes, Minerva, although the author did not mention cannibalism in her book. Starvation yes, cannibalism no. Frankly, until there was forensic evidence for cannibalism, historians were divided on whether it was extensive. Does anyone recall the forensic find?”

“Jamestowne Jane,” Heather said.

“Yes, Heather,” Mr. Greene said. “We may actually meet her. So, keep your eyes out for adolescent girls. William Kelsey of Preservation Virginia found the skull of a fourteen-year-old girl who was a victim of cannibalism, although more than likely she had died and was buried, and they dug her up and then ate her.

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