We crawl down the narrow ladder into the hold of the Susan Constant and try to imagine the tiny space crammed with 50 to 60 men. They slept on top of the supply barrels and endured the rolling seas in dungeonlike quarters for 144 days. From the ships, the trail leads through the forest to a simulated Powhatan encampment. The village appears exactly as described by 16th-century explorers. Smoke from fire pits curls through the trees and buckskin-clad interpreters demonstrate hide tanning, canoe building and the games children played.
Bent saplings covered with grass mats form the walls.
Inside, we find baskets of corn, beans and squash, and hand-crafted household items. The colonists found no treasure, their silkworm and glassmaking efforts failed, and starvation threatened them with the same fate as the Lost Colony of Roanoke Island, which disappeared in 1587. When the noblemen refused to work, chaos ruled. Then tobacco grower John Rolfe arrived with seeds from the Spanish colonies in the West Indies. The noxious weed became the economic salvation for the new colony.