The Evansville daily journal. [volume] (Evansville, Ia. [i.e. Ind.]) 1848-1862, 1857-05-29
o;bansSille Daily gournaI.

JAMEsTowN, VA.,-A Correspondent o
the New York Express who attended the
recent celebration at jamestown, Va
gives the following description of the 10.
cality. where the town WAS.
"We are approaching the town. Blu,
there is no town az all none at all! at
all! | count two houses, two or three
barns, a thrashing machine, some mules,
some oxen, and lots Of negroes, but
repeat, there is no town at all. Never
theless, some fourteen or sixteen steamers
are coming up around Jamestown,-with
other craft of all kinds and colors, and
all crowded with human beings, to pay
their respects Of the day. King James
the counterblast tobacco man, after whom
this once Tobacco town was named,
doubtless, had in his day, here, very
respectable sort of town--but now il is
only plantation,-a hrm,-with only
overseers to live on it, and negroes to
work it and it is the property of a Mr..
Allen, who gave $1,000 for it, but who
now values it at some $4,000 or more.
There are nearly 1000 acres in this is
land ofJamestOwn, six or seven hundred
oft, however, only under cultivation.
Ii Is one vast wheat field now.-and the
wheat is foot, or a foot and half in
height, as green and as beautiful, as the
owner could we'll wish. Mr.. Allen here
and elsewhere on other plantations, rails
ed last year, | was told, $4,000 bushels
of wheat! They told me, too, of corn
furrow of his, over the river, two miles
long! Judge from this now, of a landed
estate in tide water Vii ia.
And this is Jamestown ,his fat, this
pancake island! | can't yet qsite work
myself up to ctmprehending it, | feel
very much like travelling companion
mine once expressed himself in the fam,
ohS gallery of the Etruscan Vases in the
MuseO BOrbonico of Naples. "Have
come all the way here, to see only these
d-----d old pots and kett!cs?' Rome
has. or had seven hills. There is or was
the Capitolium! There is the Coliseum,
but there is only broad pread wheat
field,--enyeloping a lot of brick, with
ruined church tower projecting over them
and an old lot of broken down tomb
stones. A negro in frishtful cloud of
dust is running a four OK (don't print it
"horse", Mr.. Printer,) Omnibus. Two
mules in go cart, accompany him. The
celebration is to be two miles of, from
the landing, far down the ! lane, land
the four oxen, and two mules are the
only visible means ofgetting th,re, under
the now burning sun,-blazing upon a
bright SOIL every tread upon which rolls
up clouds and clouds OF dust.
Nevertheless. this is jamestown, the
old Capitol Of the old Dominion of Vir-
ginia. Avaunt, all improper thoughts,
for this is holy ground! This is the first
fixed Anglo Saxon settlement of Ameri.
ca. Here was sown the first seed of that
august empire of Anglo Saxons that has
grown over the Allegheny and Rocky
Mountain barriers and that now flourish
es upon the shores of the Pacific as we'll
as upon the Atlantic. 1t is and is to be
Century after century, the pilgrimage
ground of every true-hearted American,
who loves his country as whole. came
here as filial duty, to pay homage to
John Smith and his .successors,-as the
Mahommedan goes to Meccor; the Briton.
to Westminster Abbey; or the French
man TO lnvalids, around the tomb of the
great Napoleon; or the Prussian to Pots
lam, in the vault of the great Frederick.
Alas! there is little left here to reverence,
n m n haf In Ia ~ 10
struction. | rushed from the steamboat
lighter to the ruined tower of the old
church, the sole monument now left Of |
Jamestown antiquity. | hurried to the
broken marble tomb stones close by. |
This church tower, in ruins, in brambles |
and tangled vines, surrounded by shrub
berry, and partly covere A with ivy, is the
asst relic OF the ancient Jamestown,-
save the tomb stones. This church tower
must be now some 239 years old. 1t
was probably built, so says history, be- /
,wcen 1917 and 162O,-and of course,
every brick in it came from England, as
we'll as the brick wall, that even now, in
preservation, surrounds the
,rave-y yard. But every old brick in town
md churchyard, here, is monitor as
wella memento. This tower. this wall
his churchyard, and these mutilated,
)rOken tomb-stones, with their inscrip-
ionsin antique English AMI antique letter
Ill i;f wonderful letter preservation are
instinct with memories the past. Poch-
lhontas kneeled perhaps, before this altar,
~ the side of her husband Rolfe There
n the graveyard the roots Of lofty
sycamore have entwined and enveloped
me slab, said to be as old as 16OS,-so
hat no mortaPs strength can tear
he slab away. The graveyard, the
sycamore, slab recalled the
amented Stephens description of the
central American cities thus in vegeta-
ion entombed. The once little sycamore
perhaps planted by the occupant of the
omb, had seized upon that tomb and
omb stone, and fiourishing, it may be,
lpon his very dust. had re-entombed him
om5 and all, in its crushing folds Of mere
In few years the old church will be
zone. the walls and the monuments OF
he dead crumble and no trace will re-
main Ofthe labors Of those wha gave birth
o our Republican Empire on this conse.
rated spot.
A CoLoRED MAN ELECTED TO OFFICE.
ChOs. Rowland, cOlored stevedore. has
,een elected Warden in the third ward
# Providence, II. 1.-The result, it APP
n L