the starving time
A brutal Virginia winter in 1609 led Jamestown colonists to make some…desperate dietary choices.
We’ve all felt the tummy grumbles. I know that when I go too long without food, I get very cranky. But have you ever been so hungry, it hurts? Have you ever felt the sharp prick of hunger down to your bones? That is what the colonists faced during a particularly brutal winter in 1609 that came to be known as “the Starving Time.” Not the most creative name, but it gets the point across.
We know now that things got so bad for these colonists that they resorted to eating cats, horses, rats, and eventually…each other. Proof of cannibalism came in the form of the skull of a 14-year-old girl we’re calling Jane. Anthropologists were able to surmise from the markings on her skull, that she was carved up by knives to be eaten. So how did it get so bad for poor Jane? It was a few factors.
SUPPLY SHORTAGES
Several of the supplies sent from England were destroyed by hurricanes, never making it to the Virginia colony. This led many colonists to rely on the local Powhatan tribes for much of their food.
CONFLICT WITH THE POWHATANS
With little to no supplies, and hardly any knowledge of the land, colonists came to depend on the Powhatans more and more for food. Captain John Smith, who had facilitated a lot of the trade between the two peoples, left Virginia in 1609. Relations soon deteriorated. As colonists became more demanding, they attempted to cheat and steal from the natives. The natives in turn decided to starve out the English and kill anyone who left the fort.
DROUGHT AND DISEASE
Most of the colonists were unskilled, with no idea how to farm. Even if they were farmers, however, the land was plagued with a severe drought while disease spread like wildfire.
DESPERATION
So with a drought, no farming skills, no supplies, and terrible relations with the natives, the people of Jamestown were starving. They started by eating rats and cats. Then they resorted to eating their horses. Soon, there was nothing left to eat…except their friends and family.
George Percy wrote a letter describing the horrifying events: “Haveinge fedd upon our horses and other beastes as longe as they Lasted, we weare gladd to make shifte with vermin as doggs Catts, Ratts and myce…as to eate Bootes shoes or any other leather,” he wrote. “And now famin beginneinge to Looke gastely and pale in every face, thatt notheinge was Spared to mainteyne Lyfe and to doe those things which seame incredible, as to digge upp deade corpes outt of graves and to eate them. And some have Licked upp the Bloode which hathe fallen from their weake fellowes.”
Anthropologists can tell that the cuts to Jane’s skull were made after she died. Whether she died of natural causes or she was murdered to become a meal…that remains a ghastly mystery. ꩜