Remains of 4 early colonial leaders found at Jamestown

(An interesting aside-it was the same church in which Pocahontas married John Rolfe.) Using the specific time frame in which the church existed, the team searched through historical records from the Virginia Company (sponsor of the Jamestown adventure) and colonists’ recorded accounts to compile a list of possible identities for the deceased leaders.

AP A well-preserved silver box believed to be a Catholic reliquary is displayed at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History in Washington, Tuesday, July 28, 2015.

Silver Reliquary and fragments of coffin wood found in the grave of Gabriel Archer. Wainman and William West were both related to the baron.

One of the skeletons recently uncovered by archaeologists at the site of the Jamestown colony.

One of the biggest clues that the four remains are of people of noble status is the traces of lead in their bodies.

In addition to the skeletal remains, the archaeologists found the stains and nails left by three wooden coffins, including two extremely rare examples that were finely crafted into an anthropomorphic or human shape. “It packs in the bones”, says Douglas Owsley, who heads the department of archaeology at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History.

Archaeologists then sought help from Smithsonian experts to help identify the remains.

Only elite members of the community would have been buried at this site, say the archaeologists. The church site was mostly untouched and had not been excavated for more than a century until it was found in 2010.

The team identified the remains of the Reverend Robert Hunt, the first Anglican minister in Jamestown; Capt. Gabriel Archer, an enemy of onetime colony leader John Smith; Sir Ferdinando Wainman, probably the first knight buried in America; and Captain William West, who died fighting the Powhatan Indians.

All were buried between 1608 and 1610, at a time when the colony of about 145 settlers and sailors was on the brink of failure.

“What we have discovered here in the earliest English church in America are four of the first leaders of America”, he said. “Theres nothing like it anywhere else in this country.”While the individuals buried at Jamestown were not royalty, they were considered pivotal figures in the early colony.

Although the men were the top leaders of the American colonies, and are so far the highest-ranking colony leaders ever discovered, they are not widely known.

Only about 30 percent of each skeleton was recovered.

As early as 1837, eyewitnesses claimed to have seen the ruins of the James Fort submerged in the James River, off the western shore of Jamestown Island, where the settlers landed in 1607. He died at the age of 34 during a six-month period known as the “starving time” when many perished due to disease, starvation and battles with Indians.

The box, found in Jamestown, Virginia, contains seven fragments of bone and pieces of a lead ampulla, a type of flask used to hold holy water, Connecticut scans revealed. Archer’s parents were Catholic, which became illegal in Protestant England.

James Horn, president of the Jamestown Rediscovery Foundation, said in a news release Tuesday, “These men were among the first founders of English America”.

Captain William West’s body was draped with the very fragile silver and silk fabric that scientists later identified as a military sash.

“The things that we look at and can read from the bones are simply details that you’re not going to find in the history books”, Owsley said.