Jamestown, named after King James I of England, was founded on May 14, 1607, and was the first permanent English settlement in North America. King James I granted a charter to the privately owned Virginia Company in London, which hoped to find gold and silver in North America and a river route to the Pacific Ocean for easier trade with Asia. From the outset, the colony faced major challenges that brought it to the brink of disaster in 1610, when the passengers from the Sea Venture (called the Sea Adventure in the novel) finally arrived.

In December 1606, three ships set out for North America—the Susan Constant, the Godspeed, and the Discovery—with approximately 105 colonists aboard. The ships arrived at Chesapeake Bay on April 26, 1607, and on May 14, they chose a settlement site on a peninsula in the James River that came to be known as Jamestown.

The colonists’ relationship with the Indigenous peoples—mainly from the Powhatan confederacy of Algonquian-speaking tribes—was at times friendly and at times contentious. In May 1607, the colony defended itself from a surprise attack and was only able to repel the Indigenous forces with cannon fire from the ships. When two of the ships left to return to England on June 22, the colonies’ leaders believed that they would continue to be successful.