Discuss The Causes Of Drought In Early Jamestown

The reasons so many colonists died in the early Jamestown colony were the droughts that caused famine and starvation, the brackish water that caused disease, and Indian attacks/carelessness. Though they kept bringing more people onto the colony, their population was constantly dwindling from these 3 main reasons.

First off, from around 1605 to 1612 AD, the Jamestown colony was in a drought known as the Jamestown Drought. When they didn’t have water, they couldn’t grow crops, so they didn’t have anything to eat. From November 1609 to May 1610, 110 colonists died from famine and disease. This was during the Jamestown Drought. Though we can’t be sure exactly how many died from famine rather than disease, we can be sure it was quite a few. In source D, it showed how much rainfall Jamestown had based on tree rings in the area. There were many instances on the graph where Jamestown would go years without fresh water, leaving them to brackish, unsanitary water. …show more content…
In Jamestown, “filth introduced into the river tended to fester rather than flush away.” As the water of adjacent creeks rose, the water became brackish, so there wasn’t much fresh water available by the 17th century. The wells they dug were vulnerable to saltwater intrusion, as well. All of this adds up to unsanitary water, which makes it very easy for disease to spread. Approximately 180 died between 1607 and 1610 from disease, which was more people than the first ship even came with. If the other ones didn’t come later, the original colonists would’ve all died from

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Discuss The Causes Of Drought In Early Jamestown

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