John Smith's Chesapeake Bay Voyages

>>Click here for a chronology of the exploration
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"Heaven and earth never agreed better to frame a place for man's habitation..."

When Captain John Smith set out to explore the Bay, he was searching for gold and silver and for the Northwest Passage, a fabled short route between Europe and the treasures of the Far East. He never found the passage—it doesn’t exist—and he never found gold and silver. Yet he left a rich legacy.

On his voyage, Smith explored a land abounding in natural resources and came face-to-face with a well-developed culture of people who had lived in the Chesapeake region for a millennium. Smith observed, he took notes, and he made a map (below) that proved so accurate it remained the definitive map of the region for nearly a century. His detailed writings, the reports of his comrades, and his marvelous map remain vital sources for anthropologists and historians, and provide us a tour guide back to the time when our nation began to emerge.

Smith’s voyage demonstrated his personal qualities of leadership and values we still think of as “American:” independence, courage, ingenuity, perseverance, and an appreciation of talent above rank. Smith saw in the Chesapeake’s rich natural resources the opportunity for any man to come here and through his hard work make a good life. The trade he established with the Powhatan people helped Jamestown survive and Smith’s leadership as President of the struggling colony steadied it and gave it the footing it needed to survive.

He was perhaps the first to enunciate what would become the American Dream.

“Toward the end of his life, Smith was also one of the first, if not the first, to anticipate that America would be the seedbed for a new kind of society,” said David A. Price, author of Love and Hate in Jamestown. "He had escaped the obscurity to which he was born and realized that in the New World, poor men with ambition could likewise make new destinies for themselves. John Smith’s story gives us a new vantage point for looking at the American experiment.”

These events marked an historical pivot point, setting the Chesapeake Bay region on a course that would forever transform its culture, its commerce, and its environment. The Captain John Smith Chesapeake National Historic Trail is of national significance, according to the National Park Service, for its association with the themes of Ethnic Heritage (Native Americans), Exploration and Settlement, and Commerce and Trade.