Shorter Route To Virginia
In 1609, Argall, as an English ship's captain employed by the Virginia Company of London, was the first to develop a shorter, more northerly route for sailing from England across the Atlantic Ocean to the Virginia Colony and its primary port and seat of government at Jamestown. Rather than following the normal practice of going south to the tropics and west with the trade winds, Captain Argall sailed west from the Azores to Bermuda and then almost due west to the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay. His voyage took only nine weeks and six days, including two weeks becalmed. This new route enabled the English to avoid enemy Spanish ships and to save on provisions.
Upon his arrival at Jamestown, Captain Argall found the colonists in dire straits. He resupplied them with all the food he could spare and returned to England at the end of the summer. The help came to the colony at one of the most critical moments in its history, as it began the Starving Time, during which fewer than one in five survived. However, without the provisions Argall had left, the colony may have been totally destroyed.
Read more about this topic: Samuel Argall
Famous quotes containing the words shorter and/or route:
“I would rather be old for a shorter time than be old before my time.”
—Michel de Montaigne (1533–1592)
“A route differs from a road not only because it is solely intended for vehicles, but also because it is merely a line that connects one point with another. A route has no meaning in itself; its meaning derives entirely from the two points that it connects. A road is a tribute to space. Every stretch of road has meaning in itself and invites us to stop. A route is the triumphant devaluation of space, which thanks to it has been reduced to a mere obstacle to human movement and a waste of time.”
—Milan Kundera (b. 1929)