Increasingly fewer people today inside or beyond the Christian world know much about the life or miracles associated with St. Bartholomew, one of the Twelve Apostles of Jesus of Nazareth. Fewer still know of Bartholomew Gosnold’s existence, the “primary mover” in the establishment of Jamestown colony, the first permanent British settlement in North America. On the surface, it would appear that these two have little in common beyond general anonymity, but they both share like, worthy stories that impacted contemporaries and unborn millions alike in extraordinary ways.
Bartholomew, thought to have been born in Cana of Galilee (then part of the Roman Empire) in the 1st century AD/CE, was friend to Philip (another of the Twelve Apostles who is thought to have introduced Bartholomew to Jesus). According to John 1:47 (King James Version), Jesus saw in Bartholomew (referred to as “Nathanael” in the Gospel of John) a man of character. “Behold an Israelite indeed," Jesus is to have said, "in whom is no guile!”
In the years following Jesus of Nazareth’s death, Bartholomew carried the message of his mentor and savior into the lands of Zarathustra (Persia) and perhaps even into those of the Brahmins (India). While the historical record contains relatively few conclusive clues as to his life or actions, especially in India, it is nonetheless plausible that both Bartholomew and his message would have met with more interest than disdain given both the spiritual curiosity of the native peoples of the Near East at the time and the moral purity associated with Bartholomew’s character as evidenced by Jesus' own words.
In Bartholomew’s day, the Kingdom of Armenia would have stretched from roughly the shores of the Black Sea in the northwest to the Caspian Sea in the east. It was an expansive, rugged region—roughly 10 times the size of today’s modern republic of Armenia which is located along the eastern border of Turkey—whose history was shaped largely by one of the world’s most powerful empires: Rome. In the 60s AD/CE, as Bartholomew negotiated the mountainous terrain, stopping at farming communities along the many river valleys or plateaus to share the universal message of hope and eternal salvation as embodied in the death and proclaimed resurrection of Jesus Christ, he would have met with individuals who had already long subscribed to a messianic faith—Zoroastrianism—a faith based on a single Supreme Being and one that espoused concepts of heaven and hell, right and wrong, and the use of one’s free will. Because the Kingdom of Armenia existed on the borderlands of the Roman and Parthian (former Persian) Empires thereby free from direct, foreign control, its people could have more freely embraced or cast aside the new ideas, cultures, and peoples that are omnipresent along any historical borderland, whether in St. Bartholomew’s Armenia or in Bartholomew Gosnold’s America. Since Bartholomew’s message about Christ was similar to Zoroaster’s long-accepted and state-sponsored (and pre-Islamic) message, it is easy to understand why Christianity, with its tenets that transcended one’s nation-state or station in life, would take root.
While the message is often more important than the messenger, people do tend to listen with more intent and do critically reflect upon messaging if the source is a believable, reputable, and likable one. Such was seemingly the nature of Bartholomew and this might have helped him win converts. Yet whether it was Bartholomew’s character or simply the spiritual openness of the Armenian people that enabled the new religion to take hold (Armenia would become the first state in the world to adopt Christianity), his mission there did plant the seeds of the Christian faith which would be nurtured in and ultimately saved by the Byzantines (Byzantine Empire, circa 330 – 1453).
Despite Bartholomew’s success at spreading Jesus’ message and winning converts, he did meet with opposition from those who saw him and his message as a social and spiritual threat. While the manner of his death is still contested today, one legend suggests that Bartholomew cured the daughter of Polymius (possibly a regional governor or nominal king) of madness while he also performed miracles that local priests could not duplicate, explain, or perform themselves. As a result, Polymius converted to Christianity and allowed Bartholomew to preach freely about the land. Upon hearing Polymius had been baptized in the new Christian faith, Polymius’ brother Astyages became enraged and called for war against all Christians. Bartholomew was soon captured and then either flayed alive and crucified upside down, or beheaded outright. The prior (flaying) is eternized today in Rome in the Sistine Chapel where Michelangelo’s Last Judgment depicts St. Bartholomew holding his own skin in his hand. The year of his martyrdom in Armenia was likely 68 AD/CE, which, in a tragically ironic and equally fateful way, would have corresponded with the waning years of the Roman emperor Nero’s reign, himself known to torture and execute followers of what he called the “mischievous superstition” of Christianity.
However the ultimate means of his ill-fated passing, sources maintain that St. Bartholomew’s body—known to history as “Bartholomew’s relics”—was first transported to the island of Lipari, located north of the island of Sicily in the Mediterranean Sea, before eventually being sent to Rome for rest in a church built in his name (the Basilica of St. Bartholomew). It is an august sanctuary to present day and one truly befitting that of an eidolon.
If St. Bartholomew’s transformative and ultimately fateful work has rightly been associated with the Kingdom of Armenia or compass points east and north of his presumed birthplace of Cana, Bartholomew Gosnold’s fate and fame would be found in lands—a “New World”—far to the west and south of his place of origin in Grundisburgh, Suffolk, England.
Born in the 1570s to affluent and influential parents, Bartholomew Gosnold perhaps seemed more likely destined to a life of letters and books, whether religious or legal, than one filled with astrolabes or the construction of crude palisades in unchartered lands. Yet connections to the nobles and notables of high society in London town and being a nephew to a swashbuckling, privateering uncle enabled Gosnold to consider other more imaginative and intriguing outlets for his life’s path while concomitantly supporting his wife (Mary Golding Gosnold) and their seven children as was expected of a gentleman of his day.
In 1597, Gosnold first experienced salt and sail when he joined his uncle Robert on an English naval mission to the Azores off the Iberian coast. Beyond the experience gained in developing a stomach and legs for blue-water enterprises and engagements, he also amassed some royal notoriety and more than a modest material fortune whilst preying on Spanish merchant ships. His exploits were part of the larger Anglo-Spanish War (1585 – 1604), and he served under no less than Walter Raleigh (the British polymath and future popularizer of American tobacco), and Robert Devereux, the 2nd Earl of Essex (a known favorite in both mind and body of Queen Elizabeth I).
Albert Bierstadt's 1858 painting, Gosnold At Cuttyhunk 1602.
Whether motivated by further material gain or a patriotic zeal for country, Gosnold began to envision a permanent New World settlement across the Atlantic Ocean in northern Virginia. In 1602, Gosnold secured patronage and captaincy of a ship, the Concord, for an expedition to Virginia (note: in 1602 “Virginia” encompassed all the land along the eastern coast of North America from Spanish Florida to French Canada). With gusto, his God, and 39 souls (20 intended to form the first permanent colonists), Gosnold reached the American coast in seven weeks.
In search of a permanent settlement site, Gosnold sailed south from his original landing point at Cape Elizabeth (near present-day Portland, Maine) and tacked south until he reached a cape which he notated for its multitudinous cod. South of the cape he decided to name “Cape Cod," Gosnold discovered a series of islands. One of the islands he named “Martha’s Vineyard” both to honor his firstborn daughter whose soul had parted for eternal shores as an infant some four years previous and for the wild grapes that covered the island. Still another of the islands he named “Elizabeth’s Island” out of reverence to his queen, Elizabeth I.
After approximately a month gathering sassafras root, cutting cedar, and beating back both mosquitoes and hostile native peoples (likely Wampanoags), Gosnold and his small band decided to quit the small fort they had erected and sail back to England before all supplies ran out. Thus whether Shakespeare did actually base Prospero’s Island in his timeless work The Tempest from Gosnold’s notes of Martha’s Vineyard or whether the Shakespearean connection merely remains a troubadour’s tale, Gosnold’s aborted attempt at settling the future colony of Massachusetts occurred four years prior to Samuel de Champlain’s (the “Father of New France”) charting of its coast, seven years before fellow Englishman Henry Hudson made landfall in the area while searching for the passage to Cathay (modern China), and a full eighteen years before the famed Mayflower trimmed sail near the “cape of cod” Gosnold had chronicled.
Shortly after his return in 1602, Gosnold set about putting together another of his “projects” as Captain John Smith would later write. However disappointed or encouraged (or both) Gosnold may have been over the scrubbed attempt to plant a lasting colony, he actively worked to secure the necessary shillings and souls to make a go at a second attempt. After all, even though he experienced setbacks in his first attempt, he had gained invaluable experience and insight at “doing” colonization. Further and perhaps even more importantly, his initial foray revealed the economic potential of future ventures given the interest of merchants in the commodities (sassafras and cedar) he brought back with them.
In 1603, however, Gosnold’s plans looked like they may be stifled. Just as the calendar months seem to pass quickly in preparing for his next “project,” Queen Elizabeth I also passed away and James I became king. Because all new dynasties are generally wrought with new circles of power and patronage, the coronation of the new king could have displaced Gosnold’s previously well-placed connections—connections needed for another attempt at permanent settlement of the New World. Yet Gosnold found the changing of the guard to be a boon for him and his plans. In addition to the ongoing support of influential contacts, Gosnold also benefited from the changes espoused by the king himself. Because James I seemed to relish right-brained activities, as evidenced by his own scholarly pursuits or the Elizabethan arts that flourished during his reign, he proved to be a willing sponsor of new voyages of discovery and thus commissioned charters for future explorations, to include one which would enable Gosnold to return to Virginia.
Within a few years and with the aid of men within James I’s court, Gosnold found himself among a select group chosen to lead a new voyage of discovery and settlement as part of the Virginia Company of London. Gosnold and his peers, while still subject to the requirements of the British Crown, did have a great deal of autonomy relative to decision-making because they were part of a private, capitalist venture (the London Company of Virginia, comprised of two private joint stock companies, received a charter from the king for the venture). Thus it is clear that the original settlement of British North America was driven by venture capitalists as much as it was by pioneers or pulpiteers.
After weeks of waiting for weather to clear in late 1606 and early 1607, three ships carrying nearly eight score of settlers and crew set westerly sail from the Azores—waters Gosnold knew well from his privateering days. By late April, 1607, the 55-foot Susan Constant, commanded by Christopher Newport (who had been named admiral of the naval portion of the expedition), the 68-foot Godspeed, commanded by Gosnold himself (named vice-admiral), and the 38-foot Discovery, commanded by John Ratcliffe arrived near the mouth of the James River at the southern end of the Chesapeake Bay in America. Once there, Gosnold and other leading members of the expedition cracked the seal on the company’s written instructions. Inside the document, they found the names of seven men who would form the colony’s Royal Council. Interestingly, while popular accounts of the settlement of Jamestowne today continue to perpetuate and regale the exploits of Captain John Smith (to include the statue to him that exists in Historic Jamestowne today), documentary evidence reveals that Bartholomew Gosnold’s name preceded John Smith’s on the company list. In fact, Gosnold’s name appeared second on the list thus intimating well his position among the 104 first settlers who went ashore to open British North America.
Over the course of the next three increasingly dry, hot summer months of 1607, Gosnold would help oversee the erection of a triangular fort (known as “James Fort”), serve as arbiter and peacemaker among opposing factions when they emerged within the settlement, and defend the colony from outside forces, to include one instance where he was rumored to have sailed the Godspeed near the fort in order to use the ship’s guns to scatter hostile natives (likely Powhatan). Yet there would be one real or perceived enemy of the colony that Bartholomew Gosnold could not persuade, control, or eradicate: disease. On August 22, 1607, at the age of 36, Gosnold succumbed to what was thought likely to be malaria, dysentery, or swamp fever. He was not alone in his passing. In fact, over the course of that first summer in Jamestowne nearly 50% of the 104 settlers would perish from an unseen enemy. Numbered among the deceased would be two other Gosnolds, both named Anthony: a younger brother and a cousin (apparently both named for Bartholomew’s father).
In 2002, at Historic Jamestowne, archaeological work led by a pioneer in his own right, Dr. William Kelso, unearthed a single isolated burial just outside the fort walls containing skeletal remains of a European male who likely had died in his mid-to-late thirties and who had been buried with honor (outside the fort, in a gabled coffin, and with a ceremonial captain’s staff). While DNA testing proved inconclusive, the remains are thought to be that of Bartholomew Gosnold, the “primary mover,” to use Captain John Smith’s own phrase, of the Jamestowne settlement and perhaps truly one of America’s “Founding Grandfathers.”
Just as St. Bartholomew seldom attracts deserved and needed attention in print today for his actions and example, especially when compared to other apostles of Jesus of Nazareth, Bartholomew Gosnold also remains frustratingly lost to history as visionary and leader of both the Jamestowne settlement—the first permanent British settlement in North America—and chronicler of the Cape Cod area which enabled future English settlement in 1620.
A haiku for the Batholomews two:
O’ Bartholomews!
History doth not recall
Ye agents of change.
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