“Princess Pocahontas.” Base of statue by William Ordway Partridge. Memorial at St. George Church, Gravesend, England. Photo: Tracy Jenkins, Art UK. CC.
The Virginia Company’s publicity tour had been a success. Plans were made to send more colonists to Jamestown and to establish schools for religious and English instruction among Native children in Virginia.
Arrangements were made for the party to return to Virginia in the spring of 1617. As the ship set sail, Matoaka and John dined with Captain Argall in his quarters. She became sick soon after. Argall docked the ship at the town of Gravesend. Matoaka died at the Gravesend Inn and was buried at the nearby Church of St. George. Many myths have grown up around her last words, but nothing is known for certain. The party held a funeral for her at the church before setting sail again. Fearing he would not survive the journey, John Rolfe left their son Thomas with relatives.
The Mattaponi Oral History records a different version of the events. It claims that shortly after the dinner with Captain Argall, Matoaka told her sister Mattachana that she thought “the English” put something in her food. Mattachanna tried to care for her, but her condition worsened. She left to get Rolfe and when she returned, Matoaka was dead. The Oral History records that Mattachanna and Uttamatomakkin told Wahunsenaca that Matoaka had been in good health in England, and had not become sick until boarding the ship to return home.
It is impossible to know the whole truth of Matoaka’s final days. Oral traditions were long seen by Western scholars as mere folklore without reliable information. That has changed somewhat, but even scholars who argue for their indispensability point out that they are a different kind of history that, taken out of their oral medium, lose much of their nuance and meaning. As the authors of “The True Story of Pocahontas” state, “There are attributes of oral traditions that are not obtainable in a written format… There is a living connection between the oral historian and his or her ancestors.”
The lethality of eastern diseases to indigenous Americans is well documented and so European and American historians have rarely questioned the circumstances of Matoaka’s death. More skeptical writers have speculated that she may have soured on supporting the Virginia Company’s plans for large-scale conversion of Powhatan children to Christianity, or that her experience in London had not made her the enthusiastic advocate of “civilization” they had expected. Perhaps with her tour of London completed, she was no longer seen as crucial to the company’s plans. Like so much of Matoaka’s life, her death is impossible to be certain about.
Back in Tsenacomoco, the tenuous peace between the English and the Powhatan would endure for a few more years. But the death of Matoaka left Wahunsenaca stricken with grief. He turned over the leadership of the Powhatan Nation to his brother, Opitchapum. He died in 1618, roughly a year after his daughter.
Sources:
Pocahontas and Gravesend Jamestown/Yorktown Museums
“Indian Princess” sculpture- Pocahontas Archive