The Road to Goinstown: America’s Red, White, and Black Story from the Lost Colony to Revolutionary War
What if the Lost Colony of Roanoke was not lost?
This is a story of America's red, white, and black history from the Lost Colony of Roanoke to the Revolution. The purpose is to refresh forgotten memories of how America came to be and why it's worth preserving.
The search for the Lost Colony continues because too much evidence suggests that the English people, along with Manteo, a royal son of the Croatoan Indians, brought to the Outer Banks in 1587, did not simply fade away. They melded with the Natives.
The English and Spanish competed for supremacy on land and at sea. The English Sea Dogs, including Sir Walter Raleigh, Sir Francis Drake, and Sir John Hawkins, were privateers granted patents and commissions by Queen Elizabeth I to combat the Spanish. English ships roamed the high seas, searching for Spanish vessels to raid and take as "prizes."
English explorers found the Algonquin-speaking Natives of the Outer Banks welcoming. So, the English established settlements to ensure ships and sailors crossing the Atlantic had a place to rest.
Soon after the 1587 landing at Roanoke Island, Governor John White left for supplies. He entrusted Manteo with looking after the planters and moving them inland near the Alligator Swamp, where sassafras trees grew plentifully. People believed sassafras would become a valuable commodity for treating syphilis.
By the time John White finally returned in 1590, he could not locate his colony because of a series of unfortunate events, including storms, shipwrecks, and deaths.
Reports described "Indians with beards," two-story brick houses, and Indians speaking English. Much evidence shows that Algonquin-speaking Natives continued friendly relations with the English, even after many mishaps and conflicts. Indian groups from up and down the coast and inland fought alongside the English from the 1500s through the American Revolution.
Over 200 years, a great transformation took place. The English brought soldiers, tradesmen, and families from Europe. Sailors brought slaves rescued from Spanish settlements in the Caribbean and Florida. Indian wars, European settlement, and disease reduced the Native population indiscriminately.
Survivors moved inland based on racial, ancestral, and ideological ties. Some moved to the Dan River Valley and formed a community on land previously inhabited by the Saura Indians. They called the place Goinstown, and the people were called Melungeons because of their red, white, and black ancestry.
The Road to Goinstown weaves together the documented history of the Elizabethan-era English Discovery Voyages, early settlement and integration with Natives, intertribal conflict, and ultimately the American Revolution into a narrative that relays this amazing part of America's founding.
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