BBC NEWS | Programmes | From Our Own Correspondent | Putting Jamestown into context

BBC NEWS Programmes From Our Own Correspondent Putting Jamestown into context: "The Queen has arrived in the US to celebrate the 400th anniversary of the first permanent English settlement at Jamestown, Virginia - although many Americans will still tell you it was in Plymouth, Massachusetts - 13 years later.
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Nineteenth century historians had little respect for the settlers whom they described as lazy and incompetent. In short, Jamestown was a fiasco.
Virginia was also on the wrong side in the civil war. Sitting on top of Jamestown fort are the remains of a confederate gun emplacement.
'Historians in the 19th century were looking for a more noble beginning and opted for The Pilgrim Fathers,' Beverly Straube explained.
'They landed in Plymouth in 1620. They had their women and children, and were determined to forge a new life with religious freedom in a new England.'
That read much better than the story of the commercially driven Virginia company with its slaves and tobacco in the background, and reports of violence and cannibalism.
With the history of settlement re-versioned, the Thanksgiving holiday became associated with the ideals of the Pilgrim Fathers and although nothing remains to be seen of Plymouth's original settlement today most Americans will tell you that Plymouth is where it all began.
Remarkable archaeological discoveries have put Jamestown back on the map and all we need now, says Beverly Straub is another holiday straight after Thanksgiving called Jamestown day. "