Then, nearly to your destination, a hurricane strikes... There were perhaps a hundred women with children traveling to Jamestown that summer of 1609. Many were alone, since their husbands were on the flagship Sea Venture. The horror they endured that fateful July day is something we can only imagine.

“Janey!” I screamed, but in a moment she was gone, tumbling across the ’tween deck. “Janey, Janey,” I murmured. I could not save her now. I could see nothing but blackness nor hear anything but wind and rain.

Again and again we felt the Blessing rise and drop—the waves must have been as tall as cathedrals. We teetered to port then starboard, aft and bow.

It battered us and threw us and knocked us into one another. It rolled us and beat us and slammed our few possessions into us and onto us.

Our screams drowned in the wind, even unto our own ears.

I felt the bruises on my body and the warm, salty liquid trickling into my mouth. Blood. Janey was somewhere, and I could neither find her nor help her.

I lay on a mattress and made my arms and legs loose. It was helpless to fight, hopeless to stand. I would have to allow myself to roll. I gripped the mattress and went over and over, feeling boots in my face, heads in my stomach, elbows in my eyes.The ship rose and fell, rose and fell. Waves pounded it, and the wind howled like some great demon.... Death, be merciful, I thought. Swift and beneath the cold water, as Harrison had said. Take us quickly; take us now. It was no longer a matter of if, only when.

From Dark Enough to See the Stars in a Jamestown Sky by Connie Lapallo © 2006

When James, the interpreter, kindly offered me a chance to lower the flags of the reproduction Susan Constant, I jumped at the chance.

Below is the ship’s upper deck--a view the passengers would only have seen if the ship were at a virtual standstill--and only then at the Captain’s whims.