I plan to do a short paper for a US history course soon, and I've decided I'd like to write about the arms and equipment brought to the new world in early expeditions. Are there any known, reliable web resources on the sorts of arms and equipment brought to, say, Roanoke in the late 1500's or Jamestown in the early 1600's?

I'm trying to keep the number of book resources down, as it would take time to find a copy (buying is out of the question I'm afraid) and borrow it, then read it.

I've also heard that they brought a few armored soldiers with them, but I'm not very well educated on this aspect of the early settlement attempts.

M.

Did you read this?

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Swords in the Virginia Muster of 1624/25
An article by Sean Flynt

And check out: Arms and Armor in Colonial America, by Harold L. Peterson

Don't know how helpful this will be, but here's a short blurb on Conquistador armor and clothing from the National Park Service. Includes a list of arms and armor carried by an expedition of 1540. The Spanish led several expeditions through North America, including Cabrillo's expedition to the West Coast, Coronado's trek through New Mexico, West Texas, and a little of Arizona and Oklahoma, and Ponce de Leon's expedition to Florida (and later in 1565, the founding of St. Augustine, FL, the oldest continually inhabited European settlement in what is now the United States, near where de Leon landed).

Hi,

Can only echo Nathan's suggestions. Used Peterson as a major source for a similar project several years ago. Peterson, a very knowledgable guy, was with the National Park Service for many years and was also a serious collector.

Dan

There is a Yahoo group for the Jamestown Volunteers,

http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/Jamestown-Vols/

I don't see anything offhand in the files section about armor, but there is plenty to see in the Photos section. Presumably you'd have to join the group to see those. But I'm sure the folks there could point you in the right direction. Also this one:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vamilitia-17thc/

As I understand it (very basically!), the Jamestown folks came to the New World loaded with the regular pikes and stuff, expecting to fight Spaniards. They ended up with musketeers screened by swordsmen with targets (shields), all heavily armored to protect them from arrows. The reenactors at Jamestown used to use more mail and padded armor, but most of that seems to have been ditched in favor of cuirasses and tassets as their evidence firmed up. I remember years ago, feeling very odd because I spent many years reenacting Hastings and Viking-era stuff with mailshirt, helmet, shield, and sword--and here I was at Jamestown, c. 1610, with all the same gear! Last time (the 400th anniversary, VERY cool), I was a plate-armored musketeer. Still very fun!

Matthew

Explore this site:

http://www.preservationvirginia.org/rediscove...page_id=68

Be sure to see the Publications page--The little Jamestown Rediscovery monographs are inexpensive and excellent. Very much worth having if this is an ongoing interest for you. :D

You'll also find other threads here about colonial NA arms and armour.

Here are some 17thc Virginian arms and armor photos I took at Jamestown Settlement and Historic Jamestowne. I haven't fully annotated them yet, but hope to soon.

http://ForensicFashion.com/1607EnglishSoldier.html

Looks like strictly munitions grade stuff; there's even a very crude Savoyard-style helmet in one shot.

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Pikemen's armour for the infantry. Cabasset helmets seem to have been the norm. Large round shields (!)

Oh, yes, isn't that a spiffy helmet? It's one of those found at Martin's Hundred (Wolstenhome Towne). I had to try it on, and it barely went on cuz I have a big head. (And then it barely came *off*, which was a little scary!) But I really felt like the Terminator while wearing it.

For years the Jamestown folks pointed out a bit of irony--they mostly wear various cabassets and morions, since those were the common grunt helmets of the time. And yet, until a couple years ago, the ONLY helmets excavated in that region from that era were the 2 close helmets from Martin's Hundred! So they basically had to side-step their primary archeological evidence... I think they've found a few morion parts since then, whew!

Matthew