Nevertheless, he took the lead in the early life of the colony, taking part in the expedition to the James River falls in May and June 1607.

However, his persistent illness kept him from executing his office, leaving the duties of the presidency to Ratcliffe, Archer, and John Martin.

"Now all of us at James Town beginning to feel that sharp prick of hunger, which no man truly describe but he which hath tasted the bitterness thereof," he recounted later.

In June 1610, Thomas West, 3rd Baron De La Warr arrived in Jamestown and with a commission to serve as the colony's governor.

In August 1610, De la Warre sent Percy and seventy men to attack the Paspahegh and Chickahominy tribes.

The force ravaged the tribal settlements, burning their buildings, decimating their crops, and indiscriminately killing men, women, and children.

Percy also led the successful defense of the Jamestown fort against a Native American attack and earned the praise of De La Warr.

"But the winds not favoring them, they were enforced to shape their course directly for England—my lord having left and appointed me deputy governor in his absence, to execute martial law or any other power and authority as absolute as himself.

First, to address a long standing myth perpetuated on some more recent genealogy websites: Only one book asserts, with no dates, places or any sources cited, that George Percy married a woman named Anne Floyd, and they had a daughter, Anne Percy, who married Governor John West.

However, even their own caveat is suspect because there are no females named Percy or Floyd in the Jamestown Lists of Living & Dead in 1623, and none in the 1624/25 Muster.

This author cites one of his primary sources thusly: "This account of the issue of the eighth Earl of Northumberland, so full and accurate, is chiefly given from MS Collections of the late Thomas Butler, Esq.