Jamestown Rediscovery

In 1994, Preservation Virginia agreed to fund a 10-year archaeological project called Jamestown Rediscovery, in order to survey and explore their land.

[2] On April 4 work was begun in the area near the church protected by the 1900 sea wall, and archaeologists quickly discovered early colonial artifacts.

In May 2013, in conjunction with the Smithsonian Institution, the project announced the discovery of a young English woman who had been cannibalized during the "starving time" winter of 1609–1610.

Excavations continuing on the site have uncovered evidence of the Starving Time winter of 1609/10, the arrival of the survivors from the Bermuda shipwreck Sea Venture, and close to 1.5 million artifacts.

In 2013 they found evidence that the colonists had likely resorted to cannibalism during the "starving time",[3] and in 2010 discovered the remains of the original church built inside James Fort.

The archaeologists, including William Kelso, Beverly (Bly) Straube, and Nick Luccketti, used primary source material to estimate the location of the fort on Jamestown Island.

Sources included the Zuniga Map, made by a Spanish spy of the same name, and the accounts of original colonists, such as William Strachey, Captain Ralph Hamor, and John Smith.

[7] After expanding the dig, the archaeologists were able to validate that the Jamestown Fort had begun to wash into the James River, but was instead covered inadvertently by a Confederate earthwork during the American Civil War.

Tobacco pipes, pottery sherds, and combat armor all help date the excavation site to the early 17th century, giving even more support to the positive identification of the fort.

Goldsmiths, bricklayers, masons, perfumers, tailors, fishermen, coopers, blacksmiths, glassmakers, carpenters, and tobacco pipe makers are among the dominant professions for which there is archaeological evidence.

For example, one of the first human finds was the skeleton of a higher-status man aged around 19-20 who died due to a musket shot to the lower right leg that shattered the bones and led to a quick death.

It had long been thought that Baron De La Warr, who died en route to the colony from England on his second trip, had been buried elsewhere, but some recent research concluded that his body was brought to Jamestown for burial.