One can visit the replica of old Jamestown and enjoy walking through the huts, viewing tools and military equipment, and having a great view of the site.
The actual site of Jamestown is nearby and under excavation. One of the interesting takeaways I noted from the excavation is the evidence of arsenic in corpses. Historians have ventured forth with speculation about this arsenic. However, it is no mystery. Ships carried arsenic aboard and sprinkled it around food barrels. Vessels carried rat infestations abroad to many countries. A supply ship sent by the London Company (and later the Virginia Company) delivered supplies of all types, including foodstuffs. Traveling the seas was risky; passengers became ill from many diseases. Doubtless, carrying barrels ashore encountered the risk of arsenic poisoning.
One has to observe the diggings in person to appreciate a history disclosing the colonization of its first male passengers. Because of the dangerous conditions, women were not included in the first voyages.
What followed was an attack by the Powhatan Confederation of Indians that wiped out half of the colonists. The names of the survivors are available to members of VirginiaPioneers.net.
After the massacre, the colonists surrounded the little town with a palisade fence made of logs side by side vertically, with the tops sharpened as a defense against the Indians. As the story goes, Powhatan’s tribe was sometimes friendly with the colonists and shared canoes and other items of interest. However, the plan was that they would pretend to be pleasant on the day of the massacre, to the extent of borrowing a canoe to cross the river. They deluded the colonists and quickly killed them.
The Virginia Company transported colonists to and from England throughout the early 17th century. This was during the reign of Charles I (1600–1649), King of England, Scotland, and Ireland, who quarreled with Parliament. This king believed in the divine right of Kings and levied taxes without parliamentary consent. He was ultimately executed for his wars and persecutions. The monarchy was not restored until 1660, when his son, Charles II, was crowned king.
The Virginia colonists committed to a House of Burgess and sent representatives to London, only to discover that the king denied parliament its right to session. In examining the passenger lists of the supply ships, one might find that a burgess was onboard. Also, colonists were returning to England to get wives. Later, women were transported by the Virginia Company and “sold as wives.”
Sources: Royal History MSS. Commission, Eighth Report, p. 41; Force's Historical Tracts, Vol. III, p. 12; History of Jamestown