Jamestown
	
	During the early 1600's the Spanish owend alot of land in the Americas.  They were growing wealthy and spreading their religion and influence.  The British decided to try their luck at a new colony, despite the incident at Roanoke.  Jamestown was the first succesful British colony, although they had many problems from the start.
	The settlers expected to find gold and silver, and copper.  Instead of these matals they found tobbaco, crops, and especialy lumber, so scarce in England.  Another motive they had they had tov settle was to convert the Natives to Christianity.  This is what most countries involed in the Age of Exploration did with their religion.  
	I beleive that the British settled in North America because South America was just about totaly claimed.  Even if there was enough room, the chance of them being attacked would be high.  At the location in Virginia they could pick their general area, not the amount of land they recieved.  They were farther away from the mighty Spanish, and had room to expand.
	At first Jamestown had been ruled by a Council.  John Smith, who was to soon become the first leader of Jamestown was mearly a member due to his arrest on the ship, caused by quarrels on the journey over.  After the council failed and Jamestown fell into chaos, he took over.  Jamestown remained as it was with little improvement.  
	John Smith is known for telling over exaggerated stories, like the story of Poccahontas, the young indian girl who saved him from her father.  This story is famous even today.  Poccahontus later married John Rolfe then died from smallpox.
	After John Smith came am autocratic ruler, Sir Thomas Dale.  He wanted to put Jamestown into, order.  Since the settlers wouldn't listen to laws, he gave them all a peice of land.  Because they all had land they wanted laws to protect it.  He got Jamestown on its feet.
	Some of the problems of the first colony were mentioned above.  Due to John Smith's arrest Virginia was put under rule of a council.  Virginia was in utter confusion for many other reasons also.  First, there was no gold to be found, and no settlers could keep any money. No one wanted to work for nothing.  Eventually Jamestown was infested with mularia, and faliure of crops.