Page:Economic History of Virginia Vol 2.djvu/281

 addressed to the officers who had charge of the customs, in which they were instructed to permit every commodity designed for Virginia to leave their ports free from all imposition; this was intended to have direct application to the fleet making ready to sail for Virginia under the conduct of Sir Thomas Gates and now lying in the harbor of Plymouth. The eight ships and the pinnace constituting the fleet carried over the Third Supply to the Colony, which differed from the two preceding it only in quantity, being made up principally of food and apparel purchased with the funds contributed by the personal and corporate members of the Company in the manner already described. The flag-ship, in which one-fourth of the persons employed in the fleet and the greater part of the provisions were to be transported, was separated from the other vessels by a hurricane and finally wrecked upon the islands of Bermuda. The remainder arrived in Virginia safely. Previous to this event, Captain Argoll had reached the Colony on a fishing expedition, having in his ship a large supply of wine and biscuit designed for private trade; the necessities of the people at Jamestown being very urgent at this time, the provisions had been seized and consumed. The supply brought in by the fleet was very small. After the departure of the vessels in the following October, although the maize planted by Smith had been recently gathered, there intervened the frightful Starving Time, in which the greater number of the colonists perished. Somers and Gates, who had contrived means of escape from the Bermudas, reached Virginia in May, and finding the settlers plunged into the deepest misery, which they were unable to relieve with their insignificant cargo of provisions,