A Powhatan reconstructed village, part of living history in Jamestown Settlement.
Interpreter in Indian garb.
The mock camp also includes circular cooking pits, where a hearty meal would have included salt pork, beans, and hardtack; and the surgeon’s tent, where wounded soldiers would be treated with opium-based laudanum to ease pain. Gunshots echo through the camp with flintlock musket demonstrations, and a recreated Virginia farm is based on an actual homestead. “The tastes, the smells, and even the ducks and chickens are the same breeds as in the 18th century,” says Lanier. The main museum building puts the entire American Revolution in perspective, from the earlier French and Indian War to the start of the new nation. Some 500 original artifacts—weapons, documents, period furniture andmore—fill display cases along with detailed historical interpretations. Original portraits include England’s King George III, Lord Cornwallis, Founding Fathers, and perhaps the rarest item in the museum’s collection, a painting of African Ayuba Suleiman Diallo. “This is probably the earliest portrait done from life of an individual enslaved in North America,” says Davidson. I couldn’t help but notice the ornately-trimmed pistols once carried by the Marquis de Lafayette, the French military officer who came to the aid of the American rebels. An original copy of a 1776 Declaration of Independence, printed in Boston from a Philadelphia
copy, is viewed under low light. The1781Battleof Yorktown that ended theRevolutionary War thunders to life in the museum’s experiential theater with its 180-degree surround-sound screen, where seats rumble and cannonballs seemingly fly by in a smoky haze. Another exhibit depicts the less-known but important Battle of Great Bridge, where the patriots’ victory drove out British rule from Virginia in 1775. “That’s kind of the Lexington/Concord of Virginia,” explains Davidson. “It’s shown in full scale because the battle takes place on a 20-foot-wide causeway, with British troops marching across and Americans at the other end defending it.” Just a five-minute drive from the museum is the actual Yorktown Battlefield, also part of Colonial National Historical Park. A driving tour traces the British fortifications or redoubts, with stops explaining how American and French forces cornered the redcoats with no escape against the York River. Gen. Washington’s original sleeping tent is within the park’s Visitor Center, as is an original British cannon with an obvious dent in its shaft caused by a cannonball. “It’s called the Lafayette Cannon because when he came back to the United States and toured the East Coast, Lafayette saw that cannon, recognized it, and got quite emotional,” explains Park Ranger Linda Williams.
COLONIAL LIVING HISTORY
COAST TO COAST FALL MAGAZINE 2018
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