I grew up in Gravesend, where Pocahontas died and was buried in 1617.
It was when my oldest son went to his first Carol Concert with his primary school that I noticed the small picture frame in the porch of St Mary’s church.
The text reads:“In 1586 when Sir Richard Grenville returned from the newly established colony at Roanoke Island (North Carolina) he brought back an Alonquin Indian to this country and named him ‘Raleigh’ after his good friend and cousin Sir Walter Raleigh.
Sadly, on 7th April 1589 the same register records the burial of ‘Rawly’ (spelt differently but phonetically similar) in this churchyard, Above can be seen ‘Lawrence, the servant of Sir Richard Grenville’ buried 2 days later on 9th April, presumably as the result of influenza or a similar infection in the Grenville household.”A tragic story, I think. It’s not clear whether Raleigh came willingly or was captured. Certainly he can’t have begun to imagine what he was coming to when he boarded that ship to England. Grenville, having named him as he might name a pet dog, intended to make use of him as a translator on his next expedition to North Carolina. Sadly Raleigh didn’t live long enough to go home.
