The Princess Wild
Pocahontas was not who you think she was; she was a whole lot more
Disney had it right about Pocahontas. She's a cartoon, a supernaturally endowed siren who loves and saves John Smith. At least that's what she's become—a two-dimensional figment of the imagination, refracted through the biases of history.
In reality, Pocahontas was just a child when she met Smith. They were friends, never lovers. And it's not likely that she threw herself on Smith to save him from having his brains bashed out. Some historians say the self-promotional Smith made up that tale, written about 15 years after he left Jamestown. Others say he just misinterpreted an adoption ceremony in which Pocahontas may have played a scripted part.
If the reason for fame is false, why should we care about her? Because the real Pocahontas was a dazzling young woman, complex, headstrong, and shrewd—a bridge between two different worlds who arguably became for Jamestown exactly what Smith claimed: "the instrument to preserve this colony from death."
"Only nonpareil." When she first met Smith, Pocahontas was a dark-eyed girl about age 11, with the unselfconscious energy of a child. Like other Indian children, she wore nothing at all. Her black hair was chopped short at the sides and hung in a braid down her back. Her tawny frame was muscled from years spent laboring and playing outdoors.
Smith and his countrymen marveled at the little sprite, described by colonist William Strachey as cartwheeling naked with the boys of the fort. Smith, at least 14 years her senior, wrote that for "feature, countenance, and proportion" as well as for "wit and spirit," Pocahontas was "the only nonpareil" of the land. It's harder to say what she thought of the pale strangers who planted a fort in her father's realm; she left no writings of her own. But to them she stood out not just for her exuberance but because she was a favorite daughter of Powhatan, the great Indian chief who controlled the colony's fate.
Born around 1596 as Amonute (later called Matoaka), she was one of scores of children sired by Powhatan, the husband of more than 100 wives. His savvy daughter must have learned that to keep her father's affection, she had to make him laugh. "People who met her did describe a sparkling personality," says anthropologist Helen Rountree. She believes that it may have been Powhatan who gave his girl the nickname Pocahontas, meaning "little wanton" or "little mischievous one."
A precocious girl who quickly learned some English, Pocahontas became an intermediary between Powhatan and the Jamestown foreigners. On her first visit to the fort, she helped negotiate a release of some Indian prisoners, her presence interpreted by the colonists as a sign from Powhatan that he trusted the strangers enough to send his beloved daughter as an emissary.
That trust soon unraveled. In the winter of 1608-09, starving colonists tried to coerce food from the Indians, and violence boiled. During this turmoil, Pocahontas reportedly risked her life by sneaking through the woods at night to warn Smith and his party of a deadly ambush planned by Powhatan. Smith wrote that Pocahontas's "compassionate" heart gave him "much cause to respect her."
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