When a portrait of a crinkly eyed Smith was shown on "Biography," our daughter Sarah, age 7, said, "Oh, my God! He's got a beard! He's almost bald!"

When a portrait of the Indian princess was shown, Sarah took one look at the somewhat plump, round-faced child and declared: "That is not Pocahontas."

During one commercial break, however, she exclaimed, "There they are," pointing triumphantly to the screen, where the voluptuous Indian maiden and surfer John were indeed frolicking. It was an ad for the animated movie.

The film's most important critics—those under 4-feet all—want to know why Pocahontas and John Smith couldn't live happily ever after.

"It was great, but I wanted them to be boyfriend and girlfriend," said Stephanie, 8, on Saturday.

"I didn't really understand why he wanted to go back to England," said Travis, 10.

"I liked the ending," said Erica, 5. "I liked the way Pocahontas ran to the top of the hill. But I would have liked to see her married."

Captain John Smith

One of the most highly disputed issues in Smith's writings is his miraculous salvation by Pocahontas in 1607. Though he briefly told the story in the The True Relations (1608) and somewhat elaborated on it in later writings, the public first learned about the incident only in 1624, when the following account of it was included in The Generall Historie, that contains the most complete version.

The significant time-gap immediately gave rise to speculations whether the events took place as described by him or, even worse, whether they took place at all. Smith himself claimed that he had related the story to Queen Anne in a letter in 1616, but, of course, the letter could not be found and Queen Anne had already died by 1624. Likewise all possible witnesses of the scene were either dead (Pocahontas, Powhatan) or could not be interrogated because the war (1622-1640) had made the Indians and the English enemies.What made him even more suspicious is the fact that his narration follows archetypal patterns. Smith's contemporaries knew such stories from Greek mythology (i.e.: Ariadne/Theseus) or from recent history. In 1529, for instance, Juan Ortiz, a Spanish soldier, was reported to have been saved under similar circumstances by an Indian girl in Florida. Thus Smith might just have invented his story following the outlines of similar stories in order to add a fictional quality to his otherwise dry historical writing. Theweleit suggests that Smith knew that for any writing to be attractive and effective it needs a fictional element.

Some critics have argued that Smith misinterpreted the situation completely, given that the whole scene ever took place: He never was in real danger, his execution was just staged. He had to die symbolically to be born again -- and here opinions differ greatly -- either as subordinate chief of the settlers, recognized by Powhatan, or as Powhatan's adopted son Nantaquoud. However unclear Pocahontas' role in this ceremony of initiation/adoption may be, her intervention has accordingly been interpreted as part of the ritual. Unfortunately there is no evidence for such ceremonies directly from the Algonkins, but some Northwestern tribes are known to have performed such death-and-initiation rituals. According to this interpretation Powhatan pursued a policy of integration during the early stages of white settlement. Yet the question remains unanswered why Smith did not relate these events in his report of 1608. Various answers have been given, such as that he might have been embarrassed to have been saved by a 12-year-old girl, or that political considerations could have forced him to keep silent or that the editor simply shortened the story, but none of them is convincing enough. Theweleit speculates that Smith tried to confirm his manhood in the manner of the popular story of the gentleman of the South, that he attempted to draw attention to him after a more or less uneventful, unsuccessful life in Europe and that he tried to portray a noble exception of a wild red girl saving a Christian.

Histo/myth-tory

But there is a further aspect to this issue: Pocahontas and Captain Smith have entered mythology, and their relationship has become a popular myth whereas the marriage between Pocahontas and John Rolfe is far more less known. History consists of events that happened, did not happen and could/should have happened. Myth, on the other hand, only needs a center of facts to originate from (though of course Postmodernists and New-Historicists are sceptical about such a clear-cut distinction). The relation between Pocahontas and Captain Smith is more attractive and therefore more suitable to function as the core of a myth because of its sense of seduction and transgression. Quite in contrast, the marriage between Pocahontas and Rolfe is less sensational because it was legalised: she was baptized, educated and therefore was a full member of the Jamestown community. Secondly there is no evidence for a romantic affair between Pocahontas and Captain Smith, but the lack of facts makes the relationship even more attractive, it leaves room for speculation and fabulation.
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In this case, America has an original, non-British mother who is noble enough to save her enemy, a distinguished Englishman. The union between the European hero and the Native American Princess was short, but harmonic and effective. The founding act itself has become mythological, undesirable consequences like the following expulsion of the Indians have not found a way into popular mythology. Through his writings Smith promoted himself successfully and became a pop-star. He made himself Siegfried, Odysseus, Aeneas and created the core for a story that perfectly satisfied various needs over the centuries. Pocahontas has become the mother of the New World. She symbolizes the birth of a new generation arising from the union of distinctive Native American and European heritage. John Rolfe did not enter the myth- and story-making of America's founding because he is too traceable, too real. Also his connection to the history of tobacco, the driving away of the Indians and the more or less forceful Christianization of Pocahontas is not really desired in the presentation of America's origins until today.

According to Theweleit it was John Davis, who first created a mytho-literary life of Pocahontas. In 1805 he published three novels, in which he focused on her as the romantic heroine of a love story: The first settlers of Virginia, an historical novel; Captain John Smith and Princess Pocahontas, an Indian Tale; Pocahontas. He wrote a whole series of books, of which the last one, The life and surprising adventures of the celebrated John Smith, first settler of Virginia, was published in 1813. Pocahontas, highly romanticized by him, is a heroic and virtuous character, her features are in accordance with white standards. In other words, in this presentation she has lost her Indian identity.
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What people like Cooke and Henry ultimately tried to do was to maintain the foundation myth of Virginia in the face of the Northern equivalent, the story of the Pilgrim Fathers, who arrived in New England only in 1621. The history of their settlement found entry into the schoolbooks as the model of early settlement, whereas the history of the first settlement in Jamestown was denigrated its historical status and instead confined to the realms of mythology, song and literature. Such efforts were in vain, they were even counterproductive because Pocahontas was simply absorbed by the dominant, that is Northern, discourse, and became an integral part of the Plymouth Culture as Theweleit puts it. Pocahontas became the mother of the whole union.

After the Civil War the North rewrote not only its own history but also the history of the whole union. The 250th anniversary of the arrival of the Pilgrim Fathers at Plymouth in 1871 was a perfect occasion for the Northerners to stress the moral superiority of the Pilgrims (and thus of themselves) to Smith and his companions (meaning of course the Southerners) in their oratories. In Theweleit's opinion this was the birth of the American religious moralism that insists on moral superiority as being the core of the victory of the white North over the transgressing South. This feeling of superiority has been hidden differently at different times. For the purpose of justifying the Civil War properly it was covered by the popular desire to fight salvery. The process of renaming this moralism experienced various stages of which today's campaign against tobacco (being produced in the South) is only the last instance.