Pamunkey most powerful. Powhatan and his daughter Matoaka (Pocahontas), who achieved historical fame, were Pamunkey Native Americans. Captain Samuel Argall abducted her as a hostage in an attempt to secure the release of some English prisoners and ammunitions held by her father. Initial contact with Europeans was around 1570. "And from [1570] on at ever briefer intervals until the first permanent English colony was established at Jamestown in 1607, the Powhatan Confederacy was visited by white men: Spanish, French, and English." (Barbour, 5). Scholars estimate that when the English arrived in 1607, this paramount chiefdom numbered about 14,000–21,000 people. Colonists of
John Nicholl (mariner) John Nicholl (mariner) John Nicholl (fl. 1605–1637?) was an English mariner and author who joined an expedition to the English colony Guiana in 1605. He was shipwrecked and rescued by Spaniards who imprisoned him as a spy. He returned to England in 1607 and published an account of his adventures. He was one of 67 Englishmen who on 12 April 1605 sailed in the "Olive Branch", at the charge of Sir Olyff Leigh, to join the colony which had been planted by Captain Charles Leigh on the river "Wiapica" (Oyapoc) in Guiana, their leader being Captain Nicholas St. John. Off