In August of 1716, a party of men was formed, from several parts of Virginia, to go over a pass recently discovered in the Blue Ridge Mountains. John Fontaine joined in and left comments in his diary, which is good because no one else left any description of the trip. In this note I continue with selections which give some idea of what Virginia was like. The assembly point for the trip was Germanna. Fontaine left Williamsburg with Spotswood, and the trip to Germanna was very similar to the one described in the last two notes. Five days of travel were required to reach Germantown.
At Germanna, Fontaine came down with a violent fever for which he took the bark. From the symptoms and the cure, he had, as many newcomers to Virginia did also, malaria. The second day out from Germanna they had venison for dinner, in abundance, which they roasted on wooden forks before the fire. Two days later they killed a bear and more deer.
The next day the troop was besieged by hornets, which were very troublesome to the horses. On September 2, a Sunday, they saw another bear, but, it being Sunday they did not endeavor to kill anything. The next day, a thicket was so well laced together that their clothles and baggage were much damaged. At this point they were near the foot of the Blue Ridge Mountains. Progress was very slow and they made only eight miles.
On the fourth, one of the horses was bitten by a rattlesnake. The sides of the hills were so full of vines and briars that they had to clear a way for men and horses. As they ascended, they killed four rattlesnakes. The camp that night was called, familiarly, "rattlesnake" camp. The next day they crested the Blue Ridge. They found marked trees marking a trail which they presumed to have been made by the Indians. Over the mountains, they found tracks and bedding places for buffaloes and elk. They found grapes very good for the eating.
At the Shenandoah (they called it the Euphrates) they caught fish. Others killed deer and turkeys. On the way home, at one camp, there were deer, bears, and turkeys. On Sunday, September 9, they killed three bears. Fontaine could not easily eat bear and says it would have tasted better if he had not known what it was. He did compare it to veal. On the next day they were back at Germanna. At Germanna, Fontaine caught fish in the Rapidan (he calls it as it was originally named, the Rappahannock). On several occasions on the trip, Fontaine mentions large snakes which he seemed determined to kill.
Because the First Colony of Germans arrived so late in the year, it was impossible for them to raise any crops in 1714. To help them (and perhaps avoid having to supply them with food), Gov. Spotswood had legislation passed declaring there was to be no hunting by others within a five radius of Germanna. Assuming the Germans took advantage of the game, they could have been eating venison, bear, and turkey meat. They could also have caught fish in the river. If they went farther afield they might have had buffalo and elk. But it sounds as if they would not have lacked protein in the vicinity of Germanna.
Both the First and Second Colonies would have encountered, or met, Indians. As has been commented before, the Germans were the vanguard of civilization, the western edge, living under primitive conditions. Basically, if they couldn't grow it or make it themselves, they did without.
We gratefully acknowledge the work of John Blankenbaker who published over 2,500 Germanna History Notes via the Germanna-L@rootsweb.com email list from 1997 to 2008. We are equally thankful to George Durman (Sgt. George) for hosting the list and republishing the notes via rootsweb.com.