Spotlight / World History

Classic Vision/age fotostock

In 1587 a small colony was founded on an island off the eastern coast of North America. The settlement would have been the first permanent English colony in the New World, had the settlers not disappeared owing to unknown circumstances. The lost colony of Roanoke is one of the most-notorious mysteries in American history; the cryptic clues left at the abandoned settlement and the lack of any concrete evidence make it the focus of wild speculation and theories.

In the settlement’s difficult founding year, its mayor, John White, left for England to request resources and manpower. He returned three years later only to find the settlement empty—his wife, child, and grandchild, the first English child born in the Americas, having vanished. The word CROATOAN and the letters CRO, carved into trees within the colony’s borders, were the only signs pointing to an explanation. Despite the clues, the returning crew was unable to search for the missing colonists; a storm approached just as they came upon the desolate settlement, forcing them to turn back for England.

On the basis of the mysterious tree carving, the nearby Croatoan Island, now known as Hatteras Island, is the location to which many believe the colonists moved. At the time of the colony’s founding, the Hatteras Indians occupied the island, and a popular theory supposes that the colonists joined the group of Native Americans to overcome their lack of resources and knowledge of the land.

A supposed piece of evidence for this claim is the existence of carvings in stones that were purportedly made by Eleanor Dare, the daughter of John White. These stones, often called the Dare Stones, contain written stories that tell the fates of the colonists and personal anecdotes from Dare to her father. Though they are largely believed to be a hoax and forgery, there is some academic belief that at least one of the stones may be authentic.

Since 1998, the Croatoan Project has researched and provided archaeological evidence to back up the theory that the colonists moved to be with, or at least interacted with, the Hatteras tribe. Artifacts and objects found within Croatoan villages that only English settlers had owned or had made at the time have solidified the connection between the two groups. But despite this evidence, and many other theories, it is likely that no definitive answer to the mystery of the colonists’ disappearance will ever be found.