Jamestown Colonist Died Dbq

Many of the Jamestown colonist died in the New World but the question is what caused it to happen. Some events and things that contributed to killing them may be shocking because we don't expect it to affect them like this. There could be many reasons why. Though, the real reasons we think the colonist died is because there was bacteria and sickness, even huge drought and winter came by, and because they we not careful about what they did. These events and things affected the Colonist greatly.
First of all, the people in Jamestown weren't careful with the water source(s) they had, they didn't value it enough. Jamestown was located by a river that lead to the ocean, the water connected with the ocean.The river had fresh water and the ocean water was salty. When the English excreted, had left over food, and had waste in general they had dumped it in the ocean hoping the tides would wash it away (Document A). Though they did not know it did the opposite. They had built wells to get fresh water from

There was a drought that lasted 1605-1614 which was the longest period Jamestown suffered (Document B). The lack of rain really affected the colonist because their crops didn't grow which meant that they could no longer trade with the Powhatan indians and because they had no food to feed themselves. Some colonist even considered cannibalism because they were so hungry. Also the drought left no water for the colonist to drink, so some died of dehydration. One winter of 1609-16010 (Document B) affected and killed many of the colonist, this happened because it left the colonist starving, it was too cold to do anything, and because it froze the crops and killed them too. Two thirds of the settlement died because of the harsh winter (Background Essay). These climate changes killed hundreds of colonist and greatly affected them, forcing to choose hard decisions and change the way they