The Roanoke colony may have been lost because of the Spanish Armada.
Governor White sailed home for supplies, but the war kept him away three years — in 1590 he found only CROATOAN carved on a post.
The events
- The Lost Colony of Roanoke1587–1590 · Roanoke Island. In 1587 more than a hundred colonists settled on Roanoke Island, where Virginia Dare became the first English child born in the Americas. Governor John White sailed home for supplies, but war with Spain delayed him until 1590. He found the site deserted, with CROATOAN carved on a post.
- Defeat of the Spanish Armada1588 · Gravelines. Philip II sent a great fleet to invade England. After the battle off Gravelines and storms on the voyage home the Armada lost many ships; England kept its independence and Protestantism and began its rise as a sea power.
More amazing facts
- 1582 · 1918 In autumn 1582 Catholic Europe jumped from 4 to 15 October, while Yermak’s Cossacks were marching on the capital of the Khanate of Sibir.
- 1582 · 1918 Russia's February 1918 had no 1st to 13th. By decree, Wednesday 31 January was followed by Thursday 14 February — Russia adopting the Gregorian calendar 336 years after Catholic Europe.
- 1586 · 1589 Galileo probably never did his famous Leaning Tower experiment.
- 1586 · 1980 The Tsar Cannon, contrary to the saying, seems to have been fired.
- 1589 · 1971 Galileo's falling-bodies experiment was tested on the Moon.
- 1589 · 1633 Galileo probably never dropped balls from the Leaning Tower of Pisa.