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GOD S PEED Ship replica helps usher in an American celebration

May 25, 2006 12:50 am

By CLINT SCHEMMER

A time machine is about to make landfall a little ways north of Fredericksburg.

The Godspeed--an embodiment of people's fascination with America's founding days--is due in Alexandria this weekend. And quite a party there will be.

Best of all, you're invited.

The folks who created this sailing ship from the 17th century and sent it up the Eastern seaboard this week want you to take part in its voyage, albeit vicariously.

Step aboard and glimpse an era most of us can scarcely imagine. It'll be as close as you can come to dialing the clock back four centuries and stepping into the shoes of an English colonist crossing the Atlantic to the New World, if only for an hour or two.

What better way to kick off summer this Memorial Day weekend? A chance to see this amazing ship won't come again until Aug. 18-20, when the Godspeed is due to anchor at Aquia Landing Beach & Park during Stafford County's Discovery Days Festival.

The Godspeed will be accompanied in each port by a free landing party, with live entertainment and nearly a dozen historical exhibits and cultural displays.

Alexandria's shindig will occupy much of the city's historic waterfront, fitting for a place that was once Virginia's busiest port.

The fun starts Saturday morning and will continue through June 3, when the Godspeed will depart for Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York, Boston and Newport, R.I. The ship's voyage launches an 18-month series of events commemorating the 400th anniversary of the first permanent English settlement in America, at Jamestown.

As you read this, the Godspeed is probably nearing Mount Vernon on the Potomac--river of John Smith and the early colonists, of the tobacco plantations that propelled European settlement, and of founding families such as the Lees and Washingtons.

The $2.6 million replica of one of the three ships that brought the first colonists to Jamestown has undeniable appeal. Last week, as its 12-member crew practiced maneuvers on the James River, passengers on the Jamestown-Scotland ferry gawked at the spectacle, as did recreational boaters and helicopter-borne observers overhead.

The square-rigger's launch Monday from its home berth at the state-run Jamestown Settlement living-history museum drew Gov. Tim Kaine, more than 150 well-wishers and international press coverage.

As the ship set sail, its crew turned out in period costume, cannon blasts filled the air, and two rarely seen pennants--the British national flag of 1607 and a Virginia Company flag bearing the Cross of St. George--fluttered from its masts.

The voyage is one of 10 signature events and hundreds of community projects spawned by the Jamestown 2007 commemoration. Organizers are counting on what's dubbed the Godspeed Sail to fuel interest in America's 400th- anniversary commemoration.

Wonder how the Elizabethan adventurers seeking opportunity in Virginia navigated and survived their perilous ocean voyage?

"You can know this best by standing where they stood," Timothy Runyan, director of the maritime studies program at East Carolina University, said during Monday's launching ceremony.

Answering such questions for the public is a big reason Virginia built and is sailing the replica.

Many of the crew members are employees of the Jamestown-Yorktown Foundation, and have sailed on a previous version of the Godspeed or replicas of the settlers' two other ships, the Susan Constant and the Discovery. Others are well-trained volunteers who were eager for a taste of seafaring life in the long-ago Age of Discovery.

Built at Rockport Marine Inc. in Rockport, Maine, the Godspeed arrived at Jamestown Settlement on May 7. The 88-foot ship is made from rot-resistant tropical hardwoods and has twin diesel engines for use when needed. It will replace an older replica, built of pine in the 1980s and not as fast or maneuverable as the new vessel.

Because no known illustrations or plans of the Godspeed or its sister ships survive, the re-creation was based on the design of other 17th-century vessels and documentation that the original Godspeed could carry 40 tons of cargo and passengers.

Researchers' sources included old seamen's manuals, historical paintings and what's left of the Sparrow-Hawk, a 40-foot English ship bound for Virginia when it wrecked off Cape Cod in 1626. When constructing the new Godspeed's hull, the Maine shipwrights painstakingly emulated the techniques of English builders in the early 17th century.

Their efforts resulted in a replica that is more accurate than past re-creations, and surprisingly peppy under sail. It's roomier, too, said Eric Speth, the ship's captain.

Of course, "roomier" is a relative term when it comes to vessels of the Godspeed's era. Those who've gotten a glimpse of its new interior say it's incredible that people endured shipboard conditions for the nearly five months it took to cross the ocean from England to Virginia.

Thirteen crew members worked on deck while 39 passengers were shoehorned with barrels of supplies into the cargo hold, its hatch sealed shut during foul weather. As the Godspeed's cook, Noel Veden, observed, "It had to get pretty rank."

In each port, the Godspeed's crew will don historical garb before visitors come calling. While the ship is in "museum mode," its high-tech navigational gear, engines and amenities--such as a shower, a toilet and a small kitchen--will be cleverly hidden behind bulkheads and in cupboards.

"We're trying to teach it to people," said Kaia Danyluk, the ship's boatswain, "and we're trying to give everybody who wants an opportunity to come aboard and see what it was like."

Associated Press writer Sonja Barisic contributed to this report.

To reach CLINT SCHEMMER:540/368-5029
Email: cschemmer@freelancestar.com