Trading for Copper Ornaments and Iron
If not for trade with the Powhatans, the colonists would not have survived those first years in Jamestown. Food items such as corn, squash and beans were traded for metal — especially copper — glass beads, cloth and wool blankets, all of which the Indians prized.
Before the colonists arrived, the local Powhatans had almost no metal and had to make their tools and weapons from stone, wood, bark, clay, shells and animal skin. The colonists brought sheets of copper with them and fashioned beads and other ornaments according to the Indians' preferences. Chief Powhatan used most of these copper ornaments as payment to his lesser chiefs.
English weapons and lead musket balls were also desired by the Powhatans, who at the time were enemies with the Monacans in the west and the Iroquois in the north. The colonists doled out some weapons — with weak promises for more — in exchange for increased amounts of food, clay implements and animal pelts, all of which were sorely needed for their very survival.
Trade relations became so good that some of the Indian items were eventually shipped over to England, such as beaver pelts that were used in felt-hat production.
Trading "Hostages" and Hiring Guides
Since the two cultures barely understood each other, Captain John Smith first left young Henry Spelman with Chief Powhatan for a year to learn the Algonquian language. Spelman also learned the Powhatan culture — their skills, arts and customs — and later served as an interpreter between the two camps.
Captain Christopher Newport also presented 13-year-old Thomas Savage to Chief Powhatan, also to learn the Algonquian language. Powhatan reciprocated by giving one of his servant boys, Namontack, to Newport. Newport became so fond of Namontack that he took him back to England to meet the Virginia Company's investors.
If is doubtful that Chief Powhatan would have allowed his daughter Pocahontas to visit the colonists on her own, but according to Captain John Smith, she taught him even more of the Algonquian language and customs during her frequent emissary visits to Jamestown.
While these "hostages" or foreign exchange students were in each others' camps, the two cultures would feign friendship and continue trade relations, keeping a lid on hostilities for a while.
The English also arranged for Indian guides to help them navigate the rivers to look for the Northwest Passage and help find gold and other resources as instructed by the Virginia Company of London. The first such guide was an Algonquian named Nauiraus, whom the English came to like, but who refused to return to Jamestown with them.
