On May 14, 1607, 104 English men and boys arrived in North America and established Jamestown, Virginia, the first permanent English settlement on the continent. The settlement, named after King James I, was founded by the Virginia Company of London, whose investors hoped to profit from the resources of the New World. The colony gave England its first foothold in the New World, which had been dominated by the Spanish since the late 15th century. Jamestown's early years were marked by extreme hardship, including starvation, disease, and conflict with Indigenous peoples.

Jamestown's founding and the subsequent narratives of colonial settlement became a foundational theme in American literature. The story of figures like John Smith and Pocahontas was romanticized in 19th-century poetry and historical fiction, shaping a mythologized origin story for the United States. The trials of the colony, as recorded in early chronicles, provided a template for the American frontier narrative.