When the replica of the Susan Constant leaves the Jamestown Settlement for restoration at the Mystic Seaport Shipyard in Connecticut this month, it will sail past a spot in Norfolk’s Ocean View where the original Susan Constant stopped to weather a storm on its arrival in Virginia in 1607.
The current ship replica replaced an earlier iteration created for the 350th commemoration at Jamestown Festival Park in 1957. The new ship, commissioned in April 1991, has served as the flagship for Virginia’s official fleet of 17th-century vessels for 33 years. Over 19 million visitors have crossed her planked decks to experience a bit of maritime life.
For more than three decades, Capt. Eric Speth, director of maritime operations for the Jamestown-Yorktown Foundation, has commanded the vessel and implemented its water-borne ambassadorship.
“I love what I do, and I feel so fortunate to be able to work with the people I work with, the volunteers and the staff here at Jamestown Settlement,” Speth said.
Today, the bayside park in Ocean View is called Sarah Constant Beach Park in tribute to the flagship Susan Constant, the largest of three chartered English ships (Susan Constant, Godspeed and Discovery) that brought the colonists who established the first permanent English settlement in the New World at Jamestown.
On the grounds of the beach park near a cluster of live oak trees, a Virginia historical highway marker memorializes the ships and colonists who founded the English settlement on Jamestown Island in the early 17th century. Between the parking lot and the waters of Chesapeake Bay, on sandy ground, stands a shrine that bears an illustration of the Flagship Sarah Constant and a small plaque clarifying the tribute.
An engraved wooden sign on West Ocean View Avenue designates the site as Sarah Constant Beach Park, City of Norfolk. Parking is available. Restroom facilities are located in the park. A cluster of live oak trees provides shade from the sun. The sandy beach offers an impressive view of the Chesapeake Bay and the Ocean View Fishing Pier.
While the signage at the park seems to indicate a disparity, the names Sarah Constant and Susan Constant are references to the same historic vessel that accompanied the Godspeed and the pinnace Discovery in 1607.
The disparity in names probably had its origins in an error created by Anglican cleric Samuel Purchas, an Elizabethan-era travel writer who dubbed the vessel Sarah Constant instead of Susan Constant.
While the city of Norfolk and the Daughters of the American Revolution, Sarah Constant Chapter cling to the appellation Sarah Constant, Virginia prefers the name Susan Constant. The state historical highway marker on the Ocean View park site refers to the ship as the Susan Constant.
Regardless of what one chooses to call the replica vessel, we know that the original ship was a mid-size merchant vessel. It was three-masted, barque rigged. It carried square sails on the foremast, main mast, and spritsail under the bowsprit and a fore and aft rigged sail on the mizzen mast at the aft end of the vessel.
At Jamestown Settlement the ship is known as the Susan Constant. In Speth’s mind, there is no question about the ship’s identity.
“Susan Constant,” Speth said. “I think we see that in the historic record and also that is the official spelling in Virginia. Our fleet of ships here at Jamestown Settlement Museum are the Susan Constant, Godspeed and Discovery. They are the official fleet of the commonwealth of Virginia and Susan Constant is the flagship of the fleet.”
A visit to Sarah Constant Beach Park in Ocean View is worth the time to view the shrine and historical marker. It also offers a beautiful beach view of the Chesapeake Bay.
A timely visit to this bayside park in Ocean View in the next few days might even provide a sighting of the Susan Constant replica as the craft passes through the Chesapeake Bay and heads to New England for restoration. The ship is expected to set sail as early as this weekend.
