This region of northern Virginia had just been surveyed by the English, and was soon to be the site of the first English colony in North America.[3] [Footnote 1: Mentioned on p.

80.] [Footnote 2: The Andastes were akin to the Iroquois, but did not belong to their confederacy; they lived in Pennsylvania.] [Footnote 3: The inaccurate statement has frequently been written about Newfoundland being "the first British American colony".
Newfoundland was reached by the ship in which John Cabot sailed on his 1497 voyage of discovery, and a few years afterwards its shores were sought by the English in common with the French and the Portuguese, and later on the Spaniards and Basques, for the cod fishery.

But no definite British settlement, such as subsequently grew into an actual colony, was founded in Newfoundland until the year 1624; the island was not recognized as definitely British till 1713, and no governor was appointed till 1728.

The first permanent English colonial settlement in America was founded at Jamestown, Virginia, in 1607; and in the Bermudas and Barbados (West Indies) soon afterwards.] In attempting to return to the valley of the St.Lawrence in 1616, with his Andaste guides, Brule lost his way, and to avoid starvation surrendered himself to the Seneka Indians (the westernmost clan of the Iroquois) against whom the recent warlike operations of the French were being directed.

Discovering his nationality, the Senekas decided to torture him before burning him to death at the stake.