Next several warriors with clubs took their stand near him to beat out his brains, whereupon Powhatan's "dearest daughter," Pocahontas, a girl of about twelve years old, rushed forward and entreated her father to spare the prisoner.

When Powhatan refused she threw herself upon Smith, got his head in her arms, and laid her own upon his.

This proved too much for Powhatan.

He ordered Smith to be released, and, telling him that henceforth he would regard him as his son, sent him with guides back to Jamestown.[18] The credibility of this story has been attacked on the ground that it does not occur in Smith's _True Relation_, a contemporaneous account of the colony, and appears first in his _Generall Historie_, published in 1624.

But the editor of the _True Relation_ expressly states that the published account does not include the entire manuscript as it came from Smith.