From the excellent National Park Service 2005 reconsideration of Indian-English Contacts in the Seventeenth Century (http://www.nps.gov/history/history/online_books/jame1/moretti-langholtz/contents.htm), with Native American commentary:
July 24-September 7, 1608: Second Expedition
During the second expedition, when the English ship passes by a Rappahannock village, the Rappahannock Indians are dancing and singing. Further up river, the following day, the English receive a volley of arrows. After the assaulting Indians flee, the Powhatan scout, Mosco, pursues the attackers, with Smith and his men. Upon their return, they find a wounded Indian. His name is Amoroleck. Smith has the English doctor dress Amoroleck’s wound. Then Smith inquires as to why Amoroleck’s party attacked them. Amoroleck responds that they had heard that the English had “come from the under world to take their world from them.” Smith asks him how many worlds he knew of. According to Smith, Amoroleck states he “knew no more but that which was under the sky that covered him, which were the Powhatans, with the Monacans and the Massawomecks, that were higher up in the mountains.”
Near the end of Smith’s second expedition, Captain John Smith first enters the Nansemond River, finding four Nansemond villages. Along the river are massive fertile fields producing an abundance of corn. A Nansemond Indian invites Smith into his home. Afterwards, Smith follows a canoe escort further up river, at which time the English encounter seven to eight canoes of Nansemond warriors. According to Smith, the warriors start shooting a multitude of arrows at them. The English return fire with their muskets. Recognizing that the firearms shoot a further distance than their bows, the warriors jump into the river and swim to shore. The English seize the warrior’s canoes, and begin to cut one into pieces. The Nansemond warriors returned asking for peace. Smith tells the Nansemond warriors that they must bring him their Chief’s bow and arrows, a chain of pearls, and four hundred bushels of corn, or they Nansemonds’ homes, villages, corn fields and would burn the destroy their canoes. The Nansemond Indians put their weapons down and return with corn. Smith and his men take all they can possibly carry.9
Native Voice
The Spanish came here looking for gold. The English came here to conquer. I think Amoroleck knew what he was talking about.
— Chief Kenneth Branham
Monacan Nation
May 19, 2000
“There has been some scholarly debate as to whether these ‘volleys of shot’ were hostile or intended as a welcome.'”
— Karenne Wood
Virginia Council of Indians Chairman Monacan Nation
July 2004
Mahockney 