Five days after Newport's arrival at Jamestown a fire consumed nearly all the buildings in the fort.[27] The consequence was that, as the winter was very severe, many died from exposure while working to restore the town. The settlers suffered also from famine, which Captain Newport partially relieved by visiting Powhatan in February and returning in March with his "pinnace well loaden with corne, wheat, beanes, and pease," which kept the colony supplied for some weeks.[28]
Newport remained in Virginia for more than three months, but things were not improved by his stay. His instructions required him to return with a cargo, and the poor colonists underwent the severest sort of labor in cutting down trees and loading the ship with cedar, black walnut, and clapboard.[29] Captain Martin thought he discovered a gold-mine near Jamestown, and for a time the council had busied the colonists in digging worthless ore, some of which Newport carried to England.[30] These works hindered others more important to the plantation, and only four acres of land was put in corn during the spring.[31] Newport took back with him the councillors Wingfield and Archer, and April 20, ten days after Newport's departure, Captain Francis Nelson arrived in the _Phoenix_ with about forty additional settlers. He stayed till June, when, taking a load of cedar, he returned to England, having among his passengers Captain John Martin, another of the council.
During the summer Smith spent much time exploring the Chesapeake Bay, Potomac, and Rappahannock rivers,[32] and in his absence things went badly at Jamestown. The mariners of Newport's and Nelson's ships had been very wasteful while they stayed in Virginia, and after their departure the settlers found themselves on a short allowance again. Then the sickly season in 1608 was like that of 1607, and of ninety-five men living in June, 1608, not over fifty survived in the fall. The settlers even followed the precedent of the previous year in deposing an unpopular president, for Ratcliffe, by employing the men in the unnecessary work of a governor's house, brought about a mutiny in July, which led to the substitution of Matthew Scrivener. At length, September 10, 1608, Captain Ratcliffe's presidency definitely expired and Captain Smith was elected president.