Newport Tower Research Updates

Developments in Newport Tower Research

There have been two recent developments I wanted to share. The first adds credence to the theory that the Newport Tower was NOT built as a Colonial windmill, and the second points to the builders as members of the 14^th century Prince Henry Sinclair party.

Cartography

Renowned anthropologist and researcher Dr. Gunnar Thompson recently passed away, but before he did he posted to his website ( http://marcopoloinseattle.com ) a number of maps of the Narragansett Bay area which he had been researching. The first, a map dated 1569 by Gerhard Mercator, is shown here [cropped for clarity]:

 

The map clearly displays a European settlement at the northeastern end of Narragansett Bay, labeling the settlement “Norombega” and describing the settlement (not shown) as the capital city of the New World. Apparently, as of 1569, there was known to be a well-established European presence in the Newport area. (Newport is located on the eastern side of the bay, south of where the settlement is drawn.) Recall that the failed Roanoke colony was not established until 1585. And this 1569 also predates the Elizabethan-era expedition to Newport orchestrated by John Dee as proposed by researcher Jim Egan.

The conclusion that the Newport area had been settled in pre-Colonial times is further buttressed by a 1635 map drawn by William Wood, shown here:

 

Recall that Plymouth Colony was settled in 1620 by the Pilgrims. And note the label “New Plymouth” located east of Plymouth Harbor in Cape Cod Bay (you may need to zoom in). What is curious is that at the northeastern part of Narragansett Bay, where Mercator marked Norombega, there is a settlement labeled “Old Plymouth” on this map (again, zoom in). The first Colonial settlers did not arrive in Rhode Island until 1936, after this map was drawn, so this “Old Plymouth” cannot mark a Colonial settlement. Again, as we saw with the Mercator map, there seems to be a memory of some kind of ancient European settlement in the Narragansett Bay area.

 
Of course, these maps don’t prove that the Newport Tower is pre-Colonial. But they do show strong evidence of a pre-Colonial settlement in the Newport area. It is entirely possible that the Tower is part of that settlement.

 

Native American Oral History

 

So if the Tower predates the Colonists, who built it? Readers of my books know that I believe the leading candidate to have done so was Prince Henry Sinclair and his party in or around 1399. (Sinclair ruled Scottish lands near Edinburgh as wells as Norwegian lands in the Orkney Islands; his family also had a longstanding relationship with the outlawed Knights Templar.) In previous posts, and in my books and lectures, I have outlined the various reasons for this. But, until recently, I had never asked the one group of people who were actually here when I believe the Tower was built: The Native Americans.

 

In June of 2015, Pocasset Wampanoag Tribal Chief Daryl “Black Eagle” Jamieson joined a group of us at the Tower. When asked, Black Eagle replied that, according to what had been passed down to him by tribal elders, the Tower had been build by Henry Sinclair and the Knights Templar. He pointed out that whoever built the Tower must have had an alliance with the Native Americans in the area (ruling out the Colonists and also the Elizabethan-era British), else the Native Americans simply would have driven them off long before the Tower could have been completed. (A more complete excerpt of Black Eagle’s response is set forth below.)

My sincere thanks to Black Eagle for his candor and his willingness to help us solve the mystery of who built this amazing Tower.

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Black Eagle comments June, 2015:

“The Narragansett history is that the people that built this Tower are people that came here with red hair... They were red-haired people building here and they were allowed to build here—allowed... To me, the only person that could have came here and gotten away with that is somebody that was brought here by another native tribe... They would have had to have had some kind of alliance... The only ones that I know that had that alliance were Henry Sinclair when he came and met with the Micmacs.* The Knights Templar. They were the only legitimate people that could have come here and built this with the permission of the natives.”

*It is believed the Prince Henry group made an alliance with the Micmacs of Nova Scotia before coming south to New England.