David Ingram

David Ingram, Davy Ingrams, or Davyd Ingram ( 1542 – after 1583)

Exploration Ingram signed on with English privateer Sir John Hawkins in 1567 to raid and trade along the coasts of Portuguese Africa and Spanish Mexico. Hawkins himself returned to Britain and he was expected to take two to three years to return for the men left behind. In October 1568, they spotted a French vessel lying at anchor in Nova Scotia. Browne and Twide had died in the interim and only Ingram could attest to their purported journey.

Ingram described North America as a fertile and pleasant land, reporting its vast plains and diverse forests. He claimed to have seen cities and towns, including Norumbega, a legendary city that featured on early European maps of the New World. He further reported the inhabitants as "canibals" with canine-like teeth.

Veracity and treatment The account written by Walsingham was published in 1589 in Richard Hakluyt's The Principall Navigations Voiages and Discoveries of the English Nation. However, the second edition of Hakluyt's Principall Navigations of 1599 did not contain Ingram's account, as Hakluyt himself doubted the veracity of Ingram's claim.

In 1625, Samuel Purchas, who continued Hakluyt's work, with his Hakluytus Posthumus, or Purchas his Pilgrimes, contested some of Ingram's claims. On the omission of Ingram's account from Hakluyt's second edition, Purchas commented that "It seemeth some incredibilities of his reports caused him to leave him out in the next impression, the reward of lying [being] not to be believed in truths.”

Later life In 1583, Ingram returned to the New World with Sir Humphrey Gilbert, in Gilbert's unsuccessful attempt to establish an English settlement in Newfoundland.