[Looking at why our area has its unique political and religious attitudes.]

What was the life of the Indian and the Brits on first contact?

Are you familiar with the story about the Princes of Serendip? It is the source of our word serendipity. While chasing another story, I came across two wills and a land patent from 1637 on Isle of Wight, Virginia, British Colonial America that added 5-generations to my maternal grandmother’s heritage.

Who were these people?

Why did they leave merry old England?

Who met them on the swampy shores of Virginia?

What do they have to do with where the south meets the west?

In this region of Virginia and North Carolina, the North Carolina Museum of History recorded 40 tribes. Many of these moved south as the British came into Virginia. More sensational authors attribute 15,000 or more people to a tribe. Realistic data appears to be several thousand for the large tribes like Tuscarora and Cherokee with hundreds in the small tribes. The Powhattan confederation joined these tribes like Pamunkey, Nansemond, and Warraskoyak, who often were only one or two villages.

Look at Native life when young Charles Barcroft (a 10-great) came ashore, among the first survivors to arrive. The Indians had no horses or iron for tools or weapons. Their major tool was fire. To clean the forest for their small garden, they burned. They used stones for a hoe, ax, and weapon. There is no other way to put it, the early domestic culture was Stone Age.

The early immigrants thought the Native American men lazy, since the women tended the garden, one of innumerable culture clashes.

They did not comprehend how hard life was for the Indians. Since they had no domesticated work animals, the men had to drag trees, plow fields, and carry burdens using their physical strength. An interesting story is the burden-carriers went ‘on strike,’ when horses came in to displace their jobs. They built log and birch canoes, depending on the area. The men spent time in the forest pursuing game, on the river and bay fishing, harvesting water plants, gathering berries in the summer, and nuts in the fall. Letters from the time show that many tribes went to war in summer.

The Native Americans thought land and nature belonged to the Creator and was a gift for use, but not ownership. The Indians did not have fences, so the British did not think they claimed the land, another culture clash.

The lifestyle does not preclude artisans among the Native Americans. They introduced stone then pottery vessels about the same time as the Middle East cultures. Their art included beadwork from copper, clay, and exotic stones. They used many different point variations, tools, and figurines. Art and craftsmanship developed, but technology did not happen. Life was hard and short.

The Powhattan confederation had a council to advise the chiefs and had priests, who resided in temples, to look at the spirit world and as physicians, not unlike the Hebrew system. They punished wrongdoers to their law.

Chief Powhattan was shrewd, both feasting with and fighting against the foreigners. Powhattan cut them off from all food, which obviously led to war, lasting five years. There was a little peace through intermarriage, then another Chief brought on a 10-year war. Ultimately what happens when one side has stones, the other swords, knives and guns, even single-shot muzzle-loader, flintlocks?

The British ships came up the James (Powhatan) River by the Isle of Wight (Warraskoyak) to Jamestown in 1607. The original venture did not do well, and most died.

The British brought only men, which the Indians thought strange. But we know what happens with young women and single guys? Consequently, most families from the era will find both Native and British heritage in their ancestry. It was not a question of were you British or Indian? When 19- year-old grandpa met 18-year-old grandma, they both spoke the same language, with little ethnic animosity.

Even after the settling on plantations and families, the British communities were very small, with only dozens of people. Consequently, they were very vulnerable to errant attacks from the locals. In retaliation, numerous suffered.

Surviving a year after arrival, was an accomplishment due to weather, food, hard work conditions, and raids. The indentured were particularly vulnerable, with few surviving their term. The specter of slavery was not an influence, at that time. For any adult, reaching 50-years of age was highly unusual.

With so few people on either side, plenty of land and space was available to everyone. The culture clash helped neither side.

Nathaniel Bacon was the final artificer in decimating the Native people influence. The Powhattan Treaty in 1677 effectively ended the Indian Period in Virginia with only about 2,000 remaining.

Some of the smaller tribes had embraced Christianity and migrated a few miles south to Bertie, North Carolina, before later moving on to Drowning Creek near the South Carolina border. Family migrations along that route prior to 1780’s, was Native Americans. They merged and amalgamated tribes before continuing the move west. An interesting story relates that the post-Revolutionary War settlers in the Drowning Creek (Lumber River) area were surprised to find blue-eyed, English speaking Indian farmers.

History tells a story. Culture clash happens without understanding. Both sides suffer injury. There was no right and wrong side, both were trying to survive, in the only way they knew.

Although we embrace our Native American or our British culture, Americans from that era are generally  both. The more noted and influential Native Americans in Indian Territory were often also of British heritage.

Think about our results. The era moved the Native Americans from the Stone Age and the British from the intolerant aristocracy control to an American Enlightenment. The experiment has survived two-hundred-forty years with bumps and bruises, but we all are better-off than our forefathers.

What can we do to keep the experiment alive?

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Excerpts from our book:

Where Indians, Outlaws & Oilmen Were Real, ISBN: 9781658834643. Migration map by authors on base courtesy of d-maps.com