VIRGINIA INDIAN SECTION

  • Native people have lived in the land we know as Virginia for thousands of years. Today the descendants of these native people like to be called “Virginia Indians”.
  • When English settlers came to Jamestown in 1607 they found communities of Algonquian speaking peoples (the Virginia Indians). These communitieswere loosely united under the leadership of a powerful paramount chief named Wahunsenacock and commonly called Powhatan.
  • There were thirty odd districts in the chiefdom containing approximately 15 thousand people and their territory stretched northward to the modern city of Washington, D. C., westward to present day Richmond and south to Virginia Beach—the area that we call Tidewater Virginia.
  • The Virginia Indians lived in scattered villages on the several rivers that flow into the Chesapeake Bay. The men were skillful hunters and experts in fishing while the women planted fields of corn, beans and squash and gathered nuts, berries and wild plants from the woodlands. They traded with people living to the west and north for items not found in their homeland.
  • At the time of the first permanent English settlement, native people were not living permanently on Jamestown Island, but used the area for seasonal hunting and fishing camps.
  • The relationship between the Virginia Indians and the English was uneasy with periods of peace and trading followed by periods of skirmishes and attacks.
  • The Virginia Indians had no private ownership of land. The land belonged to the community and each community had a recognized territory to occupy and use.
  • Virginia Indian villages were semi-permanent, as the inhabitants left for periods of time to set up temporary hunting and fishing camps in different areas within their territory. Villages were relocated periodically to an area with more fertile land for planting.
  • English settlers saw large amounts of land they thought was not being used by the Virginia Indians and claimed it for their plantations. Virginia Indians resented their territory being taken over by the English. Conflict over land would be the cause of tension and warfare between the English and the Virginia Indians for many decades.
  • Eventually, overwhelmed by the numbers of settlers, they were pushed from their lands—disease, warfare and malnutrition took their toll and their numbers decreased. By the end of the 17th century there were barely 2000 Virginia Indians left in Virginia.
  • In spite of their diminishing numbers the Virginia Indians did survive as a people and their descendants live among us today. Seven tribes descended from the original Powhatan Chiefdom are recognized by the Commonwealth of Virginia.