Pamunkey
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The Pamunkey Native American tribe has been in existence since pre-Columbian times. It is one of the two currently existing tribes that were part of the Powhattan Confederacy. They inhabited the coastal tidewater of Virginia, near Chesapeake Bay. The Pamunkey reservation is currently located on the site of some of its ancestral land on the Pamunkey River adjacent to King William Co.,Va. This tribe is significant to American history because of its early contact with American settlers and adaptable forms of self preservation throughout its existence.
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[edit] Way of life
[edit] Subsistence and relationship to the land
The traditional Pamunkey way of life is subsistence living. They have always lived through a combination of fishing, trapping, hunting, and farming. The Pamunkey River was a main mode of transportation and food source. It also provided accessibility to hunting grounds, other tribes, and a defensive view of local river traffic. Access to the river was crucial because Pamunkey villages were not permanent settlements. Because they did not use fertilizer, fields and homes were moved about every ten years. Permitted use of unoccupied land was open to anyone, but understood as under Pamunkey jurisdiction.[citation needed] This proved a major source of conflict with the English because it was the antithesis of their land ownership model.[citation needed]
[edit] Homes
Coined by the English as “longhouses”, Pamunkey structures tended to be long and narrow. They were relatively simple structures made out of bent saplings and covered with woven mats. Homes of families of higher status were also made of bark. By changing the strength of indoor fires and the amount of mats or bark, these houses were adaptable to all weather conditions and comfortable.[citation needed]
[edit] Government
The tribe is governed by a weroance (Chief) and a tribal council composed of seven members, elected every four years.[citation needed] An ethnology written in 1894 by Jno. Garland Pollard, on behalf of the Smithsonian Institute Bureau of Ethnology, stated “The council names two candidates to be voted for. Those favoring the election of candidate number 1 must indicate their choice by depositing a grain of corn in the ballot-box at the schoolhouse, while those who favor the election of candidate number 2 must deposit a bean in the same place. The former or the latter candidate is declared chosen according as the grains of corn of the beans predominate”.[citation needed] Typical laws are mostly concerned with but not limited to intermarriage, preventing slander, bad behavior, and land use.[citation needed] There are no corporal punishments such as incarcerations or chastisement.[citation needed] Rather, punishments are only in terms of fines or banishment (usually after the third offense).[citation needed]
[edit] History
The Pamunkeys are part of the larger Algonquian family. This family represents a number of tribes that spoke variations of the same language, although most of their language is lost now. By 1607 the Powhatan Confederacy was formed, of which they were the largest and most powerful tribe. Both Chief Powhatan himself and his famous daughter Pocahontas were Pamunkeys.
Initial contact with Europeans was around 1570. “And from [1570] on at ever briefer intervals until the first permanent English colony was established at Jamestown in 1607, the Powhatan Confederacy was visited and plagued by white men: Spanish, French, and English” (Barbour, 5). There were an estimated 14,000 members of the Confederacy by the time of English arrival.
The Pamunkeys were formally recognized by the outside world since treaties with King William I of England in the second half of the 17th century. Colonists of the first successful English settlements, based at Jamestown, had an interesting relationship with Virginia Native Americans. Chief Powhatan was very close to Captain John Smith and initially dealt with the colony through him. If not for Chief Powhatan, Jamestown would not have survived through the first winters. As the settlement expanded, the friendly nature of interactions steadily decreased.
Chief Powhatan’s half brother and successor, Opechancanough, launched attacks in 1622 and 1644 in an effort to expel them from the area. The first, known as the Indian Massacre of 1622 destroyed settlements such as Henricus and Wolstenholme Towne and nearly wiped out the colony, although Jamestown itself was spared due to a warning of the impending attack. After the capture and assassination of Opechancanough, the Powhatan Confederacy was disbanded.
The Virginia Colony continued to grow and encroach on Indian land making it impossible to sustain their traditional lifestyle. Many Pamunkeys were forced to work for the English or enslaved. As the settlement grew so did their fear of Native Americans and subsequent racist tendencies and anger. This culminated in Bacon's Rebellion which began in 1675 as the colonists and Royal Governor William Berkeley disagreed about the handling of conflicts with the Indians. During the subsequent reprisals for an incident which took place in what is currently Fairfax County, the Pamunkeys were among many other innocent tribes which were wrongfully targeted. These themes of militancy and encroachment continued throughout much of American history. Although the tribe was divided in the 18th century, many Powhatan tribes including the Pamunkey secretly kept their identity.
[edit] Primary Impressions
A piece of the Pamunkey story is often told through Pocahontas, but from an English perspective. When comparing primary documents from the time of English arrival, it is apparent that initial contact was characterized by mutual cultural misunderstanding. Primary documentation characterizes the Virginia Indians through a series of paradoxes. It is apparent that there is great respect for Chief Powhatan but the other Indians are repeatedly called variations of devils and savages, such as “naked devils” or they were standing there “grim as devils”. There is a great fear and appreciation coupled with distrust and uneasiness. The following quotation from John Smith’s diary exemplifies this duality. “It pleased God, after a while, to send those people which were our mortal enemies to relieve us with victuals, as bread, corn fish, and flesh in great plenty, which was the setting up of our feeble men, otherwise we had all perished” (Southern, 35). Smith makes it apparent that without Chief Powhatan’s kindness the colony would have starved. However, Smith still considers Chief Powhatan’s people his enemies.
This general distrust from the English permeated throughout many tribes, but a sense of honor and morality is attached to the Pamunkey. “There custom is to take anything they can seize off; only the people of Pamunkey we have not found stealing, but what others can steal, their king reveiveth” (83). Even though it is apparent that the Pamunkeys meant no harm until they were pushed to seek revenge, they were repeatedly wronged.
Chief Powhatan could not understand the English need to claim everything and their overall mindset. "What it will avail you to take by force you may quickly have by love, or to destroy them that provide you food? What can you get by war, when we can hide our provisions and fly to the woods? Whereby you must famish by wronging us your friends. And why are you thus jealous of our loves seeing us unarmed, and both do, and are willing still to feed you, with that you cannot get but by our labors?" (Southern, 97). This question posed by Chief Powhatan was translated in Smith’s writings. He could not understand why the British would want to taint relations with his tribe. They were providing Jamestown with food, since the colonists refused to work, and could not otherwise survive the winter. It is apparent that these Indians only went to war as a last resort. They did not understand why the only tactics of the British were force and domination.
[edit] Pamunkeys now
The Pamunkeys have been able to survive because of their remarkable ability to adapt as a tribe. In modern times they have changed their interpretation of living off the land, but still uphold the central value of subsistence living. They continue to hunt, trap, and fish on what’s left of their reservation grounds. In order to supplement these activities they have turned traditional tribal pottery into profit generating ventures, while continuing to rely on their natural environment. The pottery is made from all natural clay including pulverized white shells used by their ancestors.
Also, the Pamunkey Indian Museum was built in 1979 to resemble a traditional Native American long house. Located on the reservation, it provides visitors with an innovative approach to the tribe throughout the years through artifacts, replicas, and stories. Their history is so rich that the Smithsonian Institute recently selected the Pamunkeys as one of 24 tribes to be featured in the National Museum of the American Indian.
[edit] Further reading
- Southern, Ed. The Jamestown Adventure: Accounts of the Virginia Colony, 1605-1614. John Blair: North Carolina, 2004
- Barbour, Phillip. Pocahontas and her World. Houghton Mifflin Co.: Boston, MA, 1969.
- Hatfield, April Lee. Atlantic VA: Intercolonial Relations in the Seventeenth Century. University of Pennsylvania Press: Philadelphia, PA, 2004.
- Pollard, Jno. Garland. “Pamunkey”. Bureau of Ethnology, Smithsonian Institute: 1894.
- “The Unofficial Pamunkey Indian Website” http://home.earthlink.net/~pamunkey/
