| Total population |
|---|
| 300 (1855) |
| Regions with significant populations |
| United States (Washington) |
| Languages |
| Religion |
|
Christianity, Indigenous |
| Related ethnic groups |
|
other Coast Salish peoples |
The Lower Skagits (sometimes called Whidbey Island Skagits) are a tribe of the Lushootseed Native American people living in the state of Washington.
Contents |
In pre-Contact times, the tribe occupied approximately 56,300 acres (228 km2) of land, including land on central Whidbey Island from Dugula Bay south to Holmes Harbor[1] (including sites at Maylor Point, Penn Cove and Coupeville), as well as sites on the mainland around the mouth of the Skagit River. The Lower Skagit had conflicts with Haida from the north, who would raid their camps for slaves, as well as Klallam from the other side of the Puget Sound, who tried to occupy their lands.[2] Like other Coast Salish tribes, the Lower Skagit were semi-sedentary, the life revolving around the food they could harvest from the sea, such as salmon, through use of fish weirs, as well as nets dragged between two canoes,[3] and hunting duck, seals and deer.[4] This diet was supplemented by cultivation of camas roots, nettles, bracken, and after white contact, potatoes.
During the fur trading era, Lower Skagits were active in trading at posts of the Hudson's Bay Company. By the 1840s, Roman Catholic missionaries were trying to convert the Lower Skagit to their beliefs. During the United States Exploring Expedition the explorer Charles Wilkes made contact in 1841 (at which point he estimated the population at 650), he found Lower Skagits building a church.[5] In January 1855, a Lower Skagit chief named Goliah signed the Treaty of Point Elliott, which placed the estimated 300 tribal members under jurisdiction of the Tulalip Agency. In September 1873, an executive order moved the tribe, along with members of the Swinomish and other tribes to the Swinomish Reservation on Fidalgo Island in Skagit County, Washington. On October 13, 1971, the Indian Claims Commission ordered US$74,856.50 to be paid to the Lower Skagits to cover the amount of land that they had lost as a result of the Point Elliott Treaty.[2]
The Swinomish Indian Reservation has a land area of 31.381 km² (12.116 sq mi) and a 2000 census resident population of 2,664 persons, only about 23 percent of whom were of solely Native American heritage. Today, Lower Skagit members that live on the reservation are primarily commercial fishers by trade.[6]
The Lower Skagit language is a subdialect of the Northern Lushootseed dialect.[7]