EASTERN SHORE VIRGINIA INDIAN HISTORY

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The Accawmacke Indians are the friendliest first people of America. They have a history of being the American Indians who went above and beyond to assist the Jamestown settlement. The Accawmacke people are a Kingdom of people who originate and reside on what today is known as the Delmarva Peninsula of Virginia, better known as Virginia’s Eastern Shore.

Origin of the Accawmacke Indians

There is a book written in 1911 by William Cropper entitled “Ye Kingdome of Accawmacke.”  The Accawmacke homeland is centrally located in Northampton County and encompasses what is almost the entire peninsula plus a small area across the bay. The Kingdom’s Main Village was located in Eastville, Virginia on what is now the Eyre Hall Plantation. 

The Accawmackes Indians were so friendly that when approached by the Pumankey Indians to supply poisonous plants to murder the Jamestown colonist they refused. In fact, they even went as far as warning Jamestown of the attack that would have rid Virginia of European presence as we know it today.

In addition, the Accawmackes fed and clothed the Colonist. The European’s need and depletion of the Virginia Bay Indian’s food stores was devastating. Conversely, the Accawmackes had more plentiful resources than their cousins on the Bay side. Unfortunately, generosity of the Accawmacke Indians was no match for the greed of the European London Company, turned Virginia Company and now the Corporation of the United States of America.

The Accawmacke Indians are part of the Powhatan Confederacy.  Across the bay from the Tsenacommacah region ruled by Wahunsenacawh in the 1600‘s also known as King Powhatan.  Accawmacke Indians also fall under the umbrella of the Cherokee nation. Accawmacke Indians often referred to themselves as Cherokee and spoke Cherokee.  Accawmacke Indians paid tribatory to King Powhatan but were not controlled or protected by the confederacy. The Powhatan Pumunkey and the Accawmackes were related, in fact, Pocahontas and Accawmacke Queen Metha (1589) were half-sisters. The famous Accawmacke King during the arrival of the English was inaccurately called Debedeavon. This is due to the fact that Indians seldom allowed their sacred true Indian names to be known. The Accawmacke King was also called the Laughing King, known to have a friendly and happy disposition. 

The Laughing King bequeathed his thrown at first, to his brother Kiptopeake, due to the Laughing King’s need to hunt at leisure.  Later upon his death, the Laughing King willed the Accawmacke throne to his daughter Nandua.  Women played equal and lauded roles in American Indian society.  Women were known for skilled sciences and arts, building homes, including teaching and medicine.  Respect for the equality of women is part of the Accawmacke culture.  The last known royal Accawmacke descendant was known as King Tom, who married Judith Cypress, also an Indian, while listed as King Tom in Court records and in connection to the Gingaskin Reservation. 

History books falsely, imply that Ensign Tom Savage having come from England with John Smith as an Interpreter was Anglo.  When in fact, the surname Savage itself reveals that the young could not have been Anglo English.  First of all, an English person would not willingly call themselves Savage. Also, just the fact Savage was able to interpret American Indian languages as a very young man, denotes he must have been of American Indian Heritage. Recall that Columbus took American Indians to Europe as did Smith on his first voyage to America.  It is an intelligent and logical estimation that Ensign Savage was an American Indian or mixed European / American Indian living in England who was brought as an interpreter by Smith to Virginia.

On one occasion the Colonist met with the Accawmackes. While Ensign Savage and John Smith resided with King Powhatan, the boy’s life was threatened and in danger.  Wahunsenacawh’s brother did not trust Ensign Savage and he sent little John Smith over to the Accawmacke Laughing King to protect his life. 

Lifestyle of the Accawmackes 

All early writings record that the Accawmackes had small towns, not camps. The towns were well civilized and developed. They had long houses made of bark and or reed/grass mats. They also had clay homes and homes that were several stories high. There were store houses for trade, sauna houses, and special holistic buildings for women. 

There were also multi-family and single-family homes, hospitals and Temples for worship. The towns were landscaped, and roads were often covered in crushed shells. In addition, there were fences and bridges. The Accawmackes were isolating infectious patients and were hand washing to prevent disease thousands of years before the European understood their Indigenous American Indian science.

The Accawmacke Indians were famous as artists, builders, farmers, hunters and fisherman.  Accawmackes are also, known as expert musicians’ artisans, healers and herbalists. To this day Accawmackes are noted to having skills in multiple areas. The Accawmakes are known to have utilized advanced agricultural techniques.  The Accawmakes also taught the colonists how to fry and smoke meat.  They Accawmakes also domesticated and raised turkeys. Contrary to history, there were horses on the Eastern Shore prior to European arrival.  These horses were sometimes domesticated for farm use and ridden, although they were not in large numbers. 

The most important aspect of the Accawmackes was and is; is their commitment to the Preservation of the Environment and Conservation of Nature and Wildlife.  We did not deplete the forests or our wildlife; we maintained nature’s balance; hunting for only what was required.  Using all portions of the animals because we honored the life and the blood that was spilled.

The Appearance (Phenotype), Reclassification and Enslavement of the Accawmackes 

The Accawmacke along with other Virginia Indians are recorded in various books such, “The History of Virginia in Four Parts, History of Virginia. Book 3, Chapter 1, page 140, as appearing in this manner, “Their Colour when they are grown up, is chestnut brown and tawny, but much clearer in their infancy.  Their skin comes afterward to harden and grow blacker, by greasing and sunning themselves.” It is apparent from all very early writings about Virginia’s first Indians; that the American Indians the colonist first encountered, had a negroid appearance. 

Hence, the early American Indigenous Accawmacke Indians were easily reclassified as Free people of Color and or Negro, Colored and Mulatto Slaves. This is greatly proven by the book entitled “The Historie of Travaile into Virginia Britannia,” written by William Strachey in 1612, where he wrote, in Caput V, the chapter headline, “A true description of the people; of their cullour, attire, ornaments, constitution, disposition” as the first line reads, “They are generally a cullour browne or rather tawnye.” The next page further describes their appearance as, “Their hayre is black, grosse, long and thicke. The men have no beards, their noses are broad, flatt and full at the end, great bigge Lippes and wyde mouthed, (yet nothing so unsightly as the Moores) they are generally tall of statue, and straight, of comely proportion and the women have handsome limbs, slender arms and pretty hands and when they sang they have a delightful and pleasant tang in their voices.”

Regrettably, this early account differs vastly from the information perpetuated by the Virginia Assembly which established laws stating an Indian could only be 1/4 Negro. This meant a true American Indian could only claim to be an American Indian if they had highly Caucasian Europeans bloodlines. If you appeared chestnut brown or very brown with “full Lippes and broad flat noses” as the early accounts described the first American Indian; you could not be identified as American Indian. Thus, the American Indigenous Accawmacke Indian who have always had a Negroid appearance, lost their identity in being called people of color, negro, colored, black; and today, African American. 

Accawmacke Clarification of False Historic Information

The fact is the term of Africa for the Continent of Africa was not popularly utilized in the 1600’s. The Continent presently known as Africa was not generally called Africa until the 1900’s. In the 1600’s Africa was chiefly known as Ethiopia. In fact, rather than use the term “Africa”, the specific people, tribes, countries and territories were named; not the entire continent.

Also, in the 1400’s, present day Indian’s was not known as Indian, it was known as Hindustan. There was no accidently calling American Indians, Indian, because Hindustan was not the destination, America was the destination. Columbus knew where he was going. Columbus was a Spanish Moorish profiteer and a slave trader with a map given to him by the Moors.  Columbus even took American Indians from Hispaniola as slave samples to Europe.  America has been a major trade destination since man could sail.  For that reason, there is an American Indian heritage throughout Africa and Europe today. 

Today many writings are falsely naming Angola the origin of so-called 1619 African slaves in Virginia. First, there are no historical records or primary sources of information citing the term African slaves in Virginia.  Also, Angola did not exist in the 1600’s.  In the1600’s, Angola was called the Congo.  Many people are told that they have relatives that are from Guinea and assume that means they were African.  When in fact, once again, you have to look to what Guinea meant at the time and place of your so-called ancestor’s arrival.  Many people are called Guinea in multiple parts of world including many of the American islands, Central America and Louisiana.  Genealogy requires placing your family history in correct historical context to the planet’s timeline.

The Accawmacke View of Point Comfort 1619 and African Slaves in Virginia

Today, the state of Virginia has a historical marker which claims Point Comfort as the arrival of the first African slaves which is in truth, a quadruple lie. First, “The Letter of Record” written by Sir John Rolfe in August 1619, truthfully read, “20 odd Negras”. 

The first lie is that Rolfe never said “Africans” and wrote with no excitement or alarm one would expect for a “First Arrival of Africans” notation. The truth is, the letter stated, “Negras". The feminine noun Negras is Spanish word for Dark Skinned People. Negras is the spanish word for  African.

The second lie is the new fabrication; one stating new evidence to show that the 1619 ship originated by intercepting a ship of African cargo from Angola. Again, Angola as a country did not exist in 1619.  That region in 1619 was referred to as the Congo. Truth is Angola was called Kongo not Angola in 1619. Also, there is no new research proving an Angolan origin of the Negro indentured servants. The Negras were mostly female Indentured Servants being transported to work in the Caribbean.  Noone would import Indentured Servants a which are temporary Servants not forever slaves from The Kongo. If the temporary servants came from the Congo half of the servants would die on the trip, the remainder would need to be nursed back to health. Next, they would have to  learn to speak both English and the Indigenous American language. In addition, they would have learn about the animals, insects and how to Farm new Vegetation. It is obvious that transporting TEMPORARY 7 year Indentured servants from Africa when they had little resources would be an unsound business expenditure. 

The third lie; 1619 mark the arrival of the first African slaves.  The truth is; the historical society of Jamestown reports that the Negroes were Indentured servants not slaves. Truth is the “20 odd Negras” were Indentured servants not slaves.

The fourth lie; the “20 old Negroes” in great condition came all the way from the Kongo.  When in truth, the term Negro is a Spanish term used for the dark-skinned Indigenous Indians of North, Central, South America and surrounding Islands.  American Spanish Colonists gave negroid phenotype Indigenous American Indian both free and slave Spanish names upon Accepting Christianity. That is why the “20 Odd Negras” had Spanish names.  Again, why would anyone waste such a great expense to travel all the way to and from the Kongo for indentured servants rather than slaves?  Fact is, that in 1619, the London Company was a business, they would not waste money going all the way to Kongo for indentured servants who knew nothing about American soil and agriculture, nor would the Spanish who had plenty of American Indian indentured servants. 

The truth is, bringing Africans to Virginia was like bringing sand to the beach.  African slave importation rarely happened, made no scientific, agricultural, historical or economic sense in Virginia.  The only exceptions would be in other states that introduced specially trained African slaves for African crops that were new to North America.  The other exception would be the case of gold mines in South America where the death tolls were significant.

The final evidence supporting that there was no significant arrival of African slaves in Virginia is a 1708 statement made by the acting Governor of Virginia, Edmund Jennings. Governor Jennings stated in a report to England’s Board of Trade that, “before the year 1680 what Negros were brought to Virginia were imported generally from Barbados for it was very rare to have a Negro ship come to this Country.”  Cited in “Planting an Empire: The Early Chesapeake in British North America”, by Jean B. Russo and J. Elliott Russo.

How America made Indigenous Indian Americans into Non-Indian African Americans

Marriage: The Eastern Shore was stolen and the subjugation of the Accawmacke Indians began via friendship and marriage, but that was extremely a brief experiment.  The English married American Indian women to claim land and would later import English wives to allow European descendants to inherit American Indian land.  Thus, leaving their mixed European / American Indian children “disenfranchised'; but were later eligible to retain a semi-recognized Indian status.

Hunting Restriction, Trade /Currency Change and Debt

Next, the Colonist changed the American Indian commerce trade system.  They implanted hunting restrictions and laws, limiting the Indian men’s ability support his family with his expert hunting.  Next the barter system was changed to a silver and gold-based trade system, of which the Accawmacke Indians saw no value.  The Accawmackes valued copper rather than silver or gold.  In, addition, the Accawmacke American Indians got accustomed to several English goods and suddenly, the fur pelts held no value in trade.  This created debt.  For example, many American Indians were in debt for the spinning wheels.  Spinning wheels were like cell phones today in a village.  Debt lead to bondage slavery / indentured servitude.  It started with asking for children who at first, were slaves for 7 years or until the age of 24-30. Twenty years is a long period time to brainwash identity and culture away. 

Law Code, Acts Gradually Turn Indentured American Indian into Forever Slaves

Laws then stated that these children would in turn Indentured American Indian of Negroid Phenotype to become forever slaves and no longer Accawmacke Indians.  In additions, laws were created that stated all offspring of American Indian / Negro slave in bondage would be forever slaves.  The 1682 Christian Parentage Act also known as the Virginia Slave Act, that stated people of non-Christian parentage were forever slaves.  Clearly, if chattel slavery of African people carried to America in boats was the basis of 400 years of slavery, it would have not required so many laws.  Laws were required to systematically enslave and reclassify the American Indigenous Accawmacke Indians and other Indians of negroid appearance. 

The mere existence of the many Virginia slave codes, laws and acts beginning in 1662 to the Virginia Slave Act of 1705, reveal the American Indians to be today’s Blacks and African Americans.  It took many laws, codes and acts to reclassify and enslave a free Negroid Indian race of American Indians and the American Accawmacke Indians heritage, history and genealogy proves the hidden truth.

In the year 1705, the Virginia General Assembly passed a law which transformed black indentured servants into slaves: the “Virginia Slave Act of 1705,” which condemned many men, women, and children to a lifetime of slavery even if they were only days away from being freed of their indentured status.

War Prisoners became Forever Slaves

As cited in “Free People of Colour, Free Negroes, Indians, Portuguese and Freed Slaves” by, Mary B. Kegley, after the Tuscarora War in 1711, many native people were sold into slavery in the West Indies. However, it occurred earlier as well. In this 1690 entry, we see an example; in the “Disposition of William Duckenfield,” that stated; “A Maherin Indian informed the Tuskaroo Indians that their two missing men were not killed by the English, but that Daniel Pugh of Nansimond County had sent four of them to Barbados and other islands.” 

This is an example of how as prisoners of the many Indian wars, American Indians were moved from North America to be disoriented and broken in Barbados and other islands, only to be shipped back to North America as Negro slaves forever. The Accawmacke Indians were reclassified from Indigenous American Indians to be forever Negro, Colored, Black and now African American. This is the creation and fall of the Accawmackes Gingakin Reservation according to the Library of Virginia, in 1641. 

The Accawmackes became known as Gingaskins when they accepted a patent from the English government for the remaining 1500 acres of their ancestral lands.  Various legal and boundary struggles with their English neighbors reduced the lands reserved for the Gingaskins to 650 acres which was patented again in 1680.  Over the years, Indian lands were often leased to outsiders in order to help support Gingaskin members, most of whom chose to maintain a traditional lifestyle and not farm the lands.  Great concern was exhibited by white neighbors about Gingaskins intermarrying with free negroes and charges were made in a petition to the General Assembly in 1787 that there were no more "real" Indians left on the reservation, therefore the land should be given to whites who could better protect it (i.e. farm it in), in the traditional English way.  In 1812, the trustees of the Gingaskin reservation convinced (or forced) the remaining members to accept a division of the land amongst themselves.  The Virginia General Assembly passed a law in 1813 to terminate the Gingaskin reservation and divide the land between the official members.  This was the first instance of termination or legal allotment of reservation lands and detribalization of its new owners in United States history.  Only three fourths of individual Gingaskin owners retained their lands until 1831 when most were forced out following the Nat Turner insurrection.

To the Accawmacke Indians the Gingaskin Reservation was a form of prison camp, separating those lighter brown Indians, mostly female Indians authorized to claim Indian status from the free and enslaved darker full-blooded Indians.  Gingaskin is an English derogatory name meaning “Gin guzzling baggy pants”.  The Accawmackes do not accept the derogatory term “Gingaskin” nor do they accept the term “Tribe” as it has an inferior connotation and status.  Those names patronize the highly civilized, Aboriginal/Indigenous people of America.  Accawmackes Indians are a people, an organization which is in fact a nation, and a kingdom which is exactly how they were identified as before the colonies were established.

In 1831, the fear of the Indigenous people and the greed for land, urged the Virginia Assembly to take what was left of the land assigned to them as the Gingaskin Reservation. Some Accawmackes hold on to remnants of the reservation to this day; others have lost their allotments.  They were pressured to sell or lost to debt and or taxes. In 1831 before the Emancipation, The Virginia Assembly claimed that the Gingaskin Reservation was dominated by “FREE Negroes/ Blacks.”  It was claimed that these free non-Indian Negroes and Blacks married Indian women to gain access to the land allotments.  Yet, there is no explanation, for the existence of all those free Negroes/ Blacks. All Negroes and Blacks in America are claimed to be stolen cargo, who had no rights to land allotments pre-emancipation, in fact Negro / Blacks were said not to be even being considered human.

The truth is that in Northampton County, Virginia the Free Negroes/ Blacks were indeed Full Blood Chestnut Brown and Copper colored Brown Indigenous American Indians.  The fact is Negro / Black appearing dark Indigenous American Indians may not have all been Accawmacke Indians but were neighboring Indigenous American Indians of Negroid appearance.  The explanation for the presence of a large number of free Negroes / Blacks in Virginia could only have been that they were Indigenous American Indians. There is no other logical explanation.

Coincidently, in 1831 the final loss lands of the Gingaskin Reservation coincided with the time of great fear in Colonial Virginia and the entire country stemming from the so-called Nat Turner Uprising. Nat Turner was also known as being American Indian and it was said he was assisted by free Indian people.  In fact, the name “Nat” is said to be a popular name for American Indians at that time. Nat Turner’s homeland in Southampton County bordered the Accawmacke Indian homeland in part of Southampton County and knowledge of that relationship inflamed the fears of the colonist. In truth, the so-called Nat Turner uprising was an American Indian War.  The American Indian War called the Nat Turner uprising, was also a major catalyst for the Trail of Tears in 1838.

According to the Museum of the Cherokee Indian, the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled that “they were a sovereign nation in Worcester vs. Georgia, (1932).  By refusing to consider Cherokee Nation v. Georgia (1831), the Supreme Court denied self-government to a Native American tribe. Prior to 1831, the federal government treated tribes as foreign entities in an effort to keep their tribal lands, the Cherokee living within Georgia turned to farming and ranching. 

They also wrote a constitution and laws reflecting some aspects of U.S. law.  The state of Georgia declared all the Cherokee laws void, prompting that nation to appeal to the Supreme Court. Chief Justice John Marshall wrote the opinion dismissing the case, saying that Indian tribes were "domestic dependent nations" and could not turn to the Supreme Court. The Cherokee Indian had no right to file a legal claim in United States' courts. 

President Andrew Jackson ignores the Supreme Court decision, enforced his Indian Removal Act of 1830 and pushed through the Treaty of New Echota. The Indian Removal Act of 1830 has been referred to as “a unitary act of systematic genocide, because it discriminated against an ethnic group in so far as to make certain the death of vast numbers of its population.  The 1830 Indian Removal Act required that the Cherokee surrender their land and move west.

The Treaty of New Echota became the legal basis for the forcible removal known as the Trail of Tears. In 1838, the Cherokee people were forcibly taken from their homes, incarcerated in stockades, forced to walk more than a thousand miles and removed to Indian Territory, now Oklahoma.  More than 4,000 died and many are buried in unmarked graves along “The Trail Where They Cried.” 

There are many genealogical and court records of Accawmacke Indian ancestors who fled Virginia during the unrest of the Trail of Tears.  Many accounts of Accawmacke Indian ancestors escaped to Florida.  Such as a few Cypresses who forcibly left to join the now Seminole of the Big Cypress Reservation in Florida. Several others such as those named Chavis, Jeffers, Stephens, Ammons, Perkins and Jones to name a few, joined the Cheraw Nation in Florida.  There were court and census records indicating that the Johnson’s who descend from the wealthiest American Indian Slave in Northampton, Virginia; Anthony Johnson who fled to Maryland and later to Cherokee Territory in Texas.  Here are also oral accounts of Accawmacke Indians fleeing to Montana as well.

Later, Post-Civil War Jim Crow Era Oppression, and legalized terrorism, served to secure the stolen lands. Creative laws were instituted in efforts to keep the Accawmackes and other Indigenous American Indians of negroid appearance from being classified as American Indians with rights and claims to American Soil. This was further enforced in with the1924 Racial Integrity Act.  A racist eugenic named Dr. Walter Plecker was hired by the Census Bureau and he insisted that all non-Whites especially those claiming Indian identity, be classified as Colored. 

This 1924 Racial Integrity Act motivated those Indians with qualifying predominate ratios of European heritage to organize their few families into the various Virginia Indian Tribes that are known today.  Only Indian tribes that had a high European blood line were allowed to resist this Act.  In fact, it divided Indian against Indians in the same community and families and those who could be classified as Indian against those who could not.  Some Virginia Indians refused to enlist in the military due to being classified as Colored. A few Virginia Indians even chose jail rather than joining WWI and WW2 as Colored people.

Fortunately, several Accawmackes adapted well to change and remained confident of their true identity and heritage despite the reclassification. Some lost the connection to their true identity and remain somewhat in denial and unaware to this very day.

In 1950, after fighting in World War II, having fought in all American Wars including the Revolutionary War, the Accawmacke Indians experienced economic and racial oppression in Northampton County. The Accawmacke Indian veterans failed to receive the benefits they were promise. As a result, many families, neighbors, friends of various Accawmacke Indian clans were forced way from their homelands in Virginia to various places all over the world.  Most notably the Accawmackes were forced to move to NYC, NJ, PA, DE and MD.  Yet many of today’s Accawmackes have both parents from the Accawmackes and all four grandparents, etc.

The Accawmackes have always been a patriotic people, fighting in every American war to this date.  They are a people who love their indigenous homeland America.  This evidenced by the fact that several Accawmacke Indians fought for America as early as the Revolutionary War. 

In addition, the Accawmackes are known as people who have an entrepreneur spirit known as being experts in trade, farming, and fishing.  The Accawmackes saw and see the benefit to business negotiations with the English. 

Unfortunately, the American Indians underestimated the level of desperate measures the Europeans would take to steal America and profit from its wealth of both human and natural resources.  The Accawmake Indians never waged nor participated in war against the Colonist and therefore signed no treaties and make no tribute to the Virginia Company or USA Corporation. 

The Accawmacke lived mostly on the Bay side of the Peninsula, also near the tip to what is now the Bay Bridge / Tunnel. The beaches on bay on which the Accawmacke used to crab, fish and swim were now blocked for years with “PRIVATE and NO TRESPASSING” signs those Beaches while the gigantic Sand Dunes that were previously in Savage Neck on the Bayside Sands were excavated and scaped causing trees to topple over. What happened to the   reported stolen Sand Dunes on Barges and Trucks? No one cared about the Destruction of The Environment and Ecosystem.  

People in Northampton see Accawmacke Indians and pass them by each day as ordinary African Americans.  Some believe the Accawmacke Indians are of mixed-American Indian / Tri Racial ancestry.  Yet, genealogy proves that most Accawmacke Indians are nearly or completely full-blooded Indians.  Therefore, the American Indigenous Accawmackes Indians today claim their pre-colonial identity freedom rights and heritage.

Accawmacke Indians obey the laws of America, respect and pledge unity and complete cooperation.  Foreign governments such as the United States of America, Inc., cannot assume the right to define, fine, tax, classify or identify indigenous civilized American Indians, such the American Indigenous Accawmacke Indians.

Accawmacke Indians of Today

The Accawmakes not only resided on the Gingaskin reservation; the majority of the Accawmacke Indians was reclassified by Virginia Law as Negro, Colored and Mulatto and lived off the reservation.  Many lived and still live to this day in the homeland and heritage land that belonged to their various 

The True History of  Virginia Indians.

Accawmacke Sub-Tribe and Clans, reclassified as African American.  The Accawmacke Indians numbered more than 5000 when the Europeans arrived. Today there are over 200 enrolled members.  Yet, there are an estimated 2000 people who are actually of the Accawmacke Indian bloodline.  Today when you meet an African American in Northampton, they may really be an authentic Indigenous American Accawmacke Indian. In fact, Accawmacke Indians are all around the world.