The Wampanoag Indians of New England

Native Americans Who First Encountered English Pilgrims

Aug 7, 2009

The Wampanoags are now a part of American folklore, tied to the Pilgrim and Thanksgiving myths. But their side of the story has elements of real tragedy.

The name “Wampanoag” is variously translated as “People of the Dawn,” People of First Light,” or simply “Eastern People” They were native tribes living chiefly in what is now southern Massachusetts and Rhode Island. They were a confederation of loosely-knit tribes, not a single political entity. Since they were on the Atlantic coast, they were among the first Native Americans to have contact with European explorers and settlers.

Wampanoags and European Contact

Circa 1600 there were around 12,000 Wampanoag. Each tribe had its own leaders, or sachems. The most famous Wampanoag tribe today are the Pokanokets. Their Great Sachem, Massasoit, had dealings with the Plymouth “Pilgrims” and forged a defensive alliance with them in 1621.

The Pokanokets, like many of the Wampanoag tribes, were under siege in the early 1600s. The “Pilgrims” were not the first white Europeans to frequent the area. There had been occasional contacts by fishermen and explorers for decades. Sometimes there was peaceful trade, but often unscrupulous Europeans would kidnap natives to use as guides or sell as slaves.

That was bad enough, but the Europeans unwittingly introduced diseases that decimated the tribes. For the most part the Native American Indians had no natural immunity, and epidemics cut a swath of destruction through the region. Historians estimate that as many as 90% of the native population died in some areas. When the English arrived in 1620, it seemed to them a wilderness. They founded Plimoth Plantation (Plymouth), a place of cleared fields and good water. The place had once been known as Patuxet and had been a Wampanoag village. The fields had once been cultivated by the Patuxet people, but they had been wiped out by disease.

Wampanoag Life in the Seventeenth Century

The Wampanoag peoples were well adapted to their environment. They hunted and fished, and cultivated such crops as corn. Deer were their “cattle,” in the sense that they were a mainstay food source. Natives would sometimes set fire to areas purposely. After an area burned, new plants would spring up that provided perfect “browse” for deer.

Men wore breechcloths and leggings, women knee-length skirts, In cold weather deerskin mantles might be worn. A woorior might wear a headband, but warbonnets such as the Lakota Sioux wore were unknown. Feet were shod with mocassins.

Massasoit and the Pilgrims

Massasoit translates to “great leader.” His real name was Ousamequin. But he was indeed a great leader, because he sought to protect his people by every means possible. The Pokenoket were threatened by the powerful Naragansett tribe, so Massasoit sought an alliance with the English. The treaty was more or less successful, though the Wampanoag people started to feel pressure from English land hunger as time went on

King Philip’s War of 1675

On the whole the first generation of English settlers kept the peace. But in 1630 a new Puritan colony, Massachusetts Bay, was founded. Thousands more English came, most of them intolerant of native culture. Wampanoeg lands were taken, and natives pressured to become Christian and abandon their old ways

In 1675 Metacom, Massasoit’s son, was the leader of the Pokanokets. Metacom, known as “King Philip” to the whites, launched a last desperate bid to preserve his people’s lands and culture. The conflict, known as “King Philip’s War,” was one of the bloodiest in American history. After heavy fighting the Wampanoags were defeated, and Metacom killed in an ambush.

The war was catastrophic for the Wampanoags. They were all but destroyed. Many thousands perished. Some died in battle, others of disase or hunger. Captive,s including Philip's own wife and child, were shipped off the the West Indies as slaves.

The Wampanoag Today

Somehow, the Wamapnoag people survived the disaster. Their numbers were low, and sometimes they would “outmarry” other ethnic groups, even whites. But the People of the Dawn held on, and successfully salvaged much of their old cultural ways. Today, the Wampanoags number about 2,000 people, with perhaps another 2,000 claiming partial ancestry

Colin G. Calloway, First Peoples: A Documentary Survey of American Indian History (Bedford/St Martins, 2008)

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