1644 – Apr 18 (or Mar 18), Powhatans attack English colonists along James River, VA–400-500

Compiled by Wayne Blanchard January 17, 2024 for upload to: http://www.usdeadlyevents.com/

—       500  Drake, Samuel G. Chronicles of the Indians of America. In Drake 1836, p. 158.

—     >500  Graves, John. “374 Years Ago on April 18, 1644…” Jamestowne Society. 4-18-2018.

–400-500  Oast and Piecuch. “Anglo-Powhatan War, Third.” In Tucker. Encyclopedia… 2011.

—     ~500  Wikipedia. “Indian massacre of 1622.” 1-5-2013 modification.[1]

—     ~400  Grizzard, Frank E. Jr. and D. Boyd Smith. Jamestown Colony. 2007, p. 134.

—     >400  Nunnally, Michael L. American Indian Wars. 2007, p. 11.

—     ~400  Rountree, Helen C. “Opechancanough (d. 1646).” Encyclopedia Virginia, 4-11-2011.

—       300  Childs. A History of the U.S. In Chronological Order…1492…to…1885. 1886, 9.

—     ~300  Fiske, John. Old Virginia and Her Neighbors (Vol. 1 of 2). 1902, p. 357.

Narrative Information

Drake:  “1644….April 18. – A great Massacre in Virginia. The Indians under Opekankanoo fall upon the English and kill 500 of them. Opekankanoo is taken prisoner by the Virginians soon after, and is shot by a soldier without orders.” (Drake, Samuel G. Chronicles of the Indians of America, From its First Discovery to the Present Time. Boston: 1836. In Drake, S. G. The Old Indian Chronicle… 1836, p. 158.)

Fiske:  “The expulsion of the Boston ministers was the beginning of a systematic harassing of the Puritans in Virginia.  It was strangely affected by the massacre perpetrated by the Indians in the spring of 1644.[2]  We seem carried back to the times of John Smith when we encounter once more the grim figure of Opekankano alive and on the war-path.  We have no need, however, with some thoughtless writers, to call him a hundred years old.  It was only thirty-six years since Smith’s capture by the Indians, although so much history had been made that the interval seems much longer.  Though a wrinkled and grizzled warrior, Opekankano need not have been more than sixty or seventy when he wreaked upon the white men his second massacre, on the eve of Good Friday, 1644.  The victims numbered about 300 [presumably fatalities], but the Indians were quickly put down by Berkeley, and a new treaty confined them to the north of York River; any Indian venturing across that boundary, except as an envoy duly marked with a badge, was liable to be shot at sight.  Opekankano was taken captive and carried on a litter to Jamestown, whence Berkeley intended to send him to London as a trophy and spectacle, but before sailing time the old chief was ignobly murdered by one of his guards.  It was the end of the Powhatan confederacy.”  (Fiske, John. Old Virginia and Her Neighbors (Vol. 1 of 2). Boston and NY: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1902, pp. 357-358.)

Graves, John. “374 Years Ago on April 18, 1644…” Jamestowne Society, 4-18-2018: “More than 500 Virginia settlers are killed in a major Powhatan uprising. This event touched off a two-year war between the Natives and the Colonists, ending in the capture and executing of Powhatan chief Opechancanough.

“Dr. John Woodson, great (x8) grandfather of Lewis & Clark Company Governor John Graves, is among those killed. His two sons, John and Robert, as well as his wife, Sarah, survived with the aid of Robert Ligon who used the doctor’s rifle as they fought off the attack from within the Woodson cabin. At the onset of the attack, Sarah hid son John under a large wooden tub and son Robert under the floor in a small root cellar. To this day, Woodson descendants are known as either Tater-hole or Tub Woodsons. Sarah killed one Indian who had climbed down the chimney by dowsing him with scalding hot water and then beating him with a fireplace poker…”

Grizzard: “Massacre of 1644.  Twenty-two years after Opechancanough, brother and successor of Powhatan, launched his massive attack against the English colonists along the James River in Virginia, he tried once again to eradicate the settlers from his inherited empire.  On 18 April 1644, a force composed of Nansemonds, Chickahominies, and Weyanocks, possibly with help from the Rappahannock’s and other local chiefdoms, attacked the English settlements, killed around 400 colonists, and took many others prisoner. This time there were no warnings delivered by sympathetic Indians, as in the March 1622 attack, but because the English population had increased so dramatically in the intervening years, the number of casualties amounted to about only one-twelfth of the population – whereas it had been as much as one-quarter to one-third in the first attack.

“Few records about the event survive from the period, but is it known that in the days and weeks following the attack the English once again consolidated their forces an set out on punitive, if not annihilative, expeditions against the groups known, or thought, to have taken part.  During the summer of 1644, attacks were made against the Chickahominies, Weyanocks, Nansemonds, Appamuttucks, and Powhatans.  Although some English lost their lives during the retaliatory raids, many more Indian lives were taken, and many of the natives who were not killed were taken prisoner and sold as slaves or servants.  In some cases, whole settlements were destroyed.” (Grizzard, Frank E. Jr. and D. Boyd Smith. Jamestown Colony: A Political Social and Cultural History. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, Inc., 2007

Nunnally: “April 18, 1644 – Virginia. Powhatan, Weyanock, Nansemond, Pamunkey and Chickahominies attack settlements and plantations along the James River, killing over 400 colonists.”[3]  (Nunnally, Michael L. American Indian Wars: A Chronology of Confrontations Between Native Peoples and Settlers and the United States Military, 1500s-1901. Jefferson, NC and London: McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers, 2007, p. 11.)

Oast and Piecuch in Tucker (2011): “Anglo-Powhatan War, Third. State Date: March 18, 1644. End Date: October 1646

“The last major conflict between the English colonists and the Powhatan Confederacy in Virginia. Also known as the Virginia-Indian War of 1644-1646, it broke the power of the Powhatans forever.

“Following their defeat in the Second Anglo-Powhatan War (1622-1632), the natives watched the growing number of settlers in Virginia occupy more and more Powhatan land. Eager to profit from the sale of tobacco, a crop that rapidly depleted the soil, the English expanded their settlements from the area along the James River to territory on the York, Rappahannock, and Potomac rivers. At the same time Virginia’s settle population grew rapidly, reaching an estimated 8,000 people in 1640.

“Opechancanough, the Powhatan leader, had few options. His people, whose population had declined in size, had been pushed to the far western reaches of their land. If the Powhatans chose to abandon their homes and try to reestablish themselves among their native enemies to the west, they might lose their cultural identity and possibly their lives. To allow the English to occupy their remaining territory would leave the Powhatans powerless and render the destruction of their culture certain. War, the only remaining choice, seemed reckless given the odds against the Powhatans and the likelihood that defeat would mean annihilation.

“Although Opechancanough was elderly (reportedly nearly 100 years old) and frail, he remained determined. Believing that the turmoil caused by the English Civil War might distract the Virginias and perhaps even bring Catholic Maryland into alliance with the Powhatans, he organized an attack on the Virginia settlements. Opechancanough also had the support of the native tribes along the Rappahannock.

“The Powhatans and their allies struck on March 18, 1644. Borne on a litter by some of his men, Opechancanough led attacks on plantations in the heart of the English settlements along the James River. Other native parties attacked settlers on the upper reaches of the York and Rappahannock. The assault took the colonists by surprise, and 400-500 were killed in the initial onslaught. Many others abandoned their farms and took refuge in fortified buildings. Although the Powhatans killed many more settlers than they had in their attack of 1622, the impact of the new attack was less significant given the increase in settler population. While the attack of 1622 killed 25 percent of the English population, that of 1644 brought the deaths of 8.3 percent of the settlers.

“As in 1622, the Powhatans hesitated after their initial victories. Regrouping swiftly, the Virginians launched counterattacks against native towns, burning buildings and crops and killing any natives they found. Within six months the settlers had reoccupied all of their abandoned plantations, and the Powhatans and their allies were in retreat. Sporadic fighting continued until the late summer of 1646, when Opechancanough was captured and brought to Jamestown. Shortly afterward he was murdered by one of his guards, who shot him in the back.

“Opechancanough’s death marked the end of Powhatan resistance. His successor, Necotowance, sighed a treaty with Virginia in October 1646 in which the Powhatans ceded most of their remaining land to the English. The natives would henceforth be confined to the small portion of their territory allotted to them by the victors, in effect the first Indian reservations in North America. The Powhatans also agreed to surrender all English prisoners and firearms, to return any runaway servants who might come to them, and to pay an annual tribute of furs to Virgina. Unfortunately, only a few years passed before the English grew covetous of the land left to the Powhatans in the treaty. Thus, in less than 40 years the powerful Powhatan Confederacy had been destroyed, and English domination of the Tidewater region of Virginia had been secured.”[4] (Jennifer Bridges Oast and Jim Piecuch. “Anglo-Powhatan War, Third,” pp. 18-19 in Tucker, Spencer C. (editor). The Encyclopedia of North American Indian Wars 1607-1890. Greenwood Publishing  Group, 2011.)

Rountree:  “The Great Assault of 1644….By early in the 1640s, colonists were claiming land on the Rappahannock and Potomac rivers, straining the peace and prompting Opechancanough, now an old man, to undertake a familiar exercise: organizing an attack force while convincing the English that his intentions were friendly. (In 1641, for instance, he declined to retaliate when the colonists murdered one of his men.) 

“As a result, the English were caught unprepared when, on April 18, 1644, Opechancanough launched the second of his great assaults with a force comprised of Nansemonds (some of them), Chickahominies, Weyanocks, and possibly others. Approximately 400 colonists were killed, more than in 1622, but this time it was a much smaller proportion of the English population. And rather than press the attack, the Indians retired, whether out of military miscalculation or the assumption (again) that the English would leave. The colonists, meanwhile, were in a better position this time to counterattack, and the Third Anglo-Powhatan War was over by 1646, when an expedition led by Virginia governor Sir William Berkeley captured Opechancanough at his fort far up the Pamunkey River. (Archaeologists remain unsure of the fort’s exact location, although it appears on an English map in 1662.)

“Opechancanough’s successor as paramount chief, Necotowance, made a peace in which, according to an English report, he proclaimed “That the Sunne and Moon should first lose their glorious lights and shining, before He, or his People should evermore hereafter wrong the English in any kind, but they would ever hold love and friendship together.” In the meantime, Governor Berkeley decreed that Opechancanough be kept alive and transported to Jamestown. There, according to Robert Beverley Jr. in his History and Present State of Virginia (1705), he was treated as an oddity, with people coming to stare at him in his cell. Within two weeks of his arrival, one of the English guards shot Opechancanough dead. There is no record of where or how he was buried.”  (Roundtree, Helen C.  “Opechancanough (d. 1646).” Encyclopedia Virginia.  Brendan Wolfe (Ed.). Virginia Foundation for the Humanities. 4-11-2011.)

Wikipedia: “The next major confrontation with the Powhatan Confederacy occurred in 1644, resulting in the deaths of about 500 colonists. While similar to the death toll in 1622, the loss a generation later represented less than ten percent of the population, and had far less impact upon the colony. This time, the elderly Opechancanough, who was being transported by litter, was captured by the colonists. Imprisoned at Jamestown, he was killed by one of his guards.”[5]  (Wikipedia.  “Indian massacre of 1622.” 1-5-2013 modification.)

Willsey and Lewis: “Massacres….Whites by Indians in Virginia…18 Apr. 1644.”  (Willsey and Lewis. “Massacres,” Harper’s Book of Facts. 1895, p. 495.)

Sources

Childs, Emery E. A History of the United States In Chronological Order From the Discovery of America in 1492 to the Year 1885. NY: Baker & Taylor, 1886. Google digitized. Accessed 9-4-2017: http://books.google.com/books?id=XLYbAAAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

Drake, Samuel G. Chronicles of the Indians of America, From its First Discovery to the Present Time. Boston: 1836.  In Drake, S. G. The Old Indian Chronicle; Being a Collection of Exceeding Rare Tracts Written and Published in the Time of King Philip’s War, by Persons Residing in the Country; to Which are Now Added Marginal Notes and Chronicles of the Indians From the discovery of America to the present time. Boston: Antiquarian Institute, 1836. Google preview accessed 2-22-2018 at: http://books.google.com/books?id=NUwMAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

Fiske, John. Old Virginia and Her Neighbors (Vol. 1 of 2). Boston and NY: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1902. Accessed 1-11-2013 at: http://books.google.com/books?id=AiQSAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

Grizzard, Frank E. Jr. and D. Boyd Smith. Jamestown Colony: A Political Social and Cultural History. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, Inc., 2007. Partially Google digitized at: http://books.google.com/books?id=555CzPsGLDMC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

Jamestowne Society. “374 Years Ago on April 18, 1644…” 4-18-2018. Accessed 1-17-2024 at: https://www.jamestowne.org/blog/374-years-ago-on-april-18-1644

Nunnally, Michael L. American Indian Wars: A Chronology of Confrontations Between Native Peoples and Settlers and the United States Military, 1500s-1901. Jefferson, NC and London: McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers, 2007.

Oast, Jennifer Bridges and Jim Piecuch. “Anglo-Powhatan War, Third,” pp. 18-19 in Tucker, Spencer C. (editor).  The Encyclopedia of North American Indian Wars 1607-1890. Greenwood Publishing  Group, 2011. Google preview accessed 1-17-2024 at: https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Encyclopedia_of_North_American_India/wRjOEAAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=The+Encyclopedia+of+North+American+Indian+Wars,+1607-1890:+A+Political,+Social,+and+Military+History&printsec=frontcover

Rountree, Helen C.  “Opechancanough (d. 1646).” Encyclopedia Virginia.  Brendan Wolfe (Ed.). Virginia Foundation for the Humanities. 4-11-2011. Accessed 1-11-2013 at: http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Opechancanough_d_1646#start_entry

Wikipedia. “Indian massacre of 1622.” 1-5-2013 modification. Accessed 1-11-2013 at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_massacre_of_1622

Wikipedia. “Indian massacre of 1622.” 12-31-2023 edit. Accessed 1-17-2024 at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_massacre_of_1622

Willsey, Joseph H. (Compiler), Charlton T. Lewis (Editor). Harper’s Book of Facts: A Classified History of the World.  New York: Harper & Brothers Publishers, 1895. Accessed 9-4-2017 at: http://books.google.com/books?id=UcwGAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_v2_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q=&f=false

 [1] The Wikipedia source does not provide an in-text citation explaining where, from the sources cited at the end, this estimate came. Given that it is fully one hundred people above the other sources cited, we do not use this figure.

[2] Cites: Hildreth (History of the U.S., i. 340) to the effect that the natives “were encouraged by signs of discord among the English, having seen fight in James River between a London ship for the Parliament and a Bristol ship for the king.”

[3] Cites: Carruth, Gorton. The Encyclopedia of American Facts & Dates. NY: Harper & Row, 1987; and Josephy, Jr., Alvin M. 500 Nations: An Illustrated History of North American Indians. NY: Alfred A Knopf, 1994.

[4] Cite as references: Axtell, James. “The Rise and Fall of the Powhatan Empire.” Chapter 10 in Natives and Newcomers: The Cultural Origins of North America. New York: Oxford University Press, 2001; Rountree, Helen C. Pocahontas’s  People: The Powhatan Indians of Virginia through Four Centuries. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1990; and Rountree, Helen C., and E. Randolph Turner III. Before and After Jamestown: Virginia’s Powhatans and Their Predecessors. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2002.

[5] Cites: Spencer C. Tucker, James R. Arnold and Roberta Wiener. The Encyclopedia of North American Indian Wars, 1607-1890: A Political, Social, and Military History. ABC-CLIO, 2011, pp. 17-19.