Camden, Currituck counties in North Carolina

I know some people in the Mattamuskeet tribe. Do you know what present town is near the old Indian Town?

Thanks for your message to me re: Camden and Currituck Counties, NC.

I’m going on memory here so I may be mistaken on some of the details, since it was about three or four years ago that I looked into these counties.

I know that Indiantown, Camden County still exists. From what I can deduce, present day Indiantown sits atop very early colonial Indiantown. As I recall, there is a huge mound (of oyster shells, nowadays covered with sod/dirt/ etc.) in presentday Indiantown.

I can’t recall the source (I believe it was an internet search), but I discovered one Peggy(?) Mainor mentioned in some early church records as a young widow with two small children. As I recall, she lived on or near the church property; which, itself, sat on, or very near Indiantown. Since Mainor (and its variants: Maynor, Mayner, Maner, etc.) is a known Coharie and Lumbee surname (in fact, one of my surnames is Maynor), I strongly suspect that this Peggy Mainor was in fact an Indian or a mixed race person. The time frame was circa 1730 or so as I recall. (Wait! I believe the source for this was the University of NC… or, maybe it was a state archives document???)

Also, wasn’t the Bennett Creek (?) Indian Reservation somewhere near Camden and Currituck Counties? (I think there was a Bennet’s Creek Reservation. It was for the remnants of the Chowan Indians as I recall.)

Also, there’s a very good internet document I found on the Mattamuskeet Indians some years ago. An ethnohistorian/genealogist (whose name I forget) traced many Hyde County residents (persons who nowadays regard themselves as black) to Mattamuskeet Indians. (An interesting aside is that this researcher attributes to famous NC historian, John Lawson a story that some of the Mattamuskeets practiced circumcision [a non-native pratice] that indicates some sort of Jewish influence prior to 1711.)

That’s about al I know I can recall from memory on the subject

I’ll try to find my sources in the next few days and post them.

I must be getting early onset Alzheimers. I got practically everything wrong in my 1st post.

(1) The Indiantown I had in mind is actually in Chowan County, not Camden County.

(2) There WAS a mound of shells on or near the Chowan County site, but apparently the mound no longer exists.

(3) It was Judith Mainer, not Peggy Mainor.

Here are the actual facts and source:

“Early reports from 16th Century explorers indicated some significant native American settlements along the Chowan River, one of the largest a relatively short distance from the mouth of Indian Creek. The White-DeBry Map of 1590 names the Indian village of Waratan, located south of Indian Creek.”

“European settlement of the area paralleled that of Edenton, one of colonial North Carolina’s first capitols. Indeed, in the early 1700’s the area known as “Indian Town” was owned by an Anglican minister, the Reverend Daniel Earl, who was rector of St. Paul’s in Edenton.”

“Hundreds of years ago the Chowanoke Indians gathered every summer at a certain river beach. It was the breeding ground of a yellow mussel much savored by the people. Over time the shells, along with pottery shards, bones, arrowheads and other discarded items, formed a mound five to six hundred yards long, sixty yards wide 8;fid five feet deep along the river bank. It had become the rubbish heap for the village, named either Waratan, Mavaton or Weyanoke, depending upon the source consulted, which had been established there. The mound is shown on a map drawn by James Wimble in 1738 and is described as “…covered with about one foot of sand and soil. It is composed almost exclusively of mussel shells taken from the river, pieces of pottery, ashes, arrowheads and human bones.”

http://www.arrowheadbeach.org/History/History_1.htm

“The indigent sometimes sought relief from the vestry as did Thomas Hobbs who was allowed 15 shillings per month in St. Paul’s in 1727 while the churchwardens investigated the validity of his request. Ministers occasionally initiated action for charitable support. The Reverend Daniel Earl personally met the immediate needs of Judith Mainer and her two children; later he submitted an account of his expenses to the vestry for reimbursement.10”

I’m going to post the web site, but it’s extremely long and probably won’t take. If it doesn’t work, do a Google search for “Reverend Daniel Earl”

http://www.ah.dcr.state.nc.us/sections/hp/colonial/Nchr/Subjects/watson1.htm+%22reverend+daniel+earl%22&hl=en”>http://72.14.203.104/search?q=cache:PR7Y9MAS0oQJ:http://www.ah.dcr.state.nc.us/sections/hp/colonial/Nchr/Subjects/watson1.htm+%22reverend+daniel+earl%22&hl=en

The best document by far I’ve ever found on the Mattamuskeet Indians is a 1975 study by Patrick H. Garrow. Virtually all of the Mattamuskeet Indians lost their identity during the early to middle part of the 19th century (from about the 1830s to circa 1860). During that time frame (after Nat Turner’s rebellion) the local white power structure initiated a culturely devastating policy of apprenticing out Mattamuskeet Indian children as young as 18 months old to white plantation owners. The apprenticeship lasted until the child turned 25 years old. By that time, all vestiges of their Indianness had been wiped clean.

Here’s what Garrow says; “A more insidious result of this apprenticeship policy was the loss of Indian identity. Since many of the children of the Mattamuskeet descendants had been removed from their homes and families at a young age and placed under the care of whites, there was little opportunity for the older generation to pass on whatever elements remained of their Indian heritage.”

Here’s the link. http://homepages.rootsweb.com/~jmack/algonqin/matta1.htm

If the link won’t work, do a Google search for “Patrick H. Garrow”

I meant to add for further geographical reference that Perquimans County, NC is also adjacent to Camden County; to the south….to save anyone the trouble of looking who, like me, didn’t have a clue where it was. 🙂 Also, as another bit of semi-related trivia; according to the Perquiman County genealogy site, the name of the county is a Yeopim Indian word meaning “land of beautiful women”. I presume that “Yeopim” and “Yawpim” are one and the same (an Algonquian tribe).

Okay, I’m finished rambling now.