The Hassanamisco Nipmuc Band is the sole state-recognized tribe in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. They were recognized in 1976 by Governor Michael Dukakis via Executive Order 126.[1] They were briefly known as the Nipmuc Nation, a union of the Hassanamisco Nipmuc and the Chaubunagungamaug Nipmuck bands, during their attempt to receive federal acknowledgment as a Nation. The Hassanamisco Nipmuc Band owns three and a half acres of reservation land in what is present day Grafton, Massachusetts.[2] The Nipmuc are native to Central Massachusetts, Northeastern Connecticut, and parts of Rhode Island.[3]
In 1647, a Puritan reverend by the name of John Eliot created the Hassanmesit "praying town."[4] Through the creation and usage of this town, the Nipmuc people were forcefully converted to Christianity.[5] In 1727, a Nipmuc woman, Sarah Robins took possession of the land that is currently referred to as the Hassanamisco Reservation.[2] In the mid-1600s intermarriages between the Nipmuc people and African Americans became common, whether it be because of bonding over shared marginalization, or because of the dwindling numbers of available Native American men.[6]
There are nearly 600 members of the Nipmuc tribe living in Massachusetts today.[3] The Hassanamisco Reservation and Cisco Homestead in Grafton, Massachusetts are owned and used by the Nipmuc people.[2] In 2011, the reservation and homestead were placed on the National Register of Historic Places.[7]
In 1980, the Hassanamisco Nipmuc Band petitioned for federal recognition. They received preliminary approval before being ultimately denied.[8][9]
History
The Nipmuc people, also referred to as "freshwater people," were divided into many villages which were connected through alliances and trade.[10] They once had a vast amount of land and were spread throughout what is now eastern to central Massachusetts and parts of Rhode Island and Connecticut.[3] The people hunted, gathered, and planted food. The women of the tribe were in charge of farming, producing, and preparing food for their families and were the ones who passed down cultural knowledge from generation to generation.[2] Since the wetus that they lived in could be moved, they were seen as "wanderers." They took great care of the land on which they lived.[10]
Not much is known about the Nipmuc people before the invasion of European settlers. The earliest encounter known was in 1621, when the Native Americans were friendly with the settlers.[citation needed]
After the end of King Phillip's War, the seven Nipmuc families that returned from war are referred to now as the Hassanamisco Nipmuc people.[2] The Hassanamisco land was stolen by settlers without consent.[12] The Nipmuc people were allowed to keep only 1,200 acres.[12] That land began to dwindle as some Hassanmesit Nipmuc people started to sell or lease their land to encroaching settlers.[13] From the 1720s to the 1740s, the Colony of Massachusetts put unassailable pressure on the Hassanamesit Nipmuc to sell their land and enter the market economy. However, this was often a tactic used on Native Americans so that they would get trapped into debt and then the settlers could claim their land as payment.[14] The Hassanmesit Nipmuc fell victim to this practice and lost some communal land.[14] Their land continued to be sold in pieces until 1857 when Moses Printer sold his land to Harry Arnold.[12] The remaining 3 1/2 acres were retained by the Nipmuc Cisco family, and are currently known as the Hassanamisco Reservation.[12]
Sarah Robins was a member of one of the original seven Nipmuc families.[2] Sarah took possession of the land in 1727 and began a tradition of female land inheritance that lasted for hundreds of years. The female members of the Cisco family took control over the land in the late nineteenth century.[2] These women became the caretakers of the land, working to ensure its preservation.[2] After 1857, Sarah Arnold Cisco's land became the last original piece of Nipmuc land dating back to before the 1600s, after her uncle John Hector sold his land so he could live with other natives and take advantage of opportunities in Worcester.[2] Sarah Cisco decided that she would stay on her land and fight for it.[citation needed]
In the early 2000s, there was excavation work done at the Hassanamisco Reservation to find the remains of Sarah Boston's farmstead.[14] Sarah Boston was the great-granddaughter of Sarah Robins. This site was the original land through which Sarah Robins started the tradition of female inheritance.[2] Through this excavation, it was learned that the farmstead relied on the breeding and cultivation of animals for meat.[14] It was also learned how she and others prepared food, what was eaten and how they procured it.[14]
Conversion to Christianity
Hassanamesit historical marker
In the seventeenth century, a Protestant missionary by the name of John Eliot spoke in Northeastern Connecticut in an attempt to convert the local Native Americans to Christianity.[2] On Nipmuc land and territory, Eliot created seven "praying towns.[4] The present day Hassanamisco Reservation located in Grafton, Massachusetts, was briefly a praying town in 1728 when it was called the town of Hassanamesit.[2] Hassanamesit was already an established community when Eliot arrived, so he illegally claimed it in order to enslave the people already living there to the settlers and their religion.[14] These towns had the backing of the Massachusetts government at the time to commit genocide.[4] Eliot believed that the Indigenous people not only needed to learn the Gospel, but to also adopt European ways of living.[15] While living in these towns, the Native inhabitants were not allowed to practice any of their traditions.[citation needed] To enforce this way of living, the "Praying Indians" of the towns were given eight rules they needed to follow. If they did not, were forced to pay a fine, killed or sold into slavery.[4] These rules included restrictions of what one's hair might look like; men were told they could not have long hair and women were required to have their hair pulled back.[4] This was done in an effort to culturally assimilate the Nipmuc; as a part of Eliot's efforts to force the Nipmuc people to Christianity and to make them more "civilized," he forced the people in Hassanamesit to raise livestock.[14] A superintendent at the time, Daniel Gookin, praised the Hassanmesit town for their ability to raise livestock.[14] He stated that their way of keeping cattle and pigs was "better than any other Indians."[citation needed] The praying towns in Northeastern Connecticut were shut down after the beginning of King Phillip's war because the residents were forced to relocate to other towns.[4]
Metacom, also known as King Phillip, recruited many different Native American tribes in New England to fight with him in his conflict with the colonists. Thousands of Native Americans were killed in this war, including members of the Nipmuc tribe.[15] During the war, the Nipmuc, along with several other tribes, attacked Brookfield and set fire to Springfield, Massachusetts.[15] In August 1675, the members of Hassanamesit praying town, along with four other towns, were held prisoner and banned from leaving the settlement under threat of imprisonment or death.[10] In October of the same year, non-combatant Nipmuc were confined to Deer Island, in Boston harbor, for the winter, where more than half died from exposure and starvation. At the end of the war, the Nipmuc tribal members who had joined King Phillip that did not manage to escape were either killed or sold into slavery in the West Indies.[10]
Denied Petition for Federal Acknowledgment
In 1980, the Hassanamisco Nipmuc Nation petitioned for federal acknowledgment. On June 18, 2004, the Assistant Secretary - Indian Affairs issued a negative final determination due to the group's failure to meet four of the seven mandatory criteria for federal acknowledgment, including criterion 83.7(e) "descent from a historic Indian tribe."[9][16]
The Branch of Acknowledgment and Research, Bureau of Indian Affairs determined that only 2% of the group's membership descended from the historic Hassanamisco tribal entity at the time of the final determination.[9] 54% of the group's membership was found to descend from the Dudley/Webster Nipmuc, and 45% of the group's membership was found to descend from a "Miscellaneous Indian" on the 1861 Earle Report. The tribal affiliation of this "Miscellaneous Indian" is unknown, although it is speculated to be Dudley/Webster Nimpuc.[17][9] The Hassanamisco Nipmuc have contended that the 1861 Earle Report was biased against their ancestors because they were mixed-race[18] and because "Mr. Earle 'conflated biological with cultural Indianness.' That means that Mr. Earle worked on the assumption that genealogical lineage was all-important, as it is to determine the factual lineage of any culture. He didn't agree with the modern pretense that 'Indianness' was also a cultural phenomenon that could be passed along just like memories of warrior ancestors, even to folks who had no blood ties to the original Native Americans."[19]
The Hassanamisco Nipmuc Nation failed to meet criterion 83.7(a), which requires that "the petitioner has been identified as an American Indian entity on a substantially continuous basis since 1900."[16][9] The final determination found that the Hassanamisco Nipmuc Nation was not identified externally as an American Indian entity on a substantially continuous basis between 1900 - 1970.[9] The Branch of Acknowledgment and Research wrote, "The evidence submitted for the [Proposed Finding] and [Final Determination] does not include substantially continuous external identifications of a Hassanamisco Nipmuc entity broader than the Hassanamisco proprietary descendants for the period 1900-1970. An external identification of the narrower Hassanamisco entity is not the same as an external identification of the current petitioner, which is substantially different from the entity that was being identified, the Hassanamisco descendants constituting 11 of the petitioner's 526 members."[9]
The Hassanamisco Nipmuc Nation failed to meet criterion 83.7(b), which requires that "A predominant portion of the petitioning group comprises a distinct community and has existed as a community from historical times until the present."[16] The Branch of Acknowledgement and Research determined that the members of the Hassanamisco Nipmuc Nation had no extended social or political interaction with each other prior to 1978.[9] They wrote, "The evidence in the record shows no direct social interaction between the Hassanamisco Nipmuc and the [Dudley/Webster] Nipmuc families between the 1730's and the 1920's -- a period of nearly two centuries. From the 1920's through the 1970's, the evidence in the record showed occasional social interaction between Hassanamisco descendants and [Dudley Webster] descendants, most frequently in the context of pan-Indian or intertribal activities...On the basis of precedent, this type of limited interaction is not sufficient in scope to establish a community under 83.7(b) during any time period."[9]
During the federal acknowledgement process, the Branch of Acknowledgment and Research also determined that the historic Hassanamisco tribal entity ceased to exist in the 18th century, writing, "There is sufficient evidence that the historical Hassanamisco Band retained community from colonial times until the period of the American Revolution, as a majority of its population lived on the reservation in Grafton, Massachusetts. From the American Revolution until the mid-19th century, there is limited evidence concerning continuing social ties among the Hassanamisco proprietary families. From the mid-19th century to the present, most of the evidence in the record pertains only to the Cisco extended family, and demonstrates only occasional social interaction between the Ciscos and the descendants of the other Hassanamisco proprietary families."[9] The Hassanamisco Nipmuc Nation was therefore found to be a group of Nipmuc descendents created in 1978, and not the successors to the historic Hassanamisco Nipmuc tribe.[9] A title search for their supposed reservation in Grafton, Massachusetts, revealed that the reservation was the private property of the Cisco family, and not commonly held Nipmuc land.[9] The Hassanamisco Nipmuc Nation was therefore found to be unrelated to the historic Hassanamisco Tribe. This - along with the lack of political influence or authority shown by the Hassanamisco Nipmuc Nation from 1978 onwards[9] - caused them to fail criterion 83.7(c), which requires that "The petitioner has maintained political influence or authority over its members as an autonomous entity from historical times until the present."[16]
Today, the Hassanamisco Nipmuc Band has over 600 members.[20] They are a state-recognized tribe.[21] In 1980, the Hassanamisco Nipmuc Nation filed a petition with the Bureau of Indian Affairs to gain federal recognition, they received preliminary approval but were ultimately denied.[6][9][8]
Cisco Homestead
The Cisco Homestead is the central building of the Hassanamisco Reservation and is currently being restored by members of the tribe.[2] Approximately 150 years ago the building was named after the Cisco family, but it had been standing long before it had received its name, having been built in 1801.[12] It is thought that the Cisco Homestead is the oldest timber-framed building that is still used by Native Americans to this day.[2]
Grafton is a town in Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 19,664 at the 2020 census. The town consists of the North Grafton, Grafton, and South Grafton geographic areas, each with a separate ZIP Code. Incorporated in 1735, the town is home to a Nipmuc village known as Hassanamisco Reservation, the Willard House and Clock Museum, Community Harvest Project, and the Tufts University Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine. Grafton operates the state's largest on-call fire department, with 74 members.
The Wampanoag, also rendered Wôpanâak, are a Native American people of the Northeastern Woodlands currently based in southeastern Massachusetts and formerly parts of eastern Rhode Island. Their historical territory includes the islands of Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket.
The Golden Hill Paugussett is a state-recognized Native American tribe in Connecticut. Granted reservations in a number of towns in the 17th century, their land base was whittled away until they were forced to reacquire a small amount of territory in the 19th century. Today they retain a state-recognized reservation in the town of Trumbull, and have an additional reservation acquired in 1978 and 1980 in Colchester, Connecticut.
The Massachusett were a Native American tribe from the region in and around present-day Greater Boston in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The name comes from the Massachusett language term for "At the Great Hill," referring to the Blue Hills overlooking Boston Harbor from the south.
Praying Indian is a 17th-century term referring to Native Americans of New England, New York, Ontario, and Quebec who converted to Christianity either voluntarily or involuntarily. Many groups are referred to by the term, but it is more commonly used for tribes that were organized into villages. The villages were known as praying towns and were established by missionaries such as the Puritan leader John Eliot and Jesuit missionaries who established the St. Regis and Kahnawake and the missions among the Huron in western Ontario.
The Schaghticoke are a Native American tribe of the Eastern Woodlands who historically consisted of Mahican, Potatuck, Weantinock, Tunxis, Podunk, and their descendants, peoples indigenous to what is now New York, Connecticut, and Massachusetts. The remnant tribes amalgamated in the area near the Connecticut-New York border after many losses, including the sale of some Schaghticoke and members of neighboring tribes into slavery in the Caribbean in the 1600s.
State-recognized tribes in the United States are organizations that identify as Native American tribes or heritage groups that do not meet the criteria for federally recognized Indian tribes but have been recognized by a process established under assorted state government laws for varying purposes or by governor's executive orders. State recognition does not dictate whether or not they are recognized as Native American tribes by continually existing tribal nations.
The Nipmuc or Nipmuck people are an Indigenous people of the Northeastern Woodlands, who historically spoke an Eastern Algonquian language. Their historic territory Nippenet, "the freshwater pond place," is in central Massachusetts and nearby parts of Connecticut and Rhode Island.
The Nipmuc Nation was a non profit entity of the state-recognized tribe Hassanamisco Nipmuc, an Indigenous people of the Northeastern Woodlands based in South Grafton, Massachusetts.
The Brothertown Indians, located in Wisconsin, are a possible Native American tribe formed in the late 18th century from communities of so-called "praying Indians", descended from Christianized Pequot, Narragansett, Montauk, Tunxis, Niantic, and Mohegan (Algonquian-speaking) tribes of southern New England and eastern Long Island, New York. In the 1780s after the American Revolutionary War, they migrated from New England into New York state, where they accepted land from the Iroquois Oneida Nation in Oneida County.
The Webster/Dudley Band of Chaubunagungamaug Nipmuck Indians, also known as the Chaubunagungamaug, Chaubunagungamaug Nipmuck, Pegan or Dudley/Webster Indians, is a cultural heritage group that claims descent from the Nipmuc people. They are a state-recognized tribe by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
The Chaubunagungamaug Reservation refers to the small parcel of land located in the town of Thompson, Connecticut, close to the border with the town of Webster, Massachusetts and within the bounds of Lake Chaubunagungamaug to the east and the French River to the west. The reservation is used by the descendants of the Nipmuck Indians of the previous reservation, c. 1682–1869, that existed in the same area, who now identify as the Webster/Dudley Band of the Chaubunagungamaug Nipmuck. Together with the Hassanamisco Nipmuc, both have received state recognition under the Massachusetts Commission on Indian Affairs.
Native American tribes in Massachusetts are the Native American tribes and their reservations that existed historically and those that still exist today in what is now the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. A Narragansett term for this region is Ninnimissinuok.
Quinsigamond is a place in Massachusetts.
Cheryll Toney Holley is a First Nations American historian, genealogist, and museum director. She serves as the Sonksq of the Hassanamisco Nipmuc Band, a Massachusetts state-recognized tribe.
Zara Cisco Brough, also called Princess White Flower, served as the Chief of the Nipmuc Nation, a state-recognized tribe in Massachusetts, from 1962 until 1987. She is best known for her work to preserve Nipmuc heritage.
James Printer, also known as Wowaus, (1640–1709) was a Native American from the Nipmuc tribe who studied and worked as a printer in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He was one of the most famous early Nipmuc writers. Printer was the first Native American printer's devil in America as well as one of John Eliot's most accomplished interpreters who assisted in the creation of the Eliot Indian Bible.
John Wompas was a Nipmuc Indian man born around 1637 in Nipmuc Country, in what would become the state of Massachusetts. He spent the first half of his childhood among his Native kin and the second half living with an English family in Roxbury, Massachusetts Bay Colony. This dual upbringing gave him fluency in the languages and customs of both Nipmuc and colonial English worlds. He used his cross-cultural knowledge largely for personal economic and political gain, but at the end of his life he also turned it to the benefit of his Nipmuc kin.
Black James was a Nipmuc constable and spiritual leader of the Chaubunagungamaug Nipmuck at the Chaubunagungamaug Reservation in colonial Massachusetts and Connecticut. Daniel Gookin appointed James to be a constable for the praying towns after he had become a Christian. In 1675, James signed a treaty agreeing not to assist King Philip, but may have supported him during King Philip's War. After the War, Black James deeded various parcels of land to settlers in Nipmuc country including at Quantisset and Maanexit in what is now eastern Connecticut near Rhode Island. His dying speech was recorded by Rev. Daniel Takawambait and later published and by 1686 a deed was signed by his heirs indicating that Black James was deceased, but another Indian used the name "Black James" until 1708.
The Praying Indians of Natick were a community of Indigenous Christian converts, known as Praying Indians, in the town of Natick, Massachusetts, one of many Praying Towns. They were also known as Natick Indians.
1 2 Thee, Christopher J. (2006). "Massachusetts Nipmucs and the Long Shadow of John Milton Earle". The New England Quarterly. 79 (4): 636–654. ISSN0028-4866. JSTOR20474497.
↑ Lepore, Jill (1998). The name of war: King Philip's War and the origins of American identity. New York. p.136. ISBN0-679-44686-9. OCLC36573588.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
1 2 3 Pulsipher, Jenny Hale (1996). "Massacre at Hurtleberry Hill: Christian Indians and English Authority in Metacom's War". The William and Mary Quarterly. 53 (3): 459–486. doi:10.2307/2947201. ISSN0043-5597. JSTOR2947201.
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