Name
The Wangunk were also called Wongunk. Some sources call the Wangunk the 'Mattabessett or Mattabesch, but Wangunk is the name used by scholars and by contemporary Wangunk descendants. [5] [8] [9] [10] [11]
| Total population | |
|---|---|
| No longer exists as a distinct tribe [1] | |
| Regions with significant populations | |
| United States (Connecticut) [2] | |
| Languages | |
| Quiripi language | |
| Religion | |
| Indigenous religion | |
| Related ethnic groups | |
| Other Algonquian peoples [3] |
The Wangunk or Wongunk were an Indigenous people from central Connecticut. [2] They were a subdivision of the Wappinger people, a Munsee-speaking people. [4] The Wangunk settled along the Connecticut River. [4]
They had three major settlements in the areas of the present-day towns of Portland, Middletown, and Wethersfield. They also used lands in other parts of what were later organized by English settlers as Middlesex and Hartford counties. [5]
There are no Wangunk state-recognized tribes [6] or federally recognized tribes. [7]
The Wangunk were also called Wongunk. Some sources call the Wangunk the 'Mattabessett or Mattabesch, but Wangunk is the name used by scholars and by contemporary Wangunk descendants. [5] [8] [9] [10] [11]
Before European contact, the Wangunk spoke Quiripi, which is part of the large Algonquian language family and had strong connections with other of the many Algonquian nations, whose territory was along the Atlantic coast and rivers leading to the sea. [3]
Wangunk people lived in and near present-day Middletown, Haddam, and Portland, Connecticut, at the time the English arrived. [12] Originally located around Hartford and Wethersfield, but displaced by settlers there, they relocated to the land around the oxbow bend in the Connecticut River. [12] [13] Before English settlement, there were at least half a dozen villages around the area on both sides of the river. [3] Of these, Mattabassett (or Mattabesseck, Matabesset) was the name most associated with the Wangunk by the English (corresponding with Middletown). Other villages include Pocowset (Portland), Cockaponet (Haddam), Coginchaug, Cononnacock, and Machamodus. [3] The Wangunk are also sometimes referred to as "the River People" because of their positioning within the fertile Connecticut river valley. [14]
When the English settled and established Middletown on the west side of the river, the designated Wangunk reservation land was mainly on the East side of the river bend, with a small parcel on the West side, an area near where Indian Hill Cemetery was developed in 1850. [3] Wongunk is also used to describe a meadow in Portland that was part of the Wangunk reservation. As the Wangunk felt pressure from the settlers for the land, they sold off portions of this land and joined either neighboring tribes such as the Tunxis (Farmington, CT). The people formed new communities of Christian Indians, relocating to central New York, and then to the Great Lakes area, settling in Wisconsin. Others went to Indian Territory, which later became part of the state of Oklahoma. [15]
Like other Algonquian groups, the Wangunk political leadership rested with an individual leader called a sachem, based on English settler documentation. [16] Most Algonquian social structures were known to be based on a matrilineal kinship system, by which inheritance and property passed through the maternal line. Children were considered born to their mother's family and clan. The women shared responsibilities and power within the tribe. The Wangunk seem to be consistent with this type. [17] They lived off the seasonal economies of the region. Contemporary scholars think they migrated between two villages: one for winter and spring, another for summer and fall. [18]
The first known Wangunk interaction with Europeans was in 1614 with traders from the Dutch East India Company. The Wangunk's proximity to the Connecticut River made their homeland desirable for European fur traders, leading to conflicts with the Pequot tribe over the area. The Wangunk allied with Narragansett and reached out to English settlers as defensive strategies against the Pequot. [13]
Alliances may have shifted with the outbreak of the Pequot War in 1636. Colonial accounts suggest that Wangunk sachem Sequassen' assisted the Pequot in their attack on Wethersfield, where he resided at the time. [3] Around the same time, Sowheage relocated to Mattabesett, later to be developed as Middletown. This movement and the confusion of the war may be reasons why Middletown was not founded until 1650, later than other towns in the region. [13] During this period, Natives and settlers living at Middletown are documented as engaging in a series of land transactions, culminating in a written reservation deed in 1673. [14]
Land transactions between the Wangunk and settlers took place within the European legal system of land ownership. This is based on concepts of individual property and land improvement – to be a proprietor is to own land individually and to work to "improve" it. Settlers often did not recognize Native communal ways of farming as "improvement". [8] [19] The Wangunk had a communal relationship to land. No single person or group had definite claim to a particular piece of land, and land could therefore not be bought or sold. [8]
English colonial law did not recognize Native ways of owning land. [20] Therefore, in order to keep claim to their lands amongst settler expropriation, Wangunk worked within the system of land proprietorship, at least for the purposes of legal documentation. [20] [21]
After the establishment of Middletown in 1650, Connecticut's government reserved approximately 350 acres of land on the east side of the Connecticut River for the descendants of Wangunk sachem Sowheage and the Wangunk tribe. The reservation remained undefined until 1673, when 13 of Sowheage's heirs signed a document which created two parcels, one of fifty acres at Indian Hill and another of 250 acres upland, on the east side of the Connecticut River. [5] Reservation land was specified as belonging to Wangunk heirs forever. [15] In Wangunk Meadow, next to the reservation land on the east side of Connecticut River, individual Wangunk households owned plots amounting to 9 acres. [8]
Wangunk land ownership remained largely communal into the reservation period. [8] Those who signed deeds did not necessarily "own" the land, and therefore sales were often contested by other Wangunk. Most Wangunk in this period were unable to read English deeds. The establishment of the reservation was economically harmful to the Wangunk, who needed a larger area of land to carry on their traditional agricultural and hunting practices. The lack of economic opportunities led to poverty and debt. During this period some Wangunk were enslaved by or became indentured to English colonists. [15]
King Philip's War broke out in 1675 as a united Indian resistance movement. [22] The Wangunk, along with many other tribes, remained neutral. This neutrality may have been coerced, as English people passed a series of laws during this period limiting Indian economic opportunities and access to weapons, and demanding hostages from tribes. [15]
During and after King Philip's War, some Wangunk sold land to colonists, often to pay debts. The English population of Middletown grew, and in the late 17th century colonists began building homes on Wangunk Meadows on the east bank of the river next to the reservation. In 1714 this group of settlers split from Middletown and formed the Third Society of Middletown, which had its own meetinghouse and separate leadership. By 1713 the Wangunk had been forced to vacate the Mattabessett portion of the reservation, which was in central Middletown. [5]
Settler encroachment on Indian land accelerated in 1732 when the Third Society got a new pastor, who built his home on the reservation. Some Wangunk began converting to Christianity during this period, resulting in migration to Christian communities. In 1746 the Third Society petitioned the Connecticut General Assembly for a new meeting house, and were granted land on the Wangunk reservation. The meeting house served to justify increased settler claims to reservation land, which they said the Wangunk were not putting to proper use. [5]
In 1757, after two petitions from settlers to the Connecticut General Assembly, Wangunk Richard Ranney, who lived away from the reservation, made a land claim and was granted 10 acres. Settlers petitioned twice more for the privilege to buy the reservation lands. In 1762 a group of male Wangunk submitted a memorial to the assembly requesting that the entire reservation be sold. A committee approved this request, citing the fact that only women and children were left on the reservation. The group of Wangunk left on the reservation were unable to support themselves, so part of the sale of their land went to payment of debts. [5] During this time, several Wangunk men are known to have served in the French and Indian War in order to gain employment. [23] In 1767, the Third Society officially became the town of Chatham (later Portland). [13]
The last piece of Wangunk reservation land was sold somewhere between 1772 and 1784. [13] The aged widow Mary Cushoy was living there with three children. The town selectmen persuaded her to sell the reservation about 1771, saying they had paid to support her family, and aided other Wangunk. They paid themselves back by the sale of the land. [24]
In the 18th century, many Wangunk moved away from the reservation. Some of these individuals married members of other Native tribes, including Quinnipiac and Mohegan. Individual Wangunk are known to have lived into old age and to have had children on the Mohegan reservation. [25] Some Wangunk served in the Revolutionary War. [26]
Connecticut historian John William De Forest (1826–1906), wrote that after the sale of the last Wangunk lands: "Mary Cushory was living on the town of Chatham as late as 1771. Three years later, the number of Indians residining in that township was two. In 1785, a committee was appointed by the Legislature to collect all of the money due on the Indian lands at Wangunk, and pay it over to the proprieters, who seem, at that time, to have entirely left the place. Thus ended the national existence of the Wangunks, or, as they were sometimes called, the Wangums." [27]
Other Wangunk joined the Farmington Indians in Connecticut, a group that formed when the Tunxi invited other Native Americans to move to their reservation and become a new tribe. The Farmington Indians were Christian Indians who later moved to Oneida, New York, where they were given space on the Oneida Reservation. Later, as European Americans encroached on this land, they removed to Brotherton, Wisconsin Territory, named for the people known as the Brotherton Indians. [28] A large number of Wangunk moved to Farmington; many of them participated in the tribe's later movements to new settlement. [14] [29] Despite increased geographic distance, the Wangunk continued to identify as Wangunk, sign land deeds, and return to Middletown for important occasions after moving away. [30]
Bette Nepash, or Old Betty, a Wangunk, held yearly tribal gatherings until the 1810s. These gatherings helped continue a longstanding Wangunk connection to the region. After Nepash's death, Jonathan Palmer was identified as the last Indian in Middletown when he died in 1813. [31] But, the Palmer family line has survived into the present and many members continue to live in Middlesex County. [32]
On this high place, that swells so fair,
O'er town and river, grove and lea,
We stand, O God, with song and prayer.
To give these grounds to Death and Thee.
To Death, thy servant, who, of old,
With tomahawk and arrowy spear,
As by our fathers we are told,
Hath reaped a bloody harvest here. [60]
Throughout colonial New England and the Connecticut River Valley, colonial efforts to convert native populations to Christianity were carried out both by individuals and town governments. [20] Conversion to Christianity also often required the rejection of Wangunk language, culture, and family. [20] Rev. Richard Treat established a school for Wangunk children in 1734, which aimed to teach Christian scripture and morality, in addition to the English language. [52] But, lacking community funding, the school closed four months later. [52]
Documented contemporary Wangunk individuals in Connecticut are descendants of Jonathan Palmer, including Gary O'Neil, who traces Wangunk ancestry through his father's line. [9] A potter and retired art teacher, he is the family genealogist of the remaining Wangunk in Middlesex County, and has been an organizer and leader of the Wangunk since the 1970s. [62] [1] He and his daughter Kyle have exhibited work honoring their Wangunk heritage. [63]
In 2003, Van Thomas Green, who claimed to be a Wangunk descendant (through Betty Cuschoy, his great-great-aunt), filed suit against the town of Portland, Wesleyan University, and other parties. [64] He sought $10 million in damages or compensation, the return of 300 acres to tribal descendants, and federal recognition for his family as a tribe. The case was dismissed in a US District Court due to the plaintiff's lack of standing. [65] In his complaint Green alleged that Indian burial grounds in Glastonbury and Portland, Connecticut, have been desecrated; that from 1799 to 2003 tribal lands were unlawfully transferred in violation of 25 U.S.C. § 177; and that agreements regarding 300 acres of land set aside for the native heirs of the Wangunk band of Indians were not honored.
The court ruled that he was unable to establish any causal connection between the injury and/or conduct complained of and some challenged action of defendants Wesleyan University and others. Elements of this lawsuit are treated in a student documentary, The Last of the Wangunks, which features Green. [66] The video also includes interviews with Gary O'Neil and genealogist Vicki Welch, Director at Seven Generations Research, both of whom challenge Green's claims to being a Wangunk descendant.
Some contemporary Wangunk descendants living in Middletown maintain kinship connections and cultural traditions. Gary "Red Oak" O'Neil stated that "hundreds of Wangunks" are living today in Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island. [9] [10]
In October 2023, City of Middletown Mayor Benjamin Florsheim presented a proclamation in recognition of Indigenous Peoples' Day to Gary "Red Oak" O'Neil, a Wangunk descendant. [11] A press release from the Mayor's office read, "The Wangunk people are the native inhabitants and caretakers of the land in and around Middletown, and have lived in this area for thousands of years. The Wangunk people have persisted to this day through their resiliency and spirit.” [11]
A November 2023 press release from the Mayor's office added that "all of the Middletown area" "is Wangunk land," and highlighted the importance of "bring[ing] awareness and recognition to the Wangunk people, who are sometimes referred to as a “lost tribe.'” [67]
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Middletown is a city in Middlesex County, Connecticut, United States. Located along the Connecticut River, in the central part of the state, 16 miles south of Hartford. Middletown is the largest city in the Lower Connecticut River Valley Planning Region. In 1650, it was incorporated by English settlers as a town under its original Native American name, Mattabeseck, after the local Wangunk village of the same name. They were among many tribes along the Atlantic coast who spoke Algonquian languages. The colonists renamed the settlement in 1653.
King Philip's War was an armed conflict in 1675–1676 between a group of indigenous peoples of the Northeastern Woodlands against the English New England Colonies and their indigenous allies. The war is named for Metacom, the Pokanoket chief and sachem of the Wampanoag who had adopted the English name Philip because of the friendly relations between his father Massasoit and the Plymouth Colony. The war continued in the most northern reaches of New England until the signing of the Treaty of Casco Bay on April 12, 1678.
New Haven Colony was an English colony from 1638 to 1664 that included settlements on the north shore of Long Island Sound, with outposts in modern-day New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Delaware. The colony joined Connecticut Colony in 1664.
Miantonomoh, also spelled Miantonomo, Miantonomah or Miantonomi, was a chief of the Narragansett people of New England Indians.
Uncas was a sachem of the Mohegans who made the Mohegans the leading regional Indian tribe in lower Connecticut, through his alliance with the New England colonists against other Indian tribes.
The Pequot War was an armed conflict that took place in 1636 and ended in 1638 in New England, between the Pequot tribe and an alliance of the colonists from the Massachusetts Bay, Plymouth, and Saybrook colonies and their allies from the Narragansett and Mohegan tribes. The war concluded with the decisive defeat of the Pequot. At the end, about 700 Pequots had been killed or taken into captivity. Hundreds of prisoners were sold into slavery to colonists in Bermuda or the West Indies; other survivors were dispersed as captives to the victorious tribes.
The Connecticut Colony, originally known as the Connecticut River Colony, was an English colony in New England which later became the state of Connecticut. It was organized on March 3, 1636, as a settlement for a Puritan congregation of settlers from the Massachusetts Bay Colony led by Thomas Hooker. The English would secure their control of the region in the Pequot War. Over the course of the colony's history it would absorb the neighboring New Haven and Saybrook colonies. The colony was part of the briefly-lived Dominion of New England. The colony's founding document, the Fundamental Orders of Connecticut has been called the first written constitution of a democratic government, earning Connecticut the nickname "The Constitution State".
Roger Ludlow (1590–1664) was an English lawyer, magistrate, military officer, and colonist. He was active in the founding of the Colony of Connecticut, and helped draft laws for it and the nearby Massachusetts Bay Colony. Under his and John Mason's direction, Boston's first fortification, later known as Castle William and then Fort Independence was built on Castle Island in Boston harbor. Frequently at odds with his peers, he eventually also founded Fairfield and Norwalk before leaving New England entirely.
Ninigret was a sachem of the eastern Niantic Indian tribe in New England at the time of colonization, based in Rhode Island. In 1637, he allied with the colonists and the Narragansetts against the Pequot Indians.
The Mystic massacre – also known as the Pequot massacre and the Battle of Mystic Fort – took place on May 26, 1637 during the Pequot War, when a force from the Connecticut Colony under Captain John Mason and their Narragansett and Mohegan allies set fire to the Pequot Fort near the Mystic River. They shot anyone who tried to escape the wooden palisade fortress and killed most of the village. There were between 400 and 700 Pequots killed during the attack; the only Pequot survivors were warriors who were away in a raiding party with their sachem Sassacus.
The Wappinger were an Eastern Algonquian Munsee-speaking Native American people from what is now southern New York and western Connecticut.
The Mohegan are an Algonquian Native American tribe historically based in present-day Connecticut. Today the majority of the people are associated with the Mohegan Indian Tribe, a federally recognized tribe living on a reservation in the eastern upper Thames River valley of south-central Connecticut. It is one of two federally recognized tribes in the state, the other being the Mashantucket Pequot, whose reservation is in Ledyard, Connecticut. There are also three state-recognized tribes: the Schaghticoke, Paugusett, and Eastern Pequot.
The Tunxis were a group of Quiripi speaking Connecticut Native Americans that is known to history mainly through their interactions with English settlers in New England. Broadly speaking, their location makes them one of the Eastern Algonquian-speaking peoples of Northeastern North America, whose languages shared a common root. More locally they were one of a number of Native communities in the lower Connecticut River Valley who shared common cultural traits.
Mattabesset was a region and settlement once occupied by Algonquian language-speaking Native Americans called the Wangunk, along the Connecticut River. The Mattabesset River reaches the Connecticut River near Middletown, Connecticut. European settler colonists established Middletown on the part of the region on the west side of the river, and a succession of settlements on the east side of the river, including Chatham and Middle Haddam, became East Hampton, Connecticut.
Wequash Cooke was allegedly one of the earliest Native American converts to Protestant Christianity, and as a sagamore he played an important role in the 1637 Pequot War in New England.
Mohegan Indians v. Connecticut (1705–1773) was the first indigenous land rights litigation in history in a common law jurisdiction. James Youngblood Henderson, professor of law, calls the case "the first major legal test of indigenous tenure." Robert Clinton calls it the "first formal litigation of North American Indian rights."
The Mohegan Tribe is a federally recognized tribe and sovereign tribal nation of the Mohegan people. Their reservation is the Mohegan Indian Reservation, located on the Thames River in Uncasville, Connecticut.
The Treaty of Hartford was a treaty concluded between English colonists in Connecticut, the Mohegan nation and the Narragansett nation on September 21, 1638, in Hartford, Connecticut.
Indian Hill Cemetery is a historic rural cemetery located at 383 Washington Street in Middletown, Connecticut on a hill adjacent to Wesleyan University.
