The Shinnecock were among the thirteen Indian bands loosely based on kinship on Long Island, which were named by their geographic locations, but the people were highly decentralized. The most common pattern of indigenous life on Long Island prior to their economic and cultural destruction - and, on occasion, actual enslavement - by the Europeans was the autonomous village linked by kinship to its neighbors.[3] They were related and politically subject to the Pequot and Narragansett, the more powerful Algonquian tribes of southern New England across Long Island Sound. The Shinnecock are believed to have spoken a dialect of Mohegan-Pequot-Montauk, similar to their neighbors the Montaukett on Long Island. As is the case with many North Eastern tribes after the establishment of reservations, the Shinnecock language was not allowed to be spoken in schools and its use was highly frowned upon off the reservation. This caused a decline in the number of people who spoke the language, however, the tribe is actively engaged in language renewal programs to secure the legacy of the language for future generations.[4]
The bands in the western part of Long Island were Lenape (Delaware), such as the Matinecock and Patchogue.[5] Also part of the large Algonquian languages family, these Lenape spoke a Delaware-Munsee dialect, one of three of their people. They shared a longhouse social system with their people also located in a territory that extended through the mid-Atlantic area, from western Connecticut, the lower Hudson River Valley, through present-day New Jersey, Delaware and Pennsylvania.[3]
Like the other Native peoples of Long Island, the Shinnecock made wampumpeag (wampum), shell beads strung onto threads that were used as currency, for record-keeping, for aesthetic purposes, and to symbolize a family. These shell beads have been found at Native American-inhabited sites as far west as the Rocky Mountains, showing their value in a trade. Although other New England tribes produced wampumpeag, the Indians of Long Island are reputed to have made the best. Paumanok, one of the many names given to Long Island, means "land of tribute".[6] The tribe was subject to raids by the Pequot and other New England tribes to control this valuable trade commodity. The Europeans quickly learned the value of the Shinnecock wampumpeag in a trade with other tribes. Cockenoe, a Montaukett/Shinnecock captured during the Pequot War in 1637, worked with John Eliot in Boston in the 1640s to translate the first parts of the Eliot Indian Bible, before returning to Long Island.
Native American populations on Long Island declined dramatically after European colonization due mostly to vulnerability to the new infectious diseases carried by colonists, to which they had no immunity. In 1658 a smallpox epidemic caused the deaths of nearly two-thirds of the Indians on the island. In addition, their communities were disrupted by land encroachment by Dutch and later English colonists; they had to shift from hunting and fishing to horticulture.[3] By 1741, estimates are that only 400 Native Americans in total survived.[5]
In 1641, English colonists signed a lease with the Shinnecock Indians. In 1703, this was ratified to include more land for English colonists. In 1792, the state of New York passed a law reorganizing the Shinnecock Indian Tribe as a trusteeship. The law also established annual elections for three tribal trustees, which have continued from 1792 to the present.[7] The Shinnecock, Montauk and Unkechaug developed tribal systems to deal with external forces;[3] the Shinnecock depended on their trustees to manage some relations with local farmers in the 18th century,[7] and with other jurisdictions in contemporary times. For more than two centuries, the trustees have managed the tribe's land and resources. In the fall of 2010, the Shinnecock gained federal recognition.[1][7]
After the American Revolutionary War, a number of Shinnecock left Long Island to join the Brothertown Indians in western New York, where the Oneida people gave them some land on their reservation. (By the mid-19th century the Shinnecock and Brothertown migrated to Wisconsin, pushed out of New York.) On Long Island, some Shinnecock intermarried with local colonists and enslaved Africans, who worked on farms and as craftsmen.[8] They often reared their children as Shinnecock, maintaining their identity and culture.[8]
The Shinnecock were at home on the water, long being fishermen and sailors around the island. Through the 19th century, Shinnecock men worked as fishermen and sailors on the whaling ships based at Sag Harbor and other local ports. It was said that not a ship left Eastern Long Island without at least 1 Shinnecock male on board.[9] In December 1876, ten Shinnecock men died while trying to save a ship stranded off East Hampton.[10] The tribe is famous in local lore for such heroic efforts. At the start of the 20th century, the Shinnecock were described as "daring seamen," and "furnishin[g] efficient recruits to the United States Life Saving Service" (Coast Guard).[11]
In 2024, Lisa Goree became the first woman chair of the Shinnecock Nation Council of Trustees.[12]
Every Labor Day Weekend since 1946, the reservation hosts a powwow, based on ceremonies beginning in 1912.[13] The Shinnecock Powwow is ranked by USA Today as one of the ten great powwows held in the United States.[14] In 2008 the powwow attracted 50,000 visitors.[15]
Federal recognition
The Shinnecock were recognized by the United States government in October 2010 after a more than 30-year effort, which included suing the Department of Interior.[7] The Acting Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Indian Affairs, George T. Skibine issued the final determination of the tribe's recognized status on June 13, 2010.[16] The first Secretary of the Interior to visit the Shinnecock Indian Reservation was Sally Jewell, who visited in 2015.[17] She was joined by Kevin K. Washburn, the Assistant Secretary of Indian Affairs.[18] One of the purposes of the visit was to highlight renewable energy initiatives.
The Shinnecock Indian Reservation is a self-governing reservation. By 1859, the current borders of 800 acres (3.2km2) were established.[13]
In 1972 the Shinnecock Native American Cultural Coalition (SNACC) was formed to establish a Native American arts and crafts program. Traditional dancing, beadwork, Native American crafts, and music are studied. A group called The Youngblood Singers was formed. Dedicated to learning traditional Algonquian songs, chants, and drum rituals, they travel throughout the Northeast performing at powwows and drum contests.[19] The Cultural Enrichment Program is a sharing and learning process that the community has engaged in to ensure that the ideals and traditions of their ancestors are passed down through the generations. It involves sharing knowledge of food, clothing, arts, crafts, dance, ceremonies, and language.[20]
The reservation has a museum, shellfish hatchery, education center, cultural and community center, playground,[21] and Presbyterian church. The reservation is three miles (5km) west of the village of Southampton, New York. In 1903, it had a population of 150. In 2012 the Shinnecock Nation numbered more than 1,400 people, with more than half residing on the reservation.[20][22]
Land claims dispute
In 2005 the nation filed a land claim against New York seeking the return of 3,500 acres (14km2) in Southampton located near the tribe's reservation, and billions of dollars in reparations for damages suffered by colonial land grabs. The disputed property is worth $1 billion and includes the Shinnecock Hills Golf Club,[7] which Shinnecock say is the location of traditional tribal burial grounds.
The tribe's lawsuit challenged the state legislature's approval of an 1859 sale of the 3500 acres of tribal land to non-native persons. This broke the terms of a 1,000-year-lease signed in 1703 by Southampton colonial officials and the tribe. The suit charges that in 1859, a group of powerful New York investors conspired to break the lease by sending the state Legislature a fraudulent petition supporting the sale, which was purported to be from a number of Shinnecock tribal members. Although other tribal members immediately protested that the petition was a forgery, the Legislature approved the sale of 3,500 acres (14km2) of tribal land.[23]
In 2019 a documentary film entitled "Conscience Point" was released and shown on WNET in New York City and other PBS stations.[24] It documents the struggle for land rights and protection of Shinnecock ancestral burials over a five-year period and features Shinnecock activist Becky Hill-Genia.[25]
Casino proposals
In 2007 the tribe proposed building a gaming casino to generate revenues for welfare and education, but it has not proceeded to development.[26] In negotiations with the state and local government, the Nation agrees a location out of the Hamptons area would be better for the environment.[7][27] If they develop a site in partnership with the state, they could build a Class III gaming casino, which is more lucrative than the Class II they would qualify for on their reservation.[7]
Whaling
The commercial whaling fishery in the United States is thought to have begun in the 1650s with a series of contracts between Southampton resident English settlers John Ogden, John Cooper and the Shinnecock Indians.[28]The English settlers were primarily farmers at that time with very little experience on the seas. The Indians had an expertise at both seamanship and whale hunting which were necessary to commercialize the industry, known as "the whale design".[29]
The skill of the hunters had a direct impact on the number of whales harvested in a season, as a result, Shinnecock men were often contracted by the whaling companies months in advance and for years at a time. This arrangement was wildly successful, and the whale fishery was soon seen all over New England. So valued were the Indian fisherman that in 1708 the governor made a law stating, “Indians under indenture to whaling companies could not be arrested, molested, or detained in any way from November first to April fifteenth”.[30] This version of whale fishing continued with Indian contract labor until at least 1746.
The whaling industry declined sharply in the mid-1700s. Whales were no longer found near shore in their former abundance. The hunt for whales went worldwide, and the Shinnecock were still very valued within the industry well into the 1800s. Notably, on April 18, 1845 aboard the whaling vessel the Manhattan, a Shinnecock Indian named Eleazar became the first Native American to enter into Japanese territory, anchoring in Tokyo Bay.[31]
Wampum
The Shinnecock Indians are very closely tied to wampum. In the early 1600s, the first recorded European reference of Long Island Indians comes from Dutch official Isaack de Rasieres. He described Long Island as, "three to four leagues broad, and it has several creeks and bays, where many savages dwell, who support themselves by planting maize and making sewan (wampum) and who are called… Sinnecox (Shinnecock)."[32]
The Long Island Indians are generally thought to be the largest producers of wampum in the colonial era with much of it being paid as tribute to larger or more powerful tribes.[33] As wampum manufacturing grew during the 1600s, it became an official currency of the colonies until the early 18th century and it was the primary currency used in the fur trade of the time. The need for wampum was so great that the Shinnecock and other Long Island Indians were included in the 1664 free trade treaty of Fort Albany as a means to secure unrestricted wampum from the Indians.[34]
The Shinnecock and neighboring Long Island tribes were keen to secure their access to the resource through treaties. In 1648, the Shinnecock, Montauk, Manhasset and Corchaug tribes sold land which would become the Town of East Hampton, New York. The treaty states, "(the tribes) reserve libertie to fish in all convenient places, for Shells to make wampum".[35]
Evidence of Shinnecock influence on the industry can still be seen today. A bull rake is a large clam harvesting tool created in the mid-1800s. It also goes by the name of a "Shinnecock rake".[36]
↑ Gilman, Daniel Coit; Peck, Harry Thurston; Colby, Frank Moore (1906). The New International Encyclopaedia. Vol.18. New York: Dodd, Mead and Company. p.88. Retrieved 2010-06-24.
↑ Landes, Jennifer (October 18, 2007). "Tribe Bids for Casino". The East Hampton Star. Archived from the original on March 19, 2008. Retrieved 2010-01-31.
The Pequot are a Native American people of Connecticut. The modern Pequot are members of the federally recognized Mashantucket Pequot Tribe, four other state-recognized groups in Connecticut including the Eastern Pequot Tribal Nation, or the Brothertown Indians of Wisconsin. They historically spoke Pequot, a dialect of the Mohegan-Pequot language, which became extinct by the early 20th century. Some tribal members are undertaking revival efforts.
Shinnecock Hills is a hamlet in Suffolk County, New York, United States. The population was 2,188 at the 2010 census. It is the home of a leading golf club, Shinnecock Hills Golf Club. Ownership of the area has been the subject of a 2005 lawsuit filed by the Shinnecock Indian Nation.
The Hamptons, part of the East End of Long Island, consist of the towns of Southampton and East Hampton, which together comprise the South Fork of Long Island, in Suffolk County, New York. The Hamptons are a popular seaside resort and one of the historical summer colonies of the northeastern United States.
Shinnecock Reservation is a Native American reservation for members of the Shinnecock Indian Nation in the town of Southampton in Suffolk County, New York, United States. It is the furthermost east of the two Native American reservations in Suffolk County; the other being Poospatuck Reservation in the town of Brookhaven. It lies on the east side of Shinnecock Bay on southeastern Long Island, near Tuckahoe, Shinnecock Hills, and the village of Southampton. The population was 819 as of the 2020 census. Roughly that many tribal members additionally live off the reservation.
Southampton, officially the Town of Southampton, is a town in southeastern Suffolk County, New York, partly on the South Fork of Long Island. As of the 2020 U.S. census, the town had a population of 69,036. Southampton is included in the stretch of shoreline prominently known as the Hamptons.
The Penobscot are an Indigenous people in North America from the Northeastern Woodlands region. They are organized as a federally recognized tribe in Maine and as a First Nations band government in the Atlantic provinces and Quebec.
The Narragansett people are an Algonquian American Indian tribe from Rhode Island. Today, Narragansett people are enrolled in the federally recognized Narragansett Indian Tribe. They gained federal recognition in 1983.
Wampum is a traditional shell bead of the Eastern Woodlands tribes of Native Americans. It includes white shell beads hand-fashioned from the North Atlantic channeled whelk shell and white and purple beads made from the quahog or Western North Atlantic hard-shelled clam.
The Town of East Hampton is located in southeastern Suffolk County, New York, at the eastern end of the South Shore of Long Island. It is the easternmost town in the state of New York. At the time of the 2020 United States census, it had a total population of 28,385.
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.
Peconic County is a proposed new county on Long Island in the U.S. state of New York that would secede the five easternmost towns of Suffolk County: East Hampton, Riverhead, Shelter Island, Southampton and Southold, plus the Shinnecock Indian Reservation.
Indigenous peoples of the Northeastern Woodlands include Native American tribes and First Nation bands residing in or originating from a cultural area encompassing the northeastern and Midwest United States and southeastern Canada. It is part of a broader grouping known as the Eastern Woodlands. The Northeastern Woodlands is divided into three major areas: the Coastal, Saint Lawrence Lowlands, and Great Lakes-Riverine zones.
The Brothertown Indians, located in Wisconsin, are a Native American tribe formed in the late 18th century from communities descended from 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 Ottawa Tribe of Oklahoma is one of four federally recognized Native American tribes of Odawa people in the United States. Its Algonquian-speaking ancestors had migrated gradually from the Atlantic coast and Great Lakes areas, reaching what are now the states of Michigan and Ohio in the 18th century. In the late 1830s the United States removed the Ottawa to west of the Mississippi River, first to Iowa, then to Kansas in what was Indian Territory.
The Montaukett ("Metoac"), more commonly known as Montauk are an Algonquian-speaking Native American people from the eastern and central sections of Long Island, New York.
Shinnecock may refer to:
Metoac is an erroneous term used by some to group together the Munsee-speaking Lenape (west), Quiripi-speaking Unquachog (center) and Pequot-speaking Montaukett (east) American Indians on what is now Long Island in New York state. The term was invented by amateur anthropologist and U.S. Congressman Silas Wood in the mistaken belief that the various native settlements on the island each comprised distinct tribes.
The East End of Long Island is constituted by the five townships at the eastern end of New York's Suffolk County, namely Riverhead, Southampton, Southold, Shelter Island, and East Hampton. Long Island's North Fork and South Fork are part of the East End. "The East End" is sometimes shortened as "The End", but this latter term is also applied only to Montauk, the most easterly hamlet of the contiguous land mass.
The Montauk Point land claim was a series of three lawsuits brought by Chief Wyandank Pharaoh, nephew of the Stephen Talkhouse who died in the same year (1879) that the tribe lost the last remaining vestige of their territory in the New York state courts, claiming Montauk Point on behalf of the Montaukett Indians, against the Long Island Rail Road (LIRR) and its predecessors in title.
Paul Cuffee was a Christian minister, missionary, and preacher. A Native American of the Shinnecock tribe, Cuffee became a Christian and was baptized as a young adult. He was ordained as a ministry of the Presbyterian Church in his late twenties and began to work as a missionary for New York Missionary Society among the native peoples of Long Island, New York, where he worked for the survival of the local tribes, and became known as powerful preacher and a strong advocate for the native peoples of Long Island, to whom he became known as "Priest Paul." He also was a tireless advocate of his people among the non-native majority. He also spoke against slavery and was mentioned in Harriet Beecher Stowe's novel, Uncle Tom's Cabin.
References
Swanton, John R. The Indian Tribes of North America. Smithsonian Institution, Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin 145. Washington DC.: Government Printing Office, 1952.
Hodge, Frederick W. Handbook of North American Indians. Washington, DC.: Government Printing Press, 1910.
Stone, Gaynell, ed. The Shinnecock Indians: A Culture History, 1983, Suffolk County Archaeological Association, Stony Brook, New York. Strong, John A. The Algonquian Peoples of Long Island From Earliest Times to 1700. Empire State Press, 1997. Strong, John A. Shinnecock and Montauk Whalemen, The Long Island Historical Journal, 2(1) 29-40.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
