Lumbee

From Wikipedia

Lumbee

Total population55,000^[1]Regions with significant populations United States North Carolina   Virginia   South Carolina  Languages

English

Related ethnic groups

Cheraw

The Lumbee are one of eight state-recognized Native American tribes in North Carolina.^[2] The Lumbee are concentrated in Robeson County on the southern border of the state. They chose the Lumbee name in 1952, drawing inspiration from the primary waterway traversing Robeson County, called the Lumber River because of the extensive 19th-century timber trade in the region. The Lumbee are not a federally recognized tribe, and their attempts to gain federal recognition are a source of continuing controversy.

The Lumbee of Robeson County were first recognized as Indians in 1885 by the State of North Carolina. At that time they were declared to be "Croatan Indians." On multiple occasions over the next 130 years, the Lumbee unsuccessfully sought federal recognition under the Croatan and other names. The ethnicity of the Lumbee has been controversial: as the people are multiracial, including mixed European and African descent, they were long classified as free people of color. In fact, in census data prior to 1885, they were uniformly identified as Negro or Mullato. The Lumbee currently identify as descended from remnants of historic Siouan-speaking tribes in the region.

In 1956, the United States Congress passed H.R. 4656, known as the Lumbee Act, which recognized the Lumbee as Native American people. With the people's agreement, the act was limited, as it did not provide for customary services through the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Since then, the Lumbee have sought full federal recognition through congressional legislation.^[3][4]

Congressional legislation extending federal recognition to the Lumbee is opposed by the U.S. Department of the Interior and most federally recognized tribes.^[5][6] The Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians is the only federally recognized tribe in North Carolina, and it has opposed Lumbee efforts to gain federal recognition. In 2009, legislation for federal recognition of the Lumbee was approved in committees of the House and Senate, but the bill did not make it to the floor for a vote in the next session.

In December 2011, Paul Brooks was elected as chairman of the Lumbee tribe. He is the fifth chairman in the decade since the tribe established its government.^[7]

 

  

1History 1.1Early references2Scholarly research 2.118th century 2.2Antebellum 2.3Civil War 2.4Lowrie Gang3Post-Reconstruction to present 3.1Education and recognition 3.2Ku Klux Klan conflict4Organization and seeking federal recognition 4.1Indian New Deal 4.2Lumbee Act 4.3Petitioning for federal recognition 4.4Theories of origins  4.4.1Lost Colony of Roanoke  4.4.2Siouan descent  4.4.3Tuscarora descent  4.4.4Cherokee descent5Government 5.1Services6Tuscarora Tribe of North Carolina7See also8Notes9References10External links  

 

History

Early references

When North Carolina Governor Matthew Rowan dispatched surveying parties in 1753 to count Indians in the colony, the surveyors returning from Bladen County (from which Robeson County was subsequently created) reported there were "no Indians in the county." The same report stated that in 1754 the neighboring Anson County was "a frontier to the Indians."

Colonial tax records from 1768 to 1770 identified Thomas Britt as the only Indian in Bladen County. Britt is not a surname traditionally associated with Lumbee families. Inhabitants of Bladen County with surnames that have been traditionally associated with Lumbee families were classified as "Mullato," or non-White, or simply "Other" in the tax records.^{[citation needed]}

A colonial proclamation in 1773 listed the names of Robeson County inhabitants who took part in a "Mob Railously Assembled together," apparently defying the efforts of colonial officials to collect taxes. The proclamation declared the "Above list of Rogus" [sic] is all Free Negors [sic, Negroes] and Mullatus [mulattoes] living upon the Kings Land." Later a colonial military survey described, "50 families a mixt crew a lawless People possess the Lands without Patent or paying quit Rents."^[8] Surnames of people listed in these records have been claimed as traditional to Lumbee families.

In the first federal census of 1790, the ancestors of the Lumbee were among those enumerated as "free persons of color", a category used to describe all free non-whites (including landless Indians, and persons of mixed-race descent: Indian-White/White-African/African-Indian-White). In subsequent censuses, these people were listed in the category of "all other free persons" or "mulatto."

In 1840, thirty-six white Robeson County residents signed a petition complaining that Robeson County had been "cursed" by the presence of what they described as being a "free colored" population who migrated from the districts near the Roanoke River, in Virginia and northern North Carolina, and the Neuse River, also in the northern part of the state.^[9]

In 1867, during Reconstruction, Lieutenant Birney of the Freedman's Bureau was placed in charge of a multiple murder investigation focused on the outlawed Lowrie gang. Two suspects referred to the Lowries as follows: "They are said to be descended from the Tuscarora Indians. They have always claimed to be Indian and disdained the idea that they are in any way connected with the African race."^[10]

In 1872, George Alfred Townsend published The Swamp Outlaws, a book about the Lowery Gang. Townsend describes Henry Berry Lowery, the leader of the gang, as being of mixed Tuscarora and white blood and then went on to say of Pop Oxendine, "Like the rest, he had the Tuscarora Indian blood in him."^{[page needed]}

Scholarly research

18th century

In 1754, a surveying party reported that Anson County was "a frontier to the Indians." Bladen County abutted Anson County which at that time extended west into Cherokee territory. The border between then Bladen and Anson counties was the present-day Lumbee River, where present-day Robeson and Scotland counties meet. The same report said that no Indians lived in Bladen County.

Land patents and deeds filed with the colonial administrations of Virginia, North and South Carolina during this period show that individuals now claimed as Lumbee ancestors migrated from Virginia, where they were born, into southern North Carolina in colonial times along the typical routes of migration with other pioneers from Virginia.^[11] They obtained land deeds in the same manner as any other migrants.^[11] Research in court, tax, indenture and other records in Virginia has shown that most of these mixed-race ancestors were free in the colonial years; the large majority were descendants of free white women (and the children took their status under the Virginia law of partus sequitur ventrem) and African men, who were indentured servants, free or slaves.^[11] In the first federal census of 1790, the ancestors of the Lumbee were enumerated as Free Persons of Color.^[12] In 1800 and 1810 they were counted in "all other free persons."

In 1885, Hamilton McMillan wrote that Lumbee ancestor James Lowrie received sizeable land grants early in the century and by 1738 possessed combined estates of more than two thousand acres (8 km²). Dial and Eliades claimed that another Lumbee ancestor John Brooks established title to over one thousand acres (4 km²) in 1735, and Robert Lowrie gained possession of almost seven hundred acres (2.8 km²).^[13] But, a state archivist has noted that no land grants were issued during these years in North Carolina. The first land grants to documented individuals claimed as Lumbee ancestors did not take place until more than a decade later, in the 1750s.^[14] The Lumbee petition for federal recognition did not use material from McMillan's claims.^[15]

Land records show that beginning in the second half of the 18th century, persons since identified as ancestral Lumbee took titles to land described in relation to Drowning Creek and prominent swamps such as Ashpole, Long, and Back Swamp. According to James Campisi, the anthropologist hired by the Lumbee tribe, this area "is located in the heart of the so-called old field of the Cheraw documented in land records between 1737 and 1739."^[16]

But in fact, the Cheraw Old Fields, sold to a Thomas Grooms in the year 1739, were located in South Carolina, near the current town of Cheraw. This was more than 60 miles (100 km) from Pembroke in Robeson County. The location of the Cheraw Old Fields is documented in the Lumbee petition for recognition based on Siouan descent, prepared by Lumbee River Legal Services in the 1980s.^[17]

Pension records for veterans of the American Revolutionary War in Robeson County listed men with surnames later associated with Lumbee families, such as Samuel Bell, Jacob Locklear, John Brooks, Berry Hunt, Thomas Jacobs, Thomas Cummings, and Michael Revels. In 1790, ancestral Lumbee such as Barnes, Bell, Braveboy (Brayboy), Brooks, Bullard, Chavers (Chavis), Cumbo, Hammonds, Hunt, Jacobs, Lockileer (Locklear), Lowrie (Lowry/Lowery), Oxendine, Revils (Revels), Strickland, and Wilkins were listed as inhabitants of the Fayetteville District; they were enumerated as "Free Persons of Color" in the first federal census.^[18] Indians living off reservations (sometimes identified as landless Indians) were not designated separately on the census until 1870; they were included in the category of free people of color.^[19]

Antebellum

Following Nat Turner Slave Rebellion of 1831, the state legislature passed amendments to its original 1776 constitution; it abolished suffrage for free people of color. This was one of a series of laws passed from 1826 to the 1850s which the historian John Hope Franklin characterized as the "Free Negro Code," erecting restrictions on that class. Free people of color were stripped of various political and civil rights which they had enjoyed for almost two generations. They could no longer vote, bear arms without a license from the state, serve on juries, or serve in the state militia.^[11] As these were obligations traditionally associated with citizenship, they were made second-class citizens.

In 1853, the North Carolina Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the state's restrictions on free people of color's bearing arms without a license. Noel Locklear, in State v. Locklear, was convicted for the illegal possession of firearms.^[20][21][22] In 1857, William Chavers from Robeson County was arrested and charged as a free person of color for carrying a shotgun without a license. Chavers, like Locklear, was convicted.

The twentieth-century anthropologist Gerald Sider published accounts of "tied mule" incidents told to him by local people; they said that such discriminatory acts had caused losses of land for Lumbee ancestors during the 19th century. But, historians have found that Lumbee ancestors lost land during the 19th century due to well-documented causes, such as failure to pay taxes and other common reasons. They have discovered no evidence for a "tied mule incident" in Robeson County records.^[20][23][24]

Civil War

North Carolina seceded from the Union and joined the Confederate States of America. Largely excluded from Confederate military service because of their status as nonwhites, the Lumbee sympathized with the Union cause. Many Lumbee were forcibly conscripted as laborers for the Confederate Army where they were held in virtual slavery at Fort Fisher near Wilmington. The Lumbee resisted conscription, clashing with the Confederate Home Guard in what was known as the Lowrie war. Union historians praise the contributions of the Lumbee, many of whom aided the Union cause as scouts and spies. Other Lumbee served the Union Army as porters and cooks. ^[25]

A yellow fever epidemic in 1862-63 killed many slaves' working on the construction of Fort Fisher near Wilmington, North Carolina, then considered to be the "Gibraltar of the South." North Carolina's slave owners resisted sending more slaves to Fort Fisher, intensifying efforts by the Confederate Home Guard to conscript the Lumbee and other able bodied nonwhites. Documentation of conscription among the free people of color in Robeson County is difficult to locate. The Confederate Home Guard captured Lumbee on sight. ^[26][27][28]

Several dozen Lumbee/Tuscarora ancestors served in regular units in the Confederate army; they are documented as drawing Confederate pensions for their service. Others tried to avoid coerced labor by hiding in the swamps. During that period, some men from Robeson County operated as guerrillas for the Union Army, sabotaging the efforts of the Confederacy and seeking retribution against their Confederate neighbors, as well as settling local grudges.

Lowrie Gang

When the Confederate Home Guard began rounding up the Lumbee as forced laborers for the Confederate Army, Henry Berry Lowrie (also spelled Lowry) led a number of Lumbee into the nearby swamps where he organized a gang of bandits. Most of the gang members were related to their leader, including two of Lowrie's brothers, six cousins (two of whom were also his brothers-in-law), the brother-in-law of two of his cousins. The gang also included other Lumbee as well as escaped slaves who had also taken refuge in the swamps.

The Lowrie gang committed two murders during the Civil War and were suspected in several thefts and robberies of the white elite in Robeson County. After an interrogation and informal trial, Robeson County's Home Guard executed Lowrie's father and brother, at the time when the Union General William T. Sherman's army was entering Robeson County.^[26][29] Shortly after, Lowrie and his band stole rifles and killed the county sheriff and several men suspected of killing his family members. The Lowrie gang aided Sherman's advance by skirmishing with the retreating Confederate Army and Home Guard. However, the gang continued to operate during Reconstruction, skirmishing with law enforcement officials of the newly created Freedmen's Bureau.

The insurgency of the Lowrie gang against the white establishment in Robeson County has become a source of inspiration and pride to the Lumbee. The Lumbee had suffered persecution by the whites, first under North Carolina's antebellum Free Negro Code and later at the hands of the Confederate Home Guard. Lowrie is hailed as the Lumbee Robin Hood.^[30]

During the Reconstruction era, George Alfred Townsend published The Swamp Outlaws (1872), a history of the Lowrie Gang. Townsend described Henry Berry Lowrie as being of mixed Tuscarora, African and European ancestry:

"The color of his skin is of a whitish yellow sort, with an admixture of copper—such a skin as, for the nature of its components, is in color indescribable, there being no negro blood in it except that of a far remote generation of mulatto, and the Indian still apparent." Townsend similarly wrote of Pop Oxendine, "Like the rest, he had the Tuscarora Indian blood in him...If I should describe the man by the words nearest my idea I should call him a Indian gypsy."^[31]

The Lowries claimed to be Tuscarora. They may have had some Tuscarora ancestors, but most of the Tuscarora, an Iroquoian-speaking people, had left the Carolinas in the early 1700s following warfare; the Tuscarora Nation does not recognize descendants of those who did not migrate as members. The Tuscarora were accepted as the Sixth Nation of the Iroquois Confederacy in present-day New York in 1722

 

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