For the U.S. Navy ships which bore this name, see USS Wampanoag.
The Wampanoag (Wôpanâak in the Wampanoag language) are a Native American nation which currently consists of five affiliated tribes.
In 1600 the Wampanoag lived in southeastern Massachusetts and Rhode Island, as well as within a territory that encompassed current day Martha's Vineyard, Nantucket and the Elizabeth Islands. Their population numbered about 12,000.
Historical Wampanoag leaders included Massasoit, who met the English who described themselves as "Pilgrims," Massasoit's oldest son Wamsutta (known by the English as King Alexander) who died under mysterious circumstances after visiting with English colonial administrators in Plymouth, his second son Metacom or Metacomet (King Philip), who initiated the war against the English known as King Philip's War in retaliation for the death of his brother at the hands of the English, the female Sachem Weetamoo of the Pocasset, who supported Metacom and drowned crossing the Taunton River fleeing the English, the female Sachem Awashonks of the Sakonnet, who at first fought the English but then changed sides, and Annawan, a war leader. Other important Wampanoag were Samoset, who first met the English, and Squanto, who was kidnapped, sold into slavery, lived in England, spoke fluent English, and later taught the English to plant indigenous crops after their first difficult winter.

Name

Groups of the Wampanoag
See also: Massachusett. The Wampanoag were semi-sedentary, with seasonal movements between fixed sites in present-day southern New England. The three sisters, corn (maize), beans and squash were the staples of their diet, supplemented by fish and game. More specifically, each community had authority over a well-defined territory from which the people derived their livelihood through a seasonal round of fishing, planting, harvesting and hunting. Because southern New England was thickly populated at the time, hunting grounds had strictly defined boundaries. Land was hereditary and, unlike European society, descent was reckoned matrilinealy, wherein both hereditary status and claims to land were passed down through women. Mothers with claims to specific plots of land used for farming or hunting passed those claims to their female descendants, irrespective of their marital status.
The work of making a living was organized on a family level. Families gathered together in the spring to fish, in early winter to hunt and in the summer they separated to cultivate individual planting fields. Boys were schooled in the way of the woods, where a man's skill at hunting and ability to survive under all conditions were vital to his family's well being. Women were trained from their earliest years to work diligently in the fields and around the family wetu, a round or oval house that was designed to be easily dismantled and moved in just a few hours.
The production of food in many Native American societies, including that of the Wampanoag, was divided along gendered lines. Men and women had specific tasks and, unlike European women, Native women played an active role in many of the stages of food production. For example, women were responsible for up to seventy-five percent of all food production. Since the Wampanoag primarily relied primarily on goods garnered from this kind of work, women had an appreciably greater socio-political, economic, and spiritual role in their respective communities than their European counterparts. Two Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket Wampanoag female sachems, Wunnatuckquannumou and Askamaboo, presided despite the competition of male contenders, including near relatives, for their power. These women gained power because their matrilineal clans held sway over large plots of land and they themselves had accrued enough status and power-- not because they were the widows of former sachems.
Pre-marital sexual experimentation was accepted, although once couples opted to marry, the Wampanoag expected fidelity within unions. Roger Williams, a contemporary English observer, stated that "single fornication they count no sin, but after Marriage, (which they solemnize by consent of Parents and publique approbation…) then they count it heinous for either of them to be false." In addition, polygamy was practiced among the Wampanoag, although monogamy was the norm. Even within Wampanoag society where status was constituted within a matrilineal, matrifocal society, some elite men could take several wives for political or social reasons. Multiple wives were also a path to and symbol of wealth because women were the producers and distributors of corn and other food products. However, as within most Native American societies, marriage and conjugal unions were not as important as ties of clan and kinship. Marriages could be and were dissolved relatively easily, but family and clan relations were of extreme and lasting importance, constituting the ties that bound individuals to one another and their tribal territories as a whole.

Culture
The Wampanoag spoke a dialect of the Wampanoag language. Currently, the Wampanoag are spearheading a language revival under the direction of the "Wampanoag Language Reclamation Project."
The decline of the Wampanoag language began to accelerate rapidly after the American Revolution. At this time, New England Native American communities suffered from huge gender imbalances due to premature male deaths, especially due to military and maritime activity. Consequently, many Wampanoag women were forced to marry outside of their linguistic groups, making it extremely difficult to maintain the various Wampanoag dialects.

Language

History

Main article: Squanto Squanto (or Tisquantum)
Squanto lived with the colonists and acted as a middleman between the Pilgrims and Massasoit, the Wampanoag sachem. For the Wampanoag, the ten years before the arrival of the Pilgrims was the worst time in their history. They were attacked by Micmac warriors from the north, who took over the coast after their victory over the Penobscot in the Tarrantine War (1607-1615). At the same time, the Penobscot came from the west, and occupied portions of eastern Connecticut.
Additionally, between 1616 and 1618, the Wampanoag suffered from an epidemic or series of epidemics, most probably a strain of plague. The groups most devastated by the illness were those that traded heavily with the French or were allied with those that did, leading to speculation that the disease was a "virgin soil" epidemic to which Europeans had some immunity but were able to act as carriers. Alfred Cosby, a medical historian, has suggested that among the Massachusett and mainland Pokanoket, the decline in population was as high as ninety percent. The disease caused a complete restructuring of Wampanoag political systems, with many sachems gathering together previously strong villages to form new alliances. For example, the Pokanoket sachem Massasoit and ten followers were forced to submit to the Narragansett, their inland rivals, and agreed to give up valuable territory at the head of the Narragansett Bay. The Narragansett, an isolated island group, had little contact with early European traders and were thus not nearly as devastated by the epidemic as the Wampanoag. As a result, their power in the region increased greatly in the mid-seventeenth century. They began to demand that the weakened Wampanoag pay them tribute, and Massasoit began to hope that the English would help his people fight the oppression by the Narragansett.
In March 1621 Massasoit visited Plymouth, accompanied by Squanto. He signed an alliance which gave the English permission to take about 12,000 acres (49 km²) of land for Plymouth Plantation. However, it is very doubtful that Massasoit understood the differences between land ownership in the European sense, compared with the native people's manner of using the land.

Massasoit
After 1630, the members of Plymouth Colony found themselves becoming a minority, due to the growing number of Puritans arriving and settling near present-day Boston. Barely tolerant of other Christians denominations, the Puritans largely viewed the native peoples as savages and heathens. They were also soldiers and traders, who had little interest in friendship or cooperation with the Indians. Under this new leadership, the English expanded westwards into the Connecticut River Valley, and in 1637 they destroyed the powerful Pequot Confederation. In 1643 the Mohegans defeated the Narragansett in a war, and with support from the English, they became the dominant tribe in southern New England.

Expansion of the Colonists
After 1640, John Eliot and other Puritan missionaries proposed a "humane" solution to the Indian "problem": converting native peoples to Christianity. The converted Indians were resettled in fourteen so-called "praying towns." The system of organization into sedentary townships was especially important because it demanded the renunciation of Wampanoag practices such as migratory hunting patterns and their adoption of a more traditionally English way of life. By settling them into established towns, Eliot and his colleagues hoped that under the tutelage of Christian ministers, Native Americans would adopt English – and therefore "civilized" – practices like monogamous marriage, agriculture, patriarchal households, and jurisprudence.
The motivations of Wampanoags, and members of other New England Native American societies, to convert to Christianity were numerous and varied. The high levels of epidemics among the Native Americans after the arrival of the Europeans certainly contributed. In addition to bringing about a dramatic restructuring of Wampanoag political hierarchies, the massive death toll caused a certain level of disillusionment in Native American societies. It has been suggested that the survivors experienced a type of spiritual crisis because their medical and religious leaders could not prevent the epidemic. Conversely, the English settlers were often unaffected by the sickness, which contributed to the belief that the English god was more powerful than their own.
In addition, by the latter half of the seventeenth century, alcoholism had become rampant among males in some southern New England ethnic groups and inspired many to turn to Christianity and Christian discipline systems for help. Thus Christianity became a refuge of Wampanoag women from male drunkenness. With its insistence upon temperance and systems of earthy and heavenly retribution for drunkenness, Christianity held great appeal to Wampanoag attempting to fight alcoholism, especially to those women whose close male relatives were affected.
The level of conversion, not only to Christianity but to English cultural and societal norms, that was demanded of the Native Americans depended on the town and region. In most of Eliot's mainland "praying towns," Wampanoag converts were expected to follow English laws, manners, and gender roles in addition to adopting the material trappings of English life. Rather than a system in which those who did not conform were punished, however, Eliot and other ministers relied on praise and rewards for those who did.
The Christian Indian settlements of Martha's Vineyard were noted for a great deal of sharing and mixing between Wampanoag and English ways of life. Wampanoag converts often carried over cultural attributes such as dress, hairstyle, and governance. These Martha's Vineyard converts were not required to scrupulously attend church and often maintained traditional cultural practices such as mourning rituals. The Martha's Vineyard Christian Indian settlements were much more a mixture of Wampanoag and English cultures than a forced acceptance of English Puritan values.
In addition to religious conversion, Eliot's "praying Indians" experienced a high degree of cultural assimilation, especially in the area of law and justice systems. In pre-colonial Wampanoag societies, the sachem and his or her council were responsible for administering justice among their people. However, converts increasingly turned to religious authorities for help in resolving their legal quarrels as the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries progressed. Christian ministers and missionaries supplanted traditional leaders as the legal authorities among Wampanoag Christians.
The conversion of Native Americans to Christianity had an especially great effect on female converts. As previously discussed, many Wampanoag women were attracted to Christianity because it offered a chance to free themselves and especially their male relatives from alcohol abuse, Christianity also altered the gender power structure. English ministers such as John Eliot attempted to introduce a patriarchal society to their Wampanoag converts, both inside and outside of the home. In many cases, however, these attempts failed because Wampanoag women, especially Wampanoag wives, were, in the majority of cases on the Vineyard, the spiritual leaders of their households. Additionally, they were also more likely to convert than Indian males. Experience Mayhew, a Puritan minister, observed that there were "a greater number of their women appearing pious than of the men among them." However, this tendency towards female conversion created a problem for missionaries intent on establishing traditional patriarchal family and societal structures among the Native Americans: in order to convert the men, these Puritans often had to place power in the hands of the women. In general, English ministers agreed that it was preferable for women to subvert the patriarchal model and assume a dominant spiritual role than it was for their husbands to remain unconverted. Experience Mayhew asked "[How] can those Wives answer it unto God who do not Use their utmost Endeavors to Perswade and oblige their husbands to maintain Prayer in their families [?]" Thus, the lives of some Wampanoag women changed greatly after their conversion to Christianity because the gender roles prescribed by pre-colonial society were often altered or replaced by English customs, while others remained practitioners of traditional Christianity.

Conversion to Christianity
Even Massasoit took on English customs. Before his death in 1661, he asked the legislators in Plymouth to give both of his sons English names. Wamsutta, the older son, was given the name Alexander, and his younger brother, Metacomet, was named Philip. After his father's death, Alexander became the sachem of the Wampanoag. The English were not happy about this, because they felt he was too self-confident, and so they invited him to Plymouth to talk. On the way home Wamsutta became seriously ill and died. The Wampanoag were told he died of fever, but many indiams thought he had been poisoned. The following year Metacomet became sachem of the Wampanoag. He was later named "King Philip" by the English.

Metacomet (King Philip)

Main article: King Philip's War King Philip's War
With the death of Philip and most of their leaders, the Wampanoags were nearly exterminated; only about 400 of them survived the war. The Narragansetts and Nipmucks suffered similar losses, and many small tribes in southern New England were, for all intents and purposes, gone. In addition, many Wampanoags were sold into slavery. Male captives were generally sold to slave traders and transported to the West Indies, Bermuda, Virginia, or the Iberian Peninsula. The families of these captives, including women and children, were usually used as slaves in the New England colonies. Of those Indians that were not sold into slavery, many were forced to move into Natick, Wamesit, Punkapoag, and Hassanamesit, four of the John Eliot's original fourteen praying towns and the only ones to be reopened after the war. Overall, approximately five thousand Native Americans (forty percent of their population) and two and a half thousand English men and women (five percent) were killed in King Philip's War.

Consequences of the War

18th to 20th century
With the exception of the Wampanoag groups on the coastal islands, who had stayed neutral through the war, the Wampanoag of the mainland were resettled with the Saconnet, or brought, together with the Nauset, into the praying towns in Barnstable County. In Massachusetts, Mashpee, on Cape Cod, was the biggest reservation. In 1660 the Indians were allotted about 50 square miles there, and beginning in 1665 they governed themselves with a court of law and trials. The area was integrated into the district of Mashpee in 1763, but in 1788 the state revoked their ability to self-govern, which it considered a failure. It then appointed a committee to supervise, consisting of five white-only members. A certain degree of self-government was returned to the Indians in 1834, and although the Indians were far from completely autonomous, one could say that this time the experiment was successful. Their land was divided up in 1842, with 2,000 acres (8 km²) of their 13,000 acres (53 km²) distributed in 60 acre parcels to each family. Many laws attest to constant problems of encroachments by whites, who stole wood from the reservation. It was a large region, once rich in wood, fish and game, and therefore desirable for the whites. Some had trouble ignoring the constantly growing community of non-whites, and so the Mashpee Indians had more conflicts with their white neighbors than the other Indian settlements in the state.

Mashpee
On Martha's Vineyard there were three reservations in the 18th and 19th centuries – Chappaquiddick, Christiantown and Gay Head. The Chappaquiddick Reservation was part of a small island with the same name, and was located on the eastern point of that island. As the result of the sale of land in 1789, the Indians lost valuable areas, and the remaining land was distributed between the Indians residents in 1810. In 1823 the laws were changed, in order to hinder those trying to get rid of the Indians and to implement a visible beginning of a civic organization. Around 1849, they owned 692 acres (2.8 km²) of infertile land, and many of the residents moved to nearby Edgartown, so that they could practice a trade and obtain some civil rights.

Wampanoag on Martha's Vineyard
About 3,000 Wampanoag survive (many of whose ancestry includes other tribes), and many live on the reservation (Watuppa Wampanoag Reservation) on Martha's Vineyard, in Dukes County. It is located in the town of Aquinnah (formerly known as Gay Head), at the extreme western part of the island. It has a land area of 1.952 km² (482.35 acres), and a 2000 census resident population of 91 persons.
There are currently five organized groups of the Wampanoag: Assonet, Gay Head, Herring Pond, Mashpee and Namasket. All have applied for recognition by the government, but only the Gay Head Wampanoag still have a reservation on Martha's Vineyard. They received government recognition in 1987 from the Bureau of Indian Affairs. They currently have 1,000 registered members. Their reservation consists of 485 acres (approx. 2 km²) and is located on the outermost southwest part of the island. The official registered name is "Wampanoag Tribe of Gay Head". The "Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe" consists of 1,200 registered members and owns many stores and museums. Since 1924 there has been a powwow every year at the beginning of July. The reservation is located near Mashpee on Cape Cod. After decades of legal disputes, the Mashpee Wampanoag obtained provisional recognition as an Indian tribe from the Bureau of Indian Affairs in April 2006, and then received official Federal recognition in February 2007. There is also still land which is owned separately by families and in common by Wampanoag descendants at both Chapaquddick and Christiantown, and they have also purchased land in Middleborough, Massachusetts to build a casino upon.
In addition, a remnant of the Wampanoag reside on St. David Island, Bermuda. They are descendants of those sold overseas in the aftermath of King Philip's War by the Puritans. See "External Links" on article Metacomet.

Current status

Demographics

Caleb Cheeshahteaumuck
Jamaal Branch Notable Wampanoag

List of Native American Tribal Entities
The City of Columbus was a shipwreck where a group of Wampanoag Indians risked their lives to save passengers
Crispus Attucks
Cuttyhunk