Indians

Indians. First People Of The Eastern Shore. When the English first visited the Eastern Shore in 1608, they found an area which had been inhabited for centuries by Algonquian Indian Tribes. Today archaeologists have found on or near the Arlington Plantation, shards of ceramics known as Roanoke ware and ossuaries burial bundles from the Early Archaic (8000-6500 B.C.) through the late Woodland Contact period., Research indicates that the village of Accawmack, seat of Esmy Shichans, the Laughing King, was at the mouth of Old Plantation Creek, as was later the Custis mansion. By 1622 Thomas Savage, an interpreter and English settler, had established a home nearby on land given to him by Esmy Shichans, and their friendship made for a peaceful environment between the Indians and the English planters living in the southern part of the peninsula., However, after the deaths of both Shichans and Savage, relationships changed as planters pushed for more and more land on which to grow corn and tobacco. By the l64O's, some Indians (now known as the Gingaskins) remained in the Old Plantation Creek area, but many moved to acreage farther north on the Shore. Relations between the two groups became increasingly strained and contacts shifted from friendly to warlike skirmishes and bitter legal battles. By 1700 the Indians on the Shore passed from a position of prominence to one of virtual insignificance.