People have been drawn to the Blue Ridge Mountains long before the Appalachian Trail was even created. Centuries ago European explorers and pioneers found their way into the mountains, most often with the help of Indians. Some settled on the mountainsides, clearing forests for homes and farms and changing the landscape. Before that, there is evidence that these mountains were visited by nomadic groups and later by tribes. During the fall seasons a lot of hunters and gatherers came to these mountain forests and streams. Unlike the Europeans, they left without disturbing the forests.

What we know about the early people of Virginia come from archeologists. Archeological evidence suggests that no permanent settlements were ever made in the mountains. Some of these camps date back to the late Ice Age. After the Ice Age nomadic groups became more permanent to the Blue Ridge in the Piedmont area, and in parts of the Shenandoah Valley. Two of the better-known tribes were the Monacans and the Manahoacs. A lot is known about the Powhatans thanks to reports and drawings from the Jamestown colonists and early explorers.

In John Smith’s journal, he describes the Indians. He writes how the women do most of the work in the village, such as making mats, baskets, pots, they pound their corn, make their bread, They made their meals, plant their corn. What he found most interesting is that they even built the homes. The men were the hunters and gatherers for the tribes. The men also made the tools and built canoes.

Coastal Algonquian tribes did not use fertilizer on their fields. Instead after a few years, they moved their fields and their homes to newly cleared areas. After a few decades, a whole village or town would move to a new area. The unused fields could be used by anyone who needed them, but the land still was owned by them. The colonists didn’t understand that, so they took their land for themselves and didn’t give it back.

The relationship between the colonists and the Powhatans became less friendly when colonists wanted to expand their land. They started to attack Indian Villages In one case they killed everyone in a village including the women and children. So after that attack, they started attacking the colonists more often and more severely. Eventually, the colonists captured the chief's daughter. For a year she was tutored by John Rolfe. Pocahontas eventually married him. In 1613 she died in England. The chief of the Powhatans died shortly after in 1618. The power was officially passed to his brother, but it was a second brother who held the real power. In 1622 he led a raid against the English colonists. He expected them to surrender, but instead, they got reinforcements to lead a counter-attack.

The English colony grew to about 8,000 people and the Powhatans population decreased to 5,000. In addition to the deaths from killing, there was a disease that killed a lot of people too. The English started to push the Powhatans off their land to go more inland for the desired cash crop at the time. The chief launched a raid in April of 1644. There were two years of this raid and then the Powhatans could not hold off the English anymore and then the chief was captured. At eighty years old, he refused his loss and did not sign the treaty. Then while still a prisoner, he was shot in the back. From that time on, the coastal tribes started to lose control of their land. The colonists forced them off their land. They still owned small parts of their land, but it wasn’t enough to sustain the normal amount of supplies. The tribes started to perish. Even with tribes merging they couldn’t tend to their needs. Some Indians tried to live in the white communities, while others went to be part of the free black communities. (Continued)