North Carolina was growing in the early eighteenth century, but its troubles continued. Not everyone was happy with the number of Quakers in the colonial government, and rebellion erupted over the issue of religious freedom. Disease swept the coastal plain.
The colonists’ problems, though, barely compared with those of the Indians they were rapidly displacing. European traders kidnapped Carolina Indians and sold them into slavery, while those who remained were dying of diseases like smallpox and slowly losing their hunting grounds to white farmers. In 1711, the Tuscarora attacked the colonists, but they lost the war that followed. By 1720, the native societies of the coastal plain and the Piedmont had nearly vanished.
In this chapter we’ll look primarily at the fate of the native peoples of eastern North Carolina. We’ll analyze their conflicts with colonists, hear the words of both sides, and learn what happened to them after 1720.
Section Contents
- Cary's Rebellion
- The Tuscarora War
- Who Owns the Land?
- Primary Source: John Lawson's Assessment of the Tuscarora
- Primary Source: The Tuscarora Ask Pennsylvania for Aid
- Primary Source: A Letter from Major Christopher Gale, November 2, 1711
- Primary Source: Christoph von Graffenried's Account of the Tuscarora War
- The Fate of North Carolina's Native Peoples
- Carolina Becomes North and South Carolina