Pamunkey Indian Reservation named among America's most endangered historic places
Settled on a 1,600-acre peninsula in King William County, the Pamunkey Indian Reservation is surrounded by the Pamunkey River on three sides. Kendall Stevens, cultural resources director for the Pamunkey Indian Tribe, said like other coastal communities, the reservation is not spared from the struggle of erosion, rising sea levels, sinking land and more severe storms.
A 2019 study of the peninsula's ecosystem found the reservation has about 13 miles of shoreline, 80 acres of emergent wetlands and 530 acres of freshwater forested wetlands, and the Pamunkey River is a tidal river, meaning downstream sections of the river are influenced by ocean tides.
About 100 people currently live on the reservation, and Stevens said it's their goal to stay there as long as the land is habitable. But there's only one road on and off the reservation, so when it floods, people are sometimes trapped on the reservation. Other historical sites on the reservation are also at risk of being lost, Stevens said.
Because of this, the National Trust for Historic Preservation announced Wednesday that the reservation is one of 11 new locations added to it's list of most endangered historic places in the United States. The reservation is joined by 10 other sites threatened by climate change and aging infrastructure, including the Hotel Casa Blanca — a historically Black resort hotel in Michigan — and the French Broad and Swannanoa River corridors in western North Carolina. According to the trust, the distinction 'has galvanized public support' for other sites previously added to the list, and only a handful of the 350 sites have been lost completely.
With chief and council approval, the tribe applied for the distinction, and Stevens said she hopes to use it to apply for future funding and gain community support for protecting the land. The tribe has already created a Community Disaster Resilience Zone, but funding and support will be needed to expand their resilience efforts.
'First and foremost, we need to do some pretty major shoreline stabilization work, which would include lots of native planting,' she said. 'We also need to do some traditional natural shoreline stabilization. Because of the threat from the water, we want to do some significant archeological work that would be very community-focused. That would include both digging and oral history to hear what elders remember about the reservation and how people relate to reservation today — just lots of documentation and preservation of the historic nature of the res.'
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The Pamunkey Indian Tribe has been in Virginia for 15,000 years, but because of the changes to the environment, the reservation could be under water in as little as 100 years if no resiliency work is done. And that's a big deal, especially since the Pamunkey people are one of the few tribes to never have ceded their land. Their reservation is considered the oldest extant reservation in the country, with Pocahontas and Wahunsenecawh (also known as Chief Powhatan) being notable members of the tribe.
'The tribe is very proud of all the work that generations of tribal people have put in to preserve it,' Stevens said. 'It's kind of ironic that now nature is what might force the Pamunkey people off their land.'
Eliza Noe, eliza.noe@virginiamedia.com
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