On this day, 22 March 1622, the Powhatan uprising began when Native Americans attacked English colonies in Virginia, killing around 350 colonists.
Indigenous peoples and the colonists had lived in peace after the English had captured Pocahontas, daughter of the Powhatan chief. But increasing numbers of settlers kept arriving and were destroying the local way of life by seizing land for tobacco plantations and driving away game from hunting grounds which the Native Americans relied on for food. The attack wiped out nearly one sixth of the colony, with many houses destroyed and 20 women taken prisoner.
The colonists retaliated brutally. During a peace parley they slaughtered dozens of Powhatans with poisoned wine and bullets, then stole food they had grown. A rich man, Dr. John Pott (who had prepared the poisoned wine, and later became governor), ransomed back some of the captured women. But he made them work off their “debt” to him, as well as the “debt” owed by their deceased husbands who had been unable to complete their terms of indentured servitude (due to being killed). One hostage later petitioned for her release from “slavery” stating that her subjugation by Dr. Pott: “differeth not from her slavery with the Indians.”
Learn more about Indigenous resistance here: https://shop.workingclasshistory.com/collections/books/products/500-years-of-indigenous-resistance-gord-hill
Pictured: an illustration of the attack https://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.296224173896073/2235599223291882/?type=3
Today is the 20th anniversary of the invasion of Iraq. This map shows the contrast between civilian and US/Coalition casualties in Baghdad, with each dot’s size correlating with the number of casualties reported on a given day
