Q. A friend told me that you said that RibbonWalk was an ancient Indian hunting ground. I know the Cherokees live In Cherokee & Oklahoma and the Catawba live near Rock Hill. Did Native Americans really live here in the Derita area?.
Yes, there were Native Americans living here long before the white European settlers arrived. Five separate Catawba villages lined just one nearby 20-mile stretch of the Catawba River, with many more settlements along other NC streams. They were farmers, fishermen, and makers of much-sought-after pottery that attracted trading parties from great distances.
The Cherokee, their biggest rivals, inhabited much of the piedmont from Georgia to NC. They grew some crops, but were better known as hunters and fishermen.Then there were the Lumbee, Waxhaw, Iroquois from Albemarle and many, many more. You need to forget the TV-Movie images of Indian Villages being so many days ride apart. Indians here in the eastern woodlands were not nomadic and didn't travel with the season. They populated neighboring areas, made good use of the resources, and thrived in great numbers until the settlers arrived with their European diseases.
To give you an idea of the sheer numbers in the area, the Catawba and Cherokee clashed in a three-day turf war near time French Broad River. 1700 warriors died in a single day, felled by tomahawk, headknocker, blowgun or hand-to-hand combat.
Yes, there's plenty of evidence that Native Americans were in our community. Friends of mine in Arvin Hills have shown me the arrowheads they've found. Longtime residents Nancy & Carolyn Eargle of Allen Hills put together a nice collection of flint arrowheads they picked up in the freshly plowed fields (now Grenelete Village) as they followed along, barefoot in the fresh dirt, behind their dad who was plowing.
Folks living along the creek on Ridgelane Rd. (behind Derita School (Turning Point Academy) and across from Hemby Woods & Forest Pond) have turned up shards of pottery and even the head of a tomahawk. Growing up here, I recall the story of an Indian family that kept pretty much to themselves, but lived in the dense woods off Neal Rd. as late as the 1950's.
You folks in Oakbrooke (just off Hwy 115 across from the old Fox Drive-in) may not realize it but your houses stand on an old farm. Before it was bulldozed, the old barn and well house dated back before the Civil War and Confederate soldiers hid from a passing Yankee patrol in the old corn crib there. But even before that, it was the site of a large flint outcropping where Indians chipped arrowheads from the stone.The rocks stood just north of the Scottsborough
and Hunter Acres neighborhoods. No way of telling how many arrowheads were made there, but broken ones littered the site as late as the mid 1990's. Indian writings could also be seen on the rock outcropping nearby.
The large amount of earth being moved in creating new sub-divisions and the years of falling leaves and fresh growth have covered most of the artifacts in our area, but it's still worth a look. Because of this, Museum quality relics are usually found a foot or two below the surface, but plowing, construction, and storm water frequently will wash something to the surface.
Natural areas like RibbonWalk, with freshwater lakes, creeks, forest and fields were an ideal place to find wild game, and the local tribesmen knew that. Keep a sharp eye for arrowheads as you walk the trails.
--- submitted by Bernie Samonds
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Yes, there were Native Americans living here long before the white European settlers arrived. Five separate Catawba villages lined just one nearby 20-mile stretch of the Catawba River, with many more settlements along other NC streams. They were farmers, fishermen, and makers of much-sought-after pottery that attracted trading parties from great distances.
The Cherokee, their biggest rivals, inhabited much of the piedmont from Georgia to NC. They grew some crops, but were better known as hunters and fishermen.Then there were the Lumbee, Waxhaw, Iroquois from Albemarle and many, many more. You need to forget the TV-Movie images of Indian Villages being so many days ride apart. Indians here in the eastern woodlands were not nomadic and didn't travel with the season. They populated neighboring areas, made good use of the resources, and thrived in great numbers until the settlers arrived with their European diseases.
To give you an idea of the sheer numbers in the area, the Catawba and Cherokee clashed in a three-day turf war near time French Broad River. 1700 warriors died in a single day, felled by tomahawk, headknocker, blowgun or hand-to-hand combat.
Yes, there's plenty of evidence that Native Americans were in our community. Friends of mine in Arvin Hills have shown me the arrowheads they've found. Longtime residents Nancy & Carolyn Eargle of Allen Hills put together a nice collection of flint arrowheads they picked up in the freshly plowed fields (now Grenelete Village) as they followed along, barefoot in the fresh dirt, behind their dad who was plowing.
Folks living along the creek on Ridgelane Rd. (behind Derita School (Turning Point Academy) and across from Hemby Woods & Forest Pond) have turned up shards of pottery and even the head of a tomahawk. Growing up here, I recall the story of an Indian family that kept pretty much to themselves, but lived in the dense woods off Neal Rd. as late as the 1950's.
You folks in Oakbrooke (just off Hwy 115 across from the old Fox Drive-in) may not realize it but your houses stand on an old farm. Before it was bulldozed, the old barn and well house dated back before the Civil War and Confederate soldiers hid from a passing Yankee patrol in the old corn crib there. But even before that, it was the site of a large flint outcropping where Indians chipped arrowheads from the stone.The rocks stood just north of the Scottsborough
and Hunter Acres neighborhoods. No way of telling how many arrowheads were made there, but broken ones littered the site as late as the mid 1990's. Indian writings could also be seen on the rock outcropping nearby.
The large amount of earth being moved in creating new sub-divisions and the years of falling leaves and fresh growth have covered most of the artifacts in our area, but it's still worth a look. Because of this, Museum quality relics are usually found a foot or two below the surface, but plowing, construction, and storm water frequently will wash something to the surface.
Natural areas like RibbonWalk, with freshwater lakes, creeks, forest and fields were an ideal place to find wild game, and the local tribesmen knew that. Keep a sharp eye for arrowheads as you walk the trails.
--- submitted by Bernie Samonds
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I grew up 2.5 miles north of Derita on Mallard Creek Rd. I found a good many arrowheads in the fields all around our home, 50, or so, years ago.
ReplyDeleteJerry H.