The Patawomeck Indian Tribe recently acquired 870 acres of its ancestral homeland along the Rappahannock River in Spotsylvania and Caroline counties, in Virginia. The tribe will be permanent stewards of the property.
This will be the second time the tribe has acquired land in the last six months. The state gave the tribe funding in November to acquire an initial 14 acres along the same river. The most recently acquired site has forests, wetlands and a river shoreline.
“This property will be instrumental in maintaining our traditional cultural practices and instilling a deep connection to the lands and waters of our home within future generations of our citizens,” Patawomeck Chief Charles Bullock said.
An anonymous landowner donated the property to the Nature Conservancy in the 1970s. The Trust for Public Land secured a North American Wetlands Act Grant through the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service and a grant from the Virginia Outdoors Foundation. The Trust for Public Land used the funding to work with the Nature Conservancy and the tribe to facilitate the transfer. The Virginia Outdoors Foundation holds a conservation easement on the land, but the tribe will remain its permanent stewards.
The Patawomeck have been present in what is now Stafford County, Virginia, since at least the 1300s and were instrumental in sustaining the Jamestown Colony, according to the tribe’s website.
The tribe was recognized by the state in 2010, and is still working to achieve federal recognition, as Virginia’s Chickahominy, Chickahominy Eastern Division, Monacan, Nansemond, Pamunkey, Rappahannock, Upper Mattaponi (all 2018) and Pamunkey (2016) tribes have done.
Editor’s Note: The Patawomeck counts among its descendants the entertainer Wayne Newton, whose grandfather was a tribe member living in Stafford. Newton returned to Virginia in 2010 to speak before a panel of state lawmakers and urged official state recognition of the Patawomeck.
The Patawomeck tribe operates a museum and living village in Fredericksburg, Virginia, which is open to the public Monday, Wednesday, and Friday from 12-5pm, and every first and third Saturday of the month from 10am to 2pm.
This story appeared at bayjournal.com on Feb. 28, 2025.
