Still Here Pt. 2
- History Fix Podcast
- 5 hours ago
- 17 min read
Episode 141: Setting the Record Straight with Chief Marilyn Berry Morrison of the Roanoke-Hatteras Tribe
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Few conflicts in American history have seen as much support, as much passion and fervor as the American Revolution. This war saw the everyman rise up for the cause because it was a cause that every American could proudly stand behind: freedom. I’ve talked about unlikely Revolutionary War heroes in the past, Deborah Sampson, a woman who disguised herself as a man in order to enlist, Andrew Jackson who joined the fight at just 13 years old. This cause was so important, the fight for liberty, that even women and children were desperate to do what they could. There are others who go mostly unrecognized too, Black men both enslaved and free, Indigenous men who risked their lives to fight for a country that had never fought for them. Israel Pearce falls into this last category. Israel Pearce was a free Black man living in Tyrell County in North Carolina when he enlisted to fight in the Revolutionary War. Upon first glance, you would likely say he was Black, but Pearce had Indigenous blood coursing through his veins as well. In fact, he’s referred to as the “Pungo River Indian.” Yes, Pungo again, I hear you universe. Despite his service to the country, despite his distinction as a free person of color, North Carolina revoked Israel Pearce’s right to vote, along with other free Blacks, at a state constitutional convention in 1835. In this new country Israel Pearce fought to forge, the land of the free, he ironically remained a second class citizen, war hero aside. And for second class citizens, the paper trail is often hard to track. But today, the great great great granddaughter of Israel Pearce is attempting to do just that, to unravel the flimsy trail of official documents in an attempt to prove her ancestry. Not for the reasons you might think though, she’s already a proud member of the Daughters of the American Revolution or DAR. No, Chief Marilyn Berry Morrison of the Roanoke-Hatteras tribe has something far more significant and surprisingly difficult to prove. Let’s fix that.
Hello, I’m Shea LaFountaine and this is History Fix where I tell surprising true stories from history you won’t be able to stop thinking about. Thank you so much for joining me again for part two of my Still Here series where I seek to bring you much needed perspective and to get to the bottom of the misconception that Indigenous Americans no longer exist in the eastern part of the country. Last week you heard from Gray Parsons, leader of the Secotan Alliance. I asked Gray this question. Why does this misconception exist? Why is the very existence of Indigenous people overlooked in the east? And his answer was two pronged. He talked about the appearance model, this stereotypical image of what a Native American person looks like, an image that is closely based on a specific group, the Plains Indians. If you’ve ever seen an Indigenous person portrayed on TV or in a movie or cartoon, this is likely what you’ve seen. But Indigenous Americans, Gray argued, don’t all look like that. And in the east, ground zero for European colonialism, they especially don’t. Because, within two or three generations, most who remained in the area had mixed with Black people, and with poor white people. Israel Pearce, for example. Here we are now, some ten generations later, the appearance model is completely out the window. So when you look at the populations of the eastern US you say, “I don’t see any Indigenous people here. None of these people look Indigenous.” But looks can be deceiving.
The other prong of Gray’s answer to my query dealt with the difficulty, the bureaucratic red tape involved in actually being recognized as a person of Indigenous descent. This is an obstacle Chief Morrison knows all too well.
Chief Morrison: first of all, I like to say Wikwasan and in Algonquin that is good morning. But we really don't have a word that says morning. It's really the first light. So that is what that means. And I would like to say Natasawis, Chief Marilyn Berry Morrison. That is who I'm called. And to some I'm called Ezecham Wamsakwa Tawik, which is Soaring Eagle, my native name. Currently I serve as the chief of the Roanoke Hatteras Indians of Dare County, North Carolina and I'm also chair of the Council of the Algonquin Indians of North Carolina, Incorporated, which is a 501c3 approved nonprofit organization. I have a passion for trying to preserve the history that for some reason no one wants to talk about it. So it really inspires me to dig deeper, especially when we start connecting the dots.
Shea: I'm going to throw a curve ball question real quick, just because you said that. Why do you think it is that no one wants to talk about it? Why do you think people are so hesitant to kind of dig in and really get into it?
Chief Morrison: Number one, many don't want to face and accept the truth. And for some, they're still living in this fear is what I've observed over the years. And it's the stories that have possibly been passed down from one generation to another generation, which has caused the fear, let's say even in our people. And so now when we try to suppress that fear, they're gradually coming around and trying to be more active and be part of the current or let's say the contemporary group. Many have been taught lies and we have been erased from history. And so some don't want to bring the truth back to life.
Shea: Right. And I think that's interesting you brought up it's kind of fear on both sides really, you know, on both sides of that. Absolutely. So my next question is, what are your personal ties to indigenous culture? I know that you're very involved. What sort of got you involved and sparked this interest? What's your connection there?
Chief Morrison: Well, it dates back to many, many years ago. We always had family gatherings and community gatherings. But we were always told to not talk about our native heritage because of some of the things that could happen to you, such as in many lands, they were transferred to reservations, you were disconnected from your family, and we didn't want that to happen. Many of the elders continued to speak the language, but they didn't teach it to us, but we learned little words here and there. And what really sparked the interest to get more involved and try to pull things back together was Dr. David Phelps, who's now deceased. He was a professor at East Carolina University. And I think he was conducting a dig down here in the Outer Banks. So he came across a lot of information that he desired to share with us.
Also the local historian, Dave Stick, grew up with my grandfather, well, my father and my great uncles, and they were very close. And so he gathered a lot of information. The funny thing is when I went to speak with him about certain things I had heard, he said, just go over to the Outer Banks Friends, what is it? The Friends of the Outer Banks History Center and tell them to give you my works. He says, I just gave them my collection. So I went over there and I said, Uncle Dave told me to please give his works to me so I can make the connection and see what has gone on all these years. OK, so they were really caught by surprise, but they kindly turned the works over to him because he threatened to take it back, his works back if they didn't share it. They have been very helpful in helping us to establish who we are and also I have to give kudos to the North Carolina State Archives who has also provided information.
Because people don't realize that being American Indian is a hard task. If you say you are, everyone wants to know, prove it. But we're really the only race of people who have to prove who we are. Luckily, even though we have an oral history, in history, things were written down. And so you have to dig deep and we have found census records, death records, birth certificates and court records, court records and land deeds. It has all, it just fills my heart when I come across an ancestor's name. Yes, I was not living during that time, but I'm familiar with the name because it was passed on. So we found that it was a very easy task for us to connect because we knew who our ancestors were and then we could walk back in history and we found their names on documents. And I am so proud to sit here today to say that I am a lifetime member of the Daughters of the American Revolution and I thank them for helping us find those court records regarding one of our lost ancestors. I won't say she was lost, but she popped up on records dated back to 1837, 38, and 1839. And so that helped us fill that gap between our patriot, who was Israel Pearce. And Israel Pearce was from Tyrrell County, and historians refer to him as the Pungo River Indian. You see, you kind of follow what I'm saying. You have to do a lot of research. You'll be looking at many, many, many documents, but everybody finds a new piece, a little piece to put together the whole story about Israel Pearce. And if we didn't know that he was a Pungo River Indian, and if we didn't know that he fought in the Revolutionary War starting out in the Navy, and then he enlisted as army, then we wouldn't know that he was our patriot. And he was in the D.A.R. system as a forgotten patriot. No one knew about him until we started doing the research.
Shea: Oh, that's so cool. Yes. I love that stuff. That's so cool. I think that's so interesting. You said, you, you're kind of, you were kind of taught not to mention it for probably a very long time. Being of indigenous ancestry was not something that you brought attention to. And so now going back and looking at and seeing these names that were passed on and picking out these names through time, it's so interesting because it's like these people were almost kind of flying under the radar trying to be sort of incognito and just blend in. And now you're looking back and going like, I see you. I see who you really were. That's so powerful to have it with this modern perspective, but to see kind of the lives that they led. That's very interesting.
Chief Morrison: Not only is looking at it that way, but people sometimes think I'm strange because these spirits will call out to you and lead you to what you need to find. For example, we always have family celebrations and they call our celebration Soople Hills. But then people knew what it was called, but where did the name come from? And I was in the library at Norfolk State University walking through the stacks and this voice was saying, hey, walk this way. And I said, oh gosh, here we go again, until we reached a stack of books. And honestly, that book just raised right off the shelf. And it says, grab it. I grabbed it. And then when it flipped open and it said, Soople Hills. I wasn't even thinking about it, but months ago, we were trying to fill in the blank. And it said, Soople’s Hill was a part of land owned by an army soldier and it was infested with mosquitoes. He abandoned the land because he did not like being bit by mosquitoes. His name was Soople. Okay. Yeah. So, yeah, our family lived on that land until they sold it into the, where they have the courthouse today.
Shea: Yeah. Wow.
Chief Morrison: If they want to be exact and you can go look it up yourself. But that's how they got it was called Soople Hill.
Shea: Yes. And I don't think that's strange at all actually because I experience that all the time as well. Those little kind of like signs and being pushed in the right direction. I do. I believe in that fully because I've experienced it many times myself. Yes. So what I really want to talk to you about today is I feel like there's this misconception. And that's really what my podcast is all about is kind of trying to correct these misconceptions about history, because there are so many. But I see this misconception that Indigenous Americans, especially in the eastern United States, sort of no longer exist, or at least aren't here anymore. Either they died or they were forced to relocate, which we know many of them were. But I think there's this misconception that, you know, Indigenous people aren't in this part of the country at all. And, you know, that's obviously not true because you're sitting here today. But why do you think that is? Why do you think so many people are unaware of this presence and of the impact of Indigenous people and cultures in the Eastern States?
Chief Morrison: Some of them may not want to be attached to those who harmed us and degraded us and killed us and raped us. And so they don't want to be a part of that. Okay? And so they, remember we got two sides to this equation. We have the other group who possibly are suffering from, let's say, post-traumatic stress syndrome of some kind, okay? Because we as American Indians, we too were enslaved at some time, but I have not found any of my people who were enslaved, okay? We have these two groups who are trying to suppress all this. But if they go to the history books, they will be enlightened to find that the American Indians of the Outer Banks were my people. There are some other tribes. And if they look at the 1733 map of Mosley, there were seven tribes who we would consider the historic tribes. And they were the Hatteras, Matamuskeet, Maherrin, Okaneechi, Tuscarora, Saponi, and the Cherokee. Seven. Now, of those seven, only four have received state recognition because it's alleged that they were able to tie back to historic tribes. So you have your Cherokee, state recognized, Maherrin, Okaneechi, Saponi. The 11counties in Northeastern North Carolina possibly have been overlooked for some reason, but we don't know why. So that's, would that be something like the lost colony? Do they think we are lost? No, we're not lost. We're here today.
Now, then you roll ahead. Noah Webster, if you look up his definition of American, he describes us as being people who are native to the land, the Indigenous Americans, and he further describes us as being copper colored. So could that possibly be a concern? And if you could go back a little further. Amadas and Barlowe? They weren't the first. Before him, them was 1524. You had Giovanni Verrazano. And he described us as being dark, complected. That's 1524. So I don't know. They write the books and tell us that they discovered America, but we wanted to show us and we invited them to our towns and villages. So something's wrong there. So we weren't discovered. They found us already here. We had our government, we had established towns and villages. We knew how to farm. We knew how to fish. We didn't need them to teach, but they needed us to survive. You know, it's a lot that we have been misled to believe. And I have to be cautious and careful about what I say because I don't want it to be misconstrued and misinterpreted because we have a lot on the line right now since we are applying for state recognition. But we can say that we, Roanoke-Hatteras, are the cradle of American history. Check your history books. And we, Roanoke-Hatteras, can say, we never left our land. We are still there today. We, Roanoke-Hatteras, can tie to a historic tribe, the Hatterask and that's in the history book. So if that's not enough documentation, maybe we need to burn up all the history books because that's what they keep telling us. Oh, the books got destroyed in the flood, got burned in the court fire. Oh, you'll never find that. But now we have artificial intelligence. When we were told we needed to find our ancestor, Elizabeth Pearce, on a court record, artificial intelligence did it. 1837, 38 and 39. And it bridged the gap.
Shea: It's definitely getting much easier to do that kind of thing. Yeah. And you know, I'm thinking about, you know, the old maps, the John White maps, those early maps of the region and Hatterask, it's labeled on those maps. So yeah, you're right. It's very well documented. It seems like it would be much easier, you know, to prove so the resistance is strange. These are original documents.
Chief Morrison: I just want to welcome Alice Gallop-West, who's a member of our tribe and we're wearing our tribal colors today.
Shea: Love it. Hi, thank you so much for being here.
Alice: Good morning.
Chief Morrison: Yes, she's a great historian as well.
Shea: Yes, and feel free to chime in, please.
Alice: Oh, I'm enjoying the conversation. Thank you for the invite.
Shea: Yeah, absolutely. Yes. You know, I thought it was so interesting you said, uh Marilyn, you said we're the only people who have to prove who we are. And that is so true. And yet also it's not it's it's more difficult for anyone to actually do that, to prove who you are. It's been made more difficult than it has almost for anyone else. So it's almost like it's been set up for failure. And I'm sure you feel that way as well.
Chief Morrison: Oh, I not only feel that way, experienced it. We reached a negative gap in our family tree. My great, great grandmother, Annie Simmons Pugh on her death certificate, you know, they usually list the mother and father's name. All right? Stay with me. You have Annie Simmons Pugh. Her mother on her death certificate's name was listed as Elizabeth Simmons. Simmons is Annie's maiden name. But Simmons for Elizabeth, is Elizabeth's married name. Because the scrivener did not write Elizabeth Pearce, we had to prove that Elizabeth Simmons is Elizabeth Pearce Simmons, who is the mother of Annie Simmons Pugh. Even go back one more generation. Elizabeth Simmons is also the daughter of Israel Pearce, the Pungo River Indian, who is also the American Revolutionary War patriot. And when we were told that we needed to produce a record of some sort that had Elizabeth's maiden name, AI went out there and found court records 1837, 1838, 1839. Because they did not recognize marriages, mixed marriages at that time, she had to go to court each time she had a baby. And in 1850, Elizabeth was listed as the head of household. And the children that she had, one of them was my great great grandmother, Annie Simmons Pugh. Now I didn't even present that to you on a piece of paper, but you were able to follow it. And it's not being accepted.
Shea: Wow. Wow. That's so frustrating. What do you feel like can be done? I mean, you know, there's obviously major issues, systemic issues here. Do you see a solution? Do you see a way forward? What do you feel like can be done to rectify this for so many people?
Chief Morrison: Being fair, not setting such a high standard for some, you know, because I'm quite sure we are possibly the only petitioner who has had to provide that depth of information.
Shea: Which is very unfair, right? It should be standard across the board.
Chief Morrison: You said it.
Shea: I did. I said it. I'll take the, I'll claim that. Oh my goodness. Do you feel like the, you talked earlier on about this, this sort of fear and this hesitancy, you know, growing up maybe not to mention indigenous ties. Do you feel like that's improved? Do you feel like society as a whole has been more accepting or do you feel like it's just as challenging today to be open about Indigenous ties. Is that fear still there or do you see that lessening somewhat?
Chief Morrison: The fear is there and I feel that it's going to take us to start working closer with our children so they will know who they are, so they will be proud of who they are because some of the elders are really stuck in their ways and it's kind of hard to get them you know, to think outside their box. I'm frequently asked, oh how many members do you all have in your tribe? I asked them, which number do you want? Because we have enrolled members with a card. We have members of the family who know who they are, but they don't want to, they say, ah I don't need a card to prove who I am. And you have those members who are just in denial. So which number do you want? What's the count? So through, and I'm glad you brought that up because we have a cultural day event coming up November 15th. It's going to be held at the Youth Community Center in Manteo. And we're hoping we're able to bridge that gap somewhat starting with some of the young people, but we know the adults are coming too, just to be nosy, but we welcome them anyway. But, we want to kind of get the children on the right track again. We are also holding small language classes for the youth and they are very, very excited when they learn how to say their name and say, Tonka Tora or Sabani or Rikasam, you know. They're so excited because they say, I can say my language, you know and they're picking up so fast. But back to the fear, that is what I feel we need to do. And helping them get over the fear, we can have more podcasts, we can have more cultural events, we have our powwow, which is also coming up April 11th and 12th. We can even have more local meetings. But the problem is getting them out. They're fearful if someone knows I'm American Indian, then what's going to happen? And I want to say what is going to happen? So it's that fear.
Shea: Yeah. And it's such a shame that that fear still exists, but it makes sense. I mean, it's just generational trauma. It's just centuries of trauma. And that doesn't just go away in a day. You know, so but I think I think you're right. I think I'm a former elementary school teacher, so I fully believe you gotta start with the children and that the children are the future. You wanna think you can change older people who are set in their ways, but it's very difficult to do. So I think that's, love that you're teaching them the language, that's so cool. That's really, really neat. But yeah, I think that's beautiful.
Chief Morrison: I just want people to understand that there is no need to fear on either side. Things are the way they are, and it's up to us to fix it. So I was trying to coin a statement to express that in a diplomatic and reserved way. And so I would say the Roanoke-Hatteras people are not lost. They are the living thread that connects America's first story to the present by speaking the truth, honoring our ancestors and restoring our rightful place in history, we begin to fix what was broken.
Shea: Absolutely, that's beautiful. Yeah.
Chief Morrison: Thank you. I can also say another thing. We are very spiritual people and we believe in one God and in our language we refer to him as the creator and we call him Mandu or Manidu. We are one people, we are God's people. We are one race and that race is the human race. And in our language, we say to her, Alice, tabani.
Alice: Tabani, tabani.
Chief Morrison: That is thank you.
Alice: Thank you.
Shea: You are so welcome. You're so welcome.
Shea: I’d like to repeat Chief Morrison’s well thought out statement. She said quote “the Roanoke-Hatteras people are not lost. They are the living thread that connects America's first story to the present. By speaking the truth, honoring our ancestors and restoring our rightful place in history, we begin to fix what was broken,” end quote. There is no need for fear on either side. She also said “We are one race and that race is the human race.” Gray echoed this same sentiment.
Gray Parsons: No one was there then. You're not responsible even if your ancestors were doing that. You're not accountable for that. You are accountable as a human being for recognizing that and going a step further in trying to understand how that has impacted not just us here locally, but how that has impacted every indigenous culture across not just the United States, but South America, West Africa, you name it.
Shea: I think the answer to my question, why does this misconception exist, this idea that Indigenous people no longer exist, is convenience. It’s more convenient for both groups if all of it just went away. It’s inconvenient to acknowledge your own indigenous ancestry. It’s inconvenient for the government to acknowledge that these groups exist. That inconvenience stems from fear and trauma and shame. But the overwhelming message here, the perspective I was seeking, is that there is no need for blame or for shame or for fear. We alive today are not responsible for what happened in the past but we have a responsibility to know about it, to learn from it, and to move forward the right way. We can’t change the past but the future is ours to shape. We get to decide what happens next. We get to fix what was broken.
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