Updated:
05/09/2008
Powhatan (1547-1618)
Chief of the Powhatan Confederacy
Drawing by Kasmin TorresPowhatan, was the father of POCAHONTAS and an intimate friend of Captain John Smith and John Rolfe. At the time of the English settlement of Jamestown (1607), Powhatan was consolidating 30 or more tribes of the confederacy from his capital, Werowocomoco, on the Pamunkey River, land which later became Gloucester and Mathews Counties. Records have shown that he ruled the tribes in 8,000 square miles of country, with 8,000 subjects, of whom about 2,400 were fighting men. Without written laws, or agreements, this mighty "savage" leader ruled with wisdom and foresight beyond his time.
Powhatan was initially friendly to the English colonists, but upon learning that John Smith was interested in metals and in finding a waterway leading to the western ocean, Powhatan perceived the English as dangerous and decided to remove them from his territory. When Smith was captured by the Indians at Werowocomoco, POCAHONTAS is said to have saved Smith's life, in all probability saving thereby the life of the Jamestown colony.
