Sagamore Helps Close Namesake Camp

It was a fitting finale to a wonderful summer camp.

Camp Pokanoket hasn't been around for anywhere near as long as the Pokanoket Nation. Indeed, the Barrington Middle School Camp has only been known as Camp Pokanoket for the last several years, while the people of the Pokanoket Nation welcomed the pilgrims to this land almost 400 years ago.

When Barrington Recreation Director John Taylor took over the post four years ago, he decided to implement the name change to recognize a very important component of the town.

The Pokanoket tribal lands originally extended from Cape Cod to the southern parts of Vermont and New Hampshire, including the East Bay area. The summer encampment of the tribe took place at what is now known as King Philip's Spring in Bristol, and Mount Hope was known as Potumtuck, meaning “lookout of Pokanoket.”

Taylor is a neighbor of William “Winds of Thunder” Guy, known more formally in tribal circles as Sagamore of the Pokanoket Nation. The Sagamore is second in command, under the Massasoit, who is considered the great leader of the tribe.

Guy is a direct descendant of the Massasoit Ousamequin, who welcomed the pilgrims all those years ago, sharing the first harvest feast with them.

Taylor invited Guy to join the Camp Pokanoket campers at a special campfire on Thursday evening at the Legion Way ice rink. The event celebrated the final week of summer camp.  Guy and his youngest daughter, tribal storyteller Tracey “Dancing Star” Brown, spoke with campers and their families about their heritage.

The Massasoit we know as King Philip is actually Metacomet, the son of Ousamequin, and his mother was the queen of the Nipmuc tribe. This union helped allow the Pokanokets to be the largest Indian nation in this country at one time.

When Metacomet was betrayed and murdered in 1676 at his summer encampment, in an attempt to destroy the tribe, said Guy, the English rulers decreed that the Pokanokets could no longer by known by their true name, meaning “land of the clearing.” They could only be known as Wampanoags, a more general term meaning “people of the first light.” Until recently, there was a law in place that made it illegal for any male over the age of 14 to refer to himself as Pokanoket.

As a result, for centuries the Pokanoket people have had a woman as Massasoit, and the current Massasoit is the first male to sit on the throne since Metacomet.

When asked how the Pokanokets are able to reconcile the wrongs of the past, Brown said, she would refer to what her cousin, Princess Redwing, historian, storyteller, and Chief of the Royal House of Pokanoket, told her.

“Her mother told her to extend not the sword of hatred, but the hand of peace,” said Brown.

After Guy demonstrated a traditional tribal dance, Brown invited the audience to join them in a tribal dance and song, and joked that while moccasins may have originally been fur-lined for softness, they had gel inserts in theirs.

While the campers and their parents may have been missing a little of the requisite coordination for a spectacular dance routine, Brown complimented them on their participation and emphasized that everyone was now qualified to join in a pow-wow.

After the dancing, campers had the chance to ask questions of the special guests before enjoying s'mores and stories around the campfire.