The Watuppa Reservation
In 1709, several decades after the end of King Philip’s War, Benjamin Church granted some of the surviving Native American Indians, among them Nemasket, Pocasset and Sakonnet tribal members, a 200-acre reservation on the Watuppa in the northeastern portion of what is present-day Fall River just north of the town of Westport. This reserve is internationally recognized under law, as outlined in the 1713 treaty of Portsmouth and the 1725 Treaty of Boston.
In 1869, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts passed the Enfranchisement Act which would dissolve reservation status for Lands held by the tribes and replace it with fee-simple property. This type of designation would have allocated land to individual tribal members who apply to the judge of probate in the county where the lands are located. This Act was successfully resisted as were subsequent attempts to slice up the Watuppa Reservation, leading the resistance then and now, our sister tribe, the Pocasset Wampanoag Tribe of Massachusetts and Rhode Island. Today, largely due to their effort over the years, the Watuppa is one of the last surviving colonial era Native American Indian Reservations in what is now the United States.
Wampanoag Royal Cemetery
The Wampanoag Royal Cemetery is a historic Native American cemetery in Lakeville, Massachusetts. The Cemetery contains about 20 graves, many if not all of them relatives to the Walmsley family, including our Ancestor the Squa Sachem of Nemasket Amie, daughter of the Pokanoket Chief Sachem Massasoit Ousamequin. Many of her descendants are also interred here. The last known burial is believed to be that of Lydia Tuspaquin, the 9th and 10th great grandmother of the current Nemasket Council.
Burr’s Hill Pokanoket Royal Burial Ground
Burr’s Hill was an ancient Pokanoket royal burial ground containing dozens of grave sites, including those of people who occupied the area in the 1600s. Used as a sand and gravel source for a railroad that was constructed next to the site in 1853, most of the graves were looted and desecrated. In 1913, in an effort to protect the remaining 42 graves, librarian and amateur archaeologist Charles Carr exhumed the contents and donated some of them to Brown University and the Heye Foundation Museum of the American Indian in New York City. A monument to the Pokanoket Grand Sachem Massasoit Ousamequin sits over a crypt containing over 500 artifacts removed from the original burial site in 1913.
King Philip’s Chair
“King Philip’s Chair,” is a rocky quartz ledge on a small hill and was a place where Po’Metacom (King Philip) held meeting and also served as a lookout site for enemies on approach to the Pokanoket village of Montaup which is today, Mount Hope. In 1675, Po’Metacom formed a great alliance of tribes, which some historians believe he called this federation, the Wampanoag. These Tribes were gathered for war against and ultimately for the removal of the English from their tribal lands. Under his leadership this confederation, which included the sister tribes of the Pokanoket, Nemasket, and Pocasset, was formidable. In June of 1675 King Philip’s War began, lasting 14 months before Po’metacom was eventually defeated. After the War, Plymouth Colony, Massachusetts Bay Colony, and Rhode Island all claimed this prized territory, and surviving members of the Tribe were either enslaved or driven out of the area. Today, this sacred place is questionably owned by Brown University and houses the Haffenreffer Museum of Anthropology.
Nemasket Nation 