Chief Opechancanough Mangopeesomon Powhatan

Notes:

Chief of the Pamunkey Indians; he planned the massacres of 1622 and 1644. He was captured by Sir William Berkeley and was killed while a captive at Jamestown in 1646 by a soldier out of revenge. He was also known as Apachisco. He was able, resourceful and unforgiving.

Opechancanough. A Powhatan chief, born about 1545, died in 1644. He captured Capt. John Smith shortly after the arrival of the latter in Virginia, and took him to his brother, the head-chief Powhatan (q. v.). Some time after his release, Smith, in order to change the temper of the Indians, who jeered at the starving Englishmen and refused to sell them food, went with a band of his men to Opechancanough's camp under pretense of buying corn, seized the chief by the hair, and at the point of a pistol marched him off a prisoner. The Pamunkey brought boat-loads of provisions to ransom their chief, who thereafter entertained more respect and deeper hatred for the English. While Powhatan lived Opechancanough was held in restraint, but after his brother's death in 1618 he became the dominant leader of the nation, although his other brother, Opitchapan, was the nominal head-chief.
He plotted the destruction of the colony so secretly that only one Indian, the Christian Chanco, revealed the conspiracy, but too late to save the people of Jamestown, who at a sudden signal were massacred, Mar. 22, 1622, by the natives deemed to be entirely friendly.
In the period of intermittent hostilities that followed, duplicity and treachery marked the actions of both whites and Indians. In the last year of his life, Opechancanough, taking advantage of the dissensions of the English, planned their extermination. The aged chief was borne into battle on a litter when the Powhatan, on Apr. 18, 1644, fell upon the settlements and massacred 300 persons, then as suddenly desisted and fled far from the colony, frightened perhaps by some omen. Opechancanough was taken prisoner to Jamestown, where one of his guards treacherously shot him, inflicting a wound of which he subsequently died.

Family/Spouse: Matachanna "Cleopatra" Powhatan ("Royal blood line"). Matachanna (daughter of Chief Wahunsonacock Powhatan and Matatishe Winanuske Nonoma Powhatan) was born in 1590 in Werowocomoco, Gloucester, Virginia, USA; died in 1641 in , Henrico, Virginia, USA. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Nicketti married "Trader" John Rice Hughes in 1640 in , Henrico, Virginia, USA. "Trader" was born in 1615 in Rector, Anglesey, Wales; died in 1700 in , Henrico, Virginia, USA. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Married: 1703, , Albemarle, Virginia, USA

Family/Spouse: Samuel Peartree. Samuel was born in 1640 in , , Virginia, USA; died in 1660. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Mary married Nathaniel Davis about 1676 in , New Kent, Virginia, USA. Nathaniel was born on 17 Apr 1655 in , Devonshire, England; died in , Lancaster, Virginia, USA. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Mary married John Joseph Burkes in 1703 in , Hanover, Virginia, USA. John was born in 1655 in , , , Ireland; died in 1721 in , , Virginia, USA. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Samuel Burk (b. 1680) m. Mary Davis (b. 1685), daughter of NathanielDavis.
(It is at this point that Indian blood enters the Burks family), as Nathaniel's wife was Elizabeth Hughes, daughter of a member of a colonial family and a Trader named Hughes and his Indian wife, Niketti, whose mother was Cleopatra, sister to Pocahontas. Or so it has been recorded in several genealogies. The Indian name Niketti translates as "She who sweeps the dew from the flowers."

Documentation for the the Burks/Davis genealogy of Nicketti is given by Frank Wellington's daughter, Mary Wheat Burks Dean (819 Peaksview, Bedford, VA 24523, April 15, 1980). She is the researcher of this Burks genealogy, which was begun by her mother. It is supplemented by information from Faye S. Poss, 471 Mimosa Drive NW., Tucker, GA 30084. Faye Poss is researching the Burks who migrated to GA.

There is positive and indisputable proof that Pocahontas had a sister named Cleopatra. This proof was located in the old library of the Maryland Historical Society, an item of three lines covering eleven years. During the period covered by the fragment, matters became so bad between the Whites and the Indians that Opechancanough , Chief of the Powhatans, was induced to agree upon a line being established which neither White nor Indian, excepting truce bearers, should cross under penalty of being shot on sight. To insure strict obedience to the compact, a law was passed at Jamestown imposing a heavy penalty on any people crossing the line without a special permit from the Commissioners Council and the General Court. This accounts for the item alluded to, which is given verbatim. It reads:


"Dec. 17th, 1641 -- Thomas Rolfe petitions the governor to let him see Opechankeno to whom he is allied, and Cleopatra, his mother's sister."The record of the General Court was evidently intended to be a verbatim
copy though they differ in phraseology and spelling:


"Dec. 17th, 1641 -- Thomas Rolph petitions Gov. to let him go see Opechanko, to whom he is allied, and Cleopatre, his mother's sister."

Thomas Rolfe was the son of John Rolfe and Pocahontas, and Cleopatra was unquestionably not his aunts Indian name. It is, however, the only name that has been passed to us historically, and we must accept it. One wonders if her name was not "Matachanna", the aunt-nurse associated with his mother in Thomas Rolfes earliest memories


Source: Virginia Genealogical Society Quarterly, Vol. 12, No. 2, April 1974. Pg. 67. SAMUEL BURKS referenced in a query from Mrs. Marion Burks Haggarty of Detroit, MI - Section "Charlotte, Dowager Duchess of Dunmore / Queries".
"Chief Powhaton had a niece Princess Nicketti. Her granddaughter, Mary Davis, married Samuel Burks, who came from England to New Kent Co., Va. Their daughter Elizabeth Burks married Dr. William Cabell in 1726. The sons of Samuel Burks were John P. Burks and Richard Burks who married Fannie Horsley in 1739."
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Source: "Our Kin: the genealogies of some of the early families who made history in the founding and development of Bedford County, Virginia." Pg. 113a, 114a. Copyrighted 1930 by Mary Denham Ackerly and Lula Eastman Jeter Parker. Available on Google Books online.
"He who cares not whence he came, cares not where he goes."

"The Cabells and Their Kin, " page 43:
"I can not vouch for it but will give it as I find it in the Floyd tradition. Opechancanough, the celebrated chief of the Powhatans, *** left a lovely young daughter, the child of his old age, the Princess Nicketti, -- 'she who sweeps the dew from the flowers.' Some years after this graceful Indian maiden had reached the years of mature womanhood, a member (the name is not given) of one of the cavalier families of Virginia fell in love with her and she with him, and the result was a clandestine marriage, and a half-breed Indian girl, who married about the year 1680 a Welshman (others say a native of Devonshire, England), named Nathaniel Davis, an Indian trader, and according to some accounts a Quaker; and from this alliance many notable people in the East and in the West have descended. Their daughter, Mary Davis, born about 1685, married Samuel Burks, of Hanover (the ancestor of the Burks family of Virginia), and their daughter, Elizabeth Burks, married Captain William Cabell, the ancestor of the Cabells.
"Martha Davis, senior, a son (the ancestor of the 'black Davises' of Kentucky and from whom Jefferson Davis descended), had a daughter, Abadiah (or Abigail) Davis, who married William Floyd, the ancestor of the Floyds of Virginia and of the West.
"A daughter or granddaughter of the Quaker married General Evan Shelby, of Maryland, the ancestor of the Shelbys of the West.
"Samuel and Philip Davis, of the Blue Mountains, were sons, and there may have been other sons and daughters.
"William Floyd left the eastern shore of Virginia, went up the country as far as the present Amherst County, which was then a very wild region, where he met with this family of Davises, who had traded with the Indians and gotten much property this way. (the Quakers were much given to friendly trading with the Indians.)
"William Floyd and his wife's brother, Robert Davis, junior, with their families emigrated to Kentucky with the first settlers, and finally located in the Bear-grass region near Louisville, where the kinsmen (Floyds and Davises) had a fort, called Floyd's Station.
* * * * * * *
"The Princess Nicketti's name has not been popular among her traditional descendents (it may be because the marriage was clandestine). The first Governor John Floyd named one of his daughters for her. I know no other namesake, but if tradition is true, no more lovely woman ever 'swept the dew from the flowers'."

Mary married Samuel King Burks in 1703 in , Hanover, Virginia, USA. Samuel (son of John Joseph Burkes and Mary Partree Peartree) was born in 1680 in , Hanover, Virginia, USA; died on 12 Feb 1756 in Saint Annes Parish, Albemarle, Virginia, USA. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Samuel married Mary Elizabeth Davis in 1703 in , Hanover, Virginia, USA. Mary (daughter of Nathaniel Davis and Mary Elizabeth Hughes) was born on 16 May 1682 in Haven Hill, Albemarle, Virginia, USA; died on 2 Feb 1756 in , Albemarle, Virginia, USA. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]