The Lower Skagit (sometimes called Whidbey Island Skagits) are a

tribe The term tribe is used in many different contexts to refer to a category of human social group. The predominant worldwide usage of the term in English language, English is in the discipline of anthropology. This definition is contested, in p ...

of the

Lushootseed Lushootseed (txʷəlšucid, dxʷləšúcid), also Puget Salish, Puget Sound Salish or Skagit-Nisqually, is a language made up of a dialect continuum of several Salish tribes of modern-day Washington state. Lushootseed is one of the Coast Salis ...

Native American people living in the

U.S. state In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its sover ...

Washington Washington commonly refers to: * Washington (state), United States * Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States ** A metonym for the federal government of the United States ** Washington metropolitan area, the metropolitan area centered o ...

. Today they are enrolled in the

federally recognized tribe This is a list of federally recognized tribes in the contiguous United States of America. There are also federally recognized Alaska Native tribes. , 574 Indian tribes were legally recognized by the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) of the United ...

, the Swinomish Indians of the Swinomish Reservation.

History

Pre-contact

In pre-

Contact Contact may refer to: Interaction Physical interaction * Contact (geology), a common geological feature * Contact lens or contact, a lens placed on the eye * Contact sport, a sport in which players make contact with other players or objects * ...

times, the tribe occupied approximately of land, including land on central

Whidbey Island Whidbey Island (historical spellings Whidby, Whitbey, or Whitby) is the largest of the islands composing Island County, Washington, in the United States, and the largest island in Washington State. (The other large island is Camano Island, ...

from Dugula Bay south to Holmes Harbor (including sites at Maylor Point, Penn Cove and Coupeville), as well as sites on the mainland around the mouth of the

Skagit River The Skagit River ( ) is a river in southwestern British Columbia in Canada and northwestern Washington in the United States, approximately 150 mi (240 km) long. The river and its tributaries drain an area of 1.7 million acres (690,000& ...

. The Lower Skagit had conflicts with

Haida Haida may refer to: Places * Haida, an old name for Nový Bor * Haida Gwaii, meaning "Islands of the People", formerly called the Queen Charlotte Islands * Haida Islands, a different archipelago near Bella Bella, British Columbia Ships * , a 1 ...

from the north, who would raid their camps to take

slaves Slavery and enslavement are both the state and the condition of being a slave—someone forbidden to quit one's service for an enslaver, and who is treated by the enslaver as property. Slavery typically involves slaves being made to perf ...

, as well as

Klallam Klallam (also Clallam, although the spelling with "K" is preferred in all four modern Klallam communities) refers to four related indigenous Native American/First Nations communities from the Pacific Northwest of North America. The Klallam cult ...

from the other side of the

Puget Sound Puget Sound ( ) is a sound of the Pacific Northwest, an inlet of the Pacific Ocean, and part of the Salish Sea. It is located along the northwestern coast of the U.S. state of Washington. It is a complex estuarine system of interconnected ma ...

, who tried to occupy their lands.Ruby;Brown, 1986 Like other Coast Salish tribes, the Lower Skagit were semi-sedentary. Their lives revolved around the food they could harvest from the sea, such as

salmon Salmon () is the common name for several list of commercially important fish species, commercially important species of euryhaline ray-finned fish from the family (biology), family Salmonidae, which are native to tributary, tributaries of the ...

, through use of

fish weirs A fishing weir, fish weir, fishgarth or kiddle is an obstruction placed in tidal waters, or wholly or partially across a river, to direct the passage of, or trap fish. A weir may be used to trap marine fish in the intertidal zone as the tide rece ...

, as well as nets dragged between two canoes, and hunting duck, seals and deer. This diet was supplemented by gathering of a wide variety of nuts and fruits, as well as cultivation of camas roots, nettles, bracken, and after European contact, potatoes.

Post-contact

During the

fur trading The fur trade is a worldwide industry dealing in the acquisition and sale of animal fur. Since the establishment of a world fur market in the early modern period, furs of boreal, polar and cold temperate mammalian animals have been the most ...

era, the Lower Skagit were active in trading at posts of the

Hudson's Bay Company The Hudson's Bay Company (HBC; french: Compagnie de la Baie d'Hudson) is a Canadian retail business group. A fur trading business for much of its existence, HBC now owns and operates retail stores in Canada. The company's namesake business div ...

. By the 1840s,

Roman Catholic Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lette ...

missionaries A missionary is a member of a religious group which is sent into an area in order to promote its faith or provide services to people, such as education, literacy, social justice, health care, and economic development.Thomas Hale 'On Being a Mi ...

like François Blanchet Jean-Baptiste Bolduc were trying to convert the Lower Skagit to their beliefs. During the

United States Exploring Expedition The United States Exploring Expedition of 1838–1842 was an exploring and surveying expedition of the Pacific Ocean and surrounding lands conducted by the United States. The original appointed commanding officer was Commodore Thomas ap Catesby ...

, the explorer

Charles Wilkes Charles Wilkes (April 3, 1798 – February 8, 1877) was an American naval officer, ship's captain, and explorer. He led the United States Exploring Expedition (1838–1842). During the American Civil War (1861–1865), he commanded ' during the ...

made contact in 1841 with the people. He found the Lower Skagit building a Catholic church. In January 1855, a Lower Skagit chief named Goliah signed the

Treaty of Point Elliott The Treaty of Point Elliott of 1855, or the Point Elliott Treaty,—also known as Treaty of Point Elliot (with one ''t'') / Point Elliott Treaty—is the lands settlement treaty between the United States government and the Native American tribes ...

, by which the United States established reservations for numerous coastal tribes. The estimated 300 tribal members were put under jurisdiction of the

Tulalip The Tulalip Tribes of Washington (, lut, dxʷlilap), formerly known as the Tulalip Tribes of the Tulalip Reservation, is a federally recognized tribe of Duwamish, Snohomish, Snoqualmie, Skagit, Suiattle, Samish, and Stillaguamish people. The ...

Agency. In September 1873, an

executive order In the United States, an executive order is a directive by the president of the United States that manages operations of the federal government. The legal or constitutional basis for executive orders has multiple sources. Article Two of th ...

moved the tribe, along with members of the

Swinomish The Swinomish are an historically Lushootseed-speaking Native American people in western Washington state in the United States. The Tribe lives in the southeastern part of Fidalgo Island in northern Puget Sound, near the San Juan Islands, in ...

and other tribes, to the Swinomish Reservation on

Fidalgo Island Fidalgo Island is an island in Skagit County, Washington, located about north of Seattle. To the east, it is separated from the mainland by the Swinomish Channel, and from Whidbey Island to the south by Deception Pass. The island is named af ...

Skagit County, Washington Skagit County is a county in the U.S. state of Washington. As of the 2020 census, the population was 129,523. The county seat and largest city is Mount Vernon. The county was formed in 1883 from Whatcom County and is named for the Skagit Ind ...

. In the twentieth century, the tribe pursued a

land claim A land claim is defined as "the pursuit of recognized territorial ownership by a group or individual". The phrase is usually only used with respect to disputed or unresolved land claims. Some types of land claims include aboriginal land claims, A ...

against the federal government because of receiving inadequate settlement. On October 13, 1971, the

Indian Claims Commission The Indian Claims Commission was a judicial relations arbiter between the United States federal government and Native American tribes. It was established under the Indian Claims Act of 1946 by the United States Congress to hear any longstanding clai ...

ordered

US$ The United States dollar (symbol: $; code: USD; also abbreviated US$ or U.S. Dollar, to distinguish it from other dollar-denominated currencies; referred to as the dollar, U.S. dollar, American dollar, or colloquially buck) is the official ...

74,856.50 to be paid to the Lower Skagit to cover the amount of land that they had lost as a result of the Point Elliott Treaty.

Swinomish Reservation

The Swinomish Indian Reservation has a land area of 31.381 km² (12.116 sq mi) and a 2000 census resident population of 2,664 persons. About 23 percent identified as being solely of Native American heritage. Like many other elements of American society, the tribe has a long history of intermarriage with other ethnic groups, but children of the tribe identify as Lower Skagit. Today, Lower Skagit members who live on the reservation are primarily commercial fishers by trade.

Language

The Lower Skagit language is a subdialect of the Northern Lushootseed dialect.Van Eijk, p.xxiv.

References

Sources

* Bennett, Lee Ann. ''Effects of White Contact on the Lower Skagit Indians'', Seattle: Washington Archaeological Society, 1972. * Ruby, Robert H.; John A. Brown (1986). ''A Guide to the Indian Tribes of the Pacific Northwest'', The Civilization of the American Indian. University of Oklahoma Press. . pages 107-109. * Jan Halliday;Gail Chehak. ''Native Peoples of the Northwest: A Traveler's Guide to Land, Art, and Culture'', Sasquatch Books, 1996, p. 74. *Van Eijk, Jan. ''The Lillooet Language: Phonology, Morphology, Syntax'', UBC Press, 1985, p.xxiv. *Idaho State University Museum. ''Occasional Papers of the Idaho State University Museum'', 1958. {{DEFAULTSORT:Lower Skagit Native American tribes in Washington (state) History of Washington (state) Lushootseed language