The First American “General” to Fall in Battle - Opechancanough (1646)

            Opechancanough, war chief of the Pamunkey tribal confederation, was commander of the unsuccessful half-century effort to expel the English colonists around Jamestown, Virginia. A talented strategist whose campaigns were marked by the inspired use of tactical surprise, especially furious surprise opening assaults, he was ultimately defeated by the superior weaponry of the invaders. Still, it was a remarkably close run struggle, marked by moments of high drama and touching the lives of people whose names are still remembered in elementary schools all over America.

            One such moment came in 1607. After a series of minor skirmishes, Opechancanough captured Captain John Smith who was freed following the entreaties of Pocahantas, the war chief’s niece. Several years later, in a symmetrical reversal of fortune, the Englishman returned the favor, freeing Opechancanough after taking his one-time captor hostage. Instead of calming the situation, these prisoner exchanges and other political gestures failed to prevent the first Anglo-Powhatan War. Waged from 1609-1614, the war concluded in a distinctly traditional way, with a “royal” wedding of Pocahantas to colonist leader John Rolfe. But deep resentments and affronts by both sides persisted, nor could Opechancanough forget his humiliating treatment at the hands of the English invaders.

            Warfare commenced anew on March 22, 1622 with a murderous surprise attack led by Opechancanough, already in his late sixties. More than 500 settlers – nearly one quarter of the entire colony population – were slaughtered in a single day. A low-level guerilla war, punctuated by several set piece battles and marked by savagery on both sides, then raged for almost fifteen years. Steady immigration from England offset the terrible losses of the settlers as the Native-Americans grew weaker. Eventually exhausted, Opechancanough sued for peace in 1635 and an uneasy truce followed for nearly a decade.

            On April 18, 1644, the old chief, now nearly 90 and carried into battle on a litter, mounted one final onslaught on the settlers. Although once again achieving tactical surprise and killing more than 300 settlers – another tremendous psychological blow to the English enemy - the Powhatan Confederation was not strong enough to consolidate its victory and by the end of the month the English captured the old man. In a spectacle reminiscent of the Roman treatment of enemy commanders, he was paraded through the streets of Jamestown and denounced as a “Bloody Monster” to the screams of those whose families had been killed in the war.

            Opechancanough, who had been a thorn in the side of the settlers for more than forty years, was imprisoned and in a still unexplained incident, murdered by one of his guards, the first “American” general to die as a prisoner of war. The strength of the Confederation was totally broken and the pattern was fixed for two and a half centuries of European expansion and displacement of the indigenous peoples in America by force of arms.

            A consummate practitioner of irregular warfare and skilled in the arts of guile, deception, and diplomacy, Opechancanough disappeared centuries ago from the annals of great American commanders. A battlefield leader who earned the loyalty of his warriors by sharing their hardships and risks, even in old age, and a careful planner, he was defeated by an insurmountable qualitative enemy advantage in weaponry and numbers. In spite of that, however, he came incredibly close to ending the English colonial penetration of Virginia very near its beginning and possibly changing the course of history on this continent.