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Time Period
16,000 BCE to 1622 CE
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At the time of the great northern glaciers, Native Americans followed the game they hunted to Virginia. Ten thousand years later, as the cold of the Ice Age gave way to a warmer, drier climate, they relied also on foraging and farming. After about 900 CE they settled into villages that united into chiefdoms. In 1607, in pursuit of opportunity in a new world, English settlers intruded into an eastern Virginia chiefdom of thirty-two tribes (15,000 to 20,000 people). Its leader then was Wahunsenacawh, whom the new settlers called by his title, Powhatan.
Time Period
1861 to 1876
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If Virginians were instrumental in creating the Union in 1776, they were also pivotal in breaking it apart eighty-five years later. Most Virginians rejected secession until they were called upon to provide troops after the Confederate attack on Fort Sumter. The far northwestern counties refused to secede and instead formed West Virginia. Virginia became the bloodiest battleground of the war. At its conclusion, slavery was ended and black males could vote, but the daily lives and standard of living of African Americans changed little. Virginia was put under military rule for three years.