Early Settlement

Captain John Smith, 1888, Library of Congress. 

For thousands of years, Native Americans inhabited and thrived on the Delmarva Peninsula. A number of tribes established communities up and down the region, including the Lenni Lenape, the Nanticoke, the Wicomico, the Accomac, the Pocomoke, the Manokin, and the Choptank tribes. Captain John Smith, along with a crew of 14 men, explored the area in 1608 to learn about and document the natural resources available, including minerals, fish, wildlife, and timber, and to observe the native population.

English and other European settlers would soon follow, as the location was ideal for establishing new settlements. The region offered easy access by boat, plenty of seafood and game for nourishment, and an abundance of water for the fields to grow crops. The settlers made trade agreements with Native Americans as they began claiming the land as their own. They offered goods, including guns, tools, and farm implements, in exchange for the land, as the settlers surveyed and drew upland plat maps and deeds, documenting the new ownership and title to the land.

Within is a country that may have the prerogative over the most pleasant places known, for large and pleasant navigable rivers, heaven and earth never agreed better to frame a place for man’s habitation.

– Captain John Smith, 1612