Presenters: Dr. David La Vere, University of North Carolina at Wilmington, and Dr. Arwin D. Smallwood, North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University
On the morning of September 22, 1711, more than 500 Tuscarora warriors and their allies attacked European settlers living along the Neuse and Pamlico Rivers of North Carolina. Thus began the Tuscarora War, the bloodiest, and perhaps most brutal, colonial war in North Carolina history. The conflict would go on to claim hundreds of lives on both sides. In this program, two historians will examine the war’s key players, reveal its many causes, and consider its long-term effects for the colony.
A former United States Marine infantryman, Dr. David La Vere is a professor in the Department of History at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington. He is an ethnohistorian and the author of seven books on American Indian history, including The Tuscarora War: Indians, Settlers, and the Fight for the Carolina Colonies. Dr. Arwin D. Smallwood is Professor and Chair of the Department of History and Political Science at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University in Greensboro. His research primarily focuses on the relationships between African Americans, Native Americans, and Europeans in eastern North Carolina during the colonial and early antebellum period.