Coree

The Coree (also Connamox, Cores, Corennines, Connamocksocks, Coranine Indians, Neuse River Indians) were a very small Native American tribe, now amalgamated, who once occupied a coastal area of southeastern North Carolina in the area now covered by Carteret and Craven Counties. They were not described by Europeans until 1701, by which time their population had been decimated in a war, leaving them with as few as 125 members.

The Coree were allied with the Tuscarora, and in 1711 they participated in the Tuscarora War. By 1715, some merged with the remaining members of the nearby Machapunga and settled in the Machapunga's single village, Mattamuskeet, on the shore of Lake Mattamuskeet in Hyde County. Other Coree remained in Carteret county (especially in isolated areas such as Indian Beach, Atlantic Beach, Harkers Island-formerly known as Craney Island, Core Creek, and swamp lands) and became amalgamated with the white population.

Chief Jerry "Turtle" Faircloth has made attempts to gain government recognition for the descendants of the Coree (referred to now as the "Faircloth Indians"). There has been much speculation to the validity of Faircloth's claims and his attempts at government recognition have received little attention and viewed with little credibility.

Language

James Mooney speculated that they were related to the Cherokee without convincing evidence. They spoke a language that was not intelligible with Tuscarora, Carolina Algonquian, or Woccon as evidenced in a statement by John Lawson in 1709. However, the name Coree may be the singular form of the Carolina Algonquian name Cwareuuoc.

External links

• Coree Indian Tribe, Access Genealogy
• Who are the Coree

Bibliography

• Goddard, Ives. (2005). The indigenous languages of the Southeast. Anthropological Linguistics, 47 (1), 1-60.