When reading the history of almost continuous conflicts between Settlers and Natives during the early years, one has to ask where did it all go wrong. The short answer is, almost from the very beginning. For the first two years after Jamestown was founded in 1607, the Settlers and Natives were content to trade. The Natives wanted mostly metal implements such as knives and hatchets, the Colonists wanted foodstuffs. In 1609, with their own efforts to cultivate the ground largely unsuccessful, John Smith decided to raid some of the local Native villages for food. His efforts did not yield much other than the increasing animosity and suspicion of the Natives as it began to dawn on them that the settlers didn't mean to stay quietly in their towns on the banks of the James River. They intended to conquer the land by force. Chief Powhatan called the English out on their aims during a parley. "Your coming is not for trade, but to invade my people and possess my country," he said. A new governor, Thomas Gates, arrived in Jamestown in 1610 with instructions from the Virginia Company in London. The Natives were to be assimilated into the Colony, by force if necessary. They were to be Christianized and swear loyalty to King James. If Powhatan or other Native leaders stood in the way of that process, they were to be captured and imprisoned. After looking things over in Jamestown, Gates decided that the Colony was not viable and ordered an evacuation. While at sea en route back to England, they met up with a fleet led by Lord de la Ware and turned back to the Virginia coast. De la Ware sent Gates on a punitive expedition against the Kecoughtan, one of the tribes in the Powhatan Confederacy. The first Anglo-Powhatan War was on.
De la Ware also sent George Percy with a detachment to attach the capital of the Pashpahegh. They burnt the village and crops, killing 65-75 Natives and capturing the chief's wife and children. The children were shot on the trip back to Jamestown, while the woman was killed "with the sword" on arrival in the Colony. While the wives and children of chiefs did not have royal status, they were still important individuals within their communities and beloved by their families. The various tribes of the Powhatan Confederacy now considered themselves at war with the Colonists. De la Ware sent out more raiding parties. Chief Wowinchopuk, coming to avenge his wife and family, was killed in a skirmish near Jamestown in 1611.
In May, 1611, Sir Thomas Dale arrived as the new Governor of the Colony and he began looking for more places to establish settlements. He took over an island in the James River from another tribe, the Arrohattocs. Nemattenew, an advisor to Powhatan and his family, began raiding in the area, earning himself the saucy name 'Jack o' the Feather' from the Colonists. Powhatan, aged and ill, was ceding more control of his tribe to his younger brother, Opechancanough, and neither man was certain how to respond to the growing threat. In 1612, the Colonists concluded a separate peace with the Patawomeck. In 1613, Patawomeck warriors captured Pocahontas and turned her over to the English. Although she was not a princess, Colonists who wrote about this period noted the close bond between Powhatan and his daughter. To attack Jamestown directly was to risk her life, something he could not bring himself to do. 
The capture of this important hostage and the constant raids by Colonists had deprived the Powhatan Confederacy of most of their land along the James River. The Kecoughtan and Paspehagh tribes were virtually destroyed. The Weyanoke, Appomattoc, Arrohattoc and Powhatan's own tribe had lost significant amounts of land. In fact, the Arrohattoc and Quickohannock were never spoken of again in Colonial records. They were either destroyed entirely, or remnants of the people absorbed into surrounding tribes. After a year of stalemate, in 1614, Governor Dale took Pocahontas in search of her father. They encountered Powhatan at his new town of Matchcot and concluded a peace. Iron implements for the Natives in exchange for food stuffs for the colony. The peace was sealed with the marriage of Pocahontas to John Rolfe. In a major disappointment for all the ink that has ever been spilt over this "love match", Rolfe made his motives for the marriage plain. He married Pocahontas "not with the unbridled desire of carnal affection but for the good of the colony and the glory of God." Matters settled into an uneasy peace between the Colonists and the various Native tribes, but it was not to last long. Powhatan died in 1618. His brother, Opechacanough assumed his place as Paramount Chief the Powhatan Confederacy. War boiled over again when a Settler murdered the new chief's trusted advisor and ranking warrior, Nemattanew. On March 22, 1622, Opechacanough and his warriors struck at the English settlements along the James River. Christianized Natives warned Jamestown itself and the warriors considered the town to large and too heavily fortified to attack. Other settlements were not as well prepared and nearly a third of the colonists were killed in what became known as the Powhatan Massacre. This attack sparked the Second Powhatan War. Sporadic fighting between both sides followed this attack. In 1624, the Natives regrouped for a major offensive, but had to fall back after Settlers began burning their cornfields. A ceasefire was declared in 1628, but hostilities flared again until a final peace was declared in 1630.
The English began claiming more and more Native land. In 1633, they built a palisade across the Peninsula between the York and the James, near where Williamsburg stands. By 1642, Opechacanough was forced to lease land to the Settlers, in return for fifty bushes of corn a year payment from them. In 1644, Opechacanough launched one final effort to dislodge the Settlers from Virginia. In retaliation, the Settlers launched raids against several allied tribes, including two based in North Carolina, the Chawanoke and Secoton. In February, 1645, the Colonists started building outlying forts further into Native land. They also staged a raid that captured 92-year-old Opechacanough. He was taken to Jamestown, where he was shot. In 1646, a new chief of what remained of the Powhatan Confederacy signed a treaty with the Colonists, ceding more land and declaring his people to be subjects of the King of England. Although some tribes of the Powhatan Confederacy lingered on, the Confederacy itself was broken, never to unite
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