Chief Harold 'Buster' Hatcher in full regalia against the sky, eagle-head staff in hand
Waccamaw Indian People · 1992 – 2026 · thirty years

Thank you,
Chief.

On June 29, 2026, Chief Harold "Buster" Hatcher retired after three decades leading the tribe he founded — closing his letter to the People with "Thank you for allowing me to serve… I did my best for you."

This museum is the People's answer.

His story Hear his voice See the years Support the fight
1521
First historical mention of the Waccamaw
1813
John Dimery buys back 300 acres — the Dimery Settlement
1935
Vander Hatcher sues Horry County over the Indian school
1988
Told "there are no Indians in South Carolina," Buster Hatcher sues the state — and wins
1992
The modern tribe is founded
2005
First state-recognized tribe in South Carolina
2016
The third constitution is ratified
2022
The federal recognition petition is filed
2026
Chief Hatcher retires; Chief Cail succeeds
The unfinished fight

Support Waccamaw federal recognition

Chief Hatcher gave his life to one unfinished fight: the United States has still never recognized the Waccamaw Indian People. That gap keeps the tribe's sovereignty incomplete — and its ancestors on museum shelves. It now belongs to all of us.

2005State-recognized
Not yetFederally recognized
600+Ancestors still held
Help fund the fight
Donate to the tribe Urge Congress to act Read the unfinished fight →

Donations are processed by Zeffy for the Waccamaw Indian People. Or contact your representatives and ask them to support Waccamaw federal recognition.

The Pillars

In His Own Words — Chief Hatcher

The chief's voice — from his memoirs, recorded oral histories, broadcasts, and his last letter
What Harold 'Buster' Hatcher actually said — the boyhood, the war, the people, the fight, and the goodbye, in his own words.

The Tribe Today — Chief Cheryl Cail

Pillar exhibit · the present tense — the Cail administration, 2026 →
The story did not end with Chief Hatcher's retirement. On June 29, 2026 the chieftaincy passed to Cheryl Cail — and the People carry on.

Photo Gallery — Chief Hatcher

A sourced photographic record, 1994–2026
The chief in photographs — every image sourced and credited.

Sitting with Ms. June — the chief as his people's historian

New exhibit · a 2016 house call, 2 hours 45 minutes on tape — the chief doing his own fieldwork
Chief Hatcher visits an elder of an old inlet family and turns on a recorder — platform burials, grave beads, and the Marion County reburial he was called to perform. The chief collecting his people's memory, the way this museum now collects his.

Twenty Years a Soldier — the Veterans History Project interview

His Army life, spoken aloud — the 2006 Library of Congress interview, transcribed in full
In June 2006 the Veterans History Project sat Chief Hatcher down and let him talk — enlisting off a street sign for $90 a month, the tunnel, the spit at Scott Air Force Base, and twenty years to Chief Warrant Officer, in his spoken voice.

The Written Record — 1715 to 1900

Pillar exhibit · two centuries in other people's handwriting
Every surviving written mention of the Waccamaw, from the first European accounts to the 1900 census — including the fifty-eight-year silence, and what the record does and does not prove.

The Dimery Settlement

Pillar exhibit · the origin place — Dog Bluff, Horry County, 1813 to today
Where the modern Waccamaw come from: 300 acres bought back in 1813, a farming community of families 'neither Black nor White,' its own church and school — and the Jim Crow schoolhouse fight that ran in the family blood.

The Long Fight — five generations

Pillar exhibit · 1813 · 1935 · 1988 · 2005 · 2018 · 2022 — one family, one argument, two centuries
From John Dimery buying back his people's land to the letters on a President's desk to the federal petition: the same fight, five generations running.

Waccamaw: Past, Present, Future

The commissioned exhibit · Coastal Carolina University × the Waccamaw Indian People, 2021–2024
The award-winning CCU collaboration — a Horry County Museum exhibit, a 3-D walkthrough, oral histories, and an interpretive trail at the Tribal Grounds — that told the People's story from the deep past to the fight ahead.

Waccamaw Voices — recordings & film

Oral histories, television, and film — the People on tape, from the powwow grounds to the Death Chant
The People in their own voices — oral histories, broadcast television, and the family's film archive, preserved and transcribed.
The Halls · the People, their government, their web

Federal Recognition — the unfinished fight

Hall exhibit · state-recognized since 2005, still not federal — and what that costs
South Carolina recognized the Waccamaw in 2005. The United States has not. What that distinction means — for a bill in Congress, for a burial, for 600 ancestors on museum shelves.

Nume Checks the Snares — the chief as storyteller

The chief as storyteller — his unfinished fiction of a Waccamaw boy, a trap line, a storm, and the whites' 'papers'
Two unfinished drafts found on Chief Hatcher's computer: the story of Nume (Bear), a Waccamaw boy running trap lines ahead of a storm — seeded with tribal words, and with the arrival of the papers that took the land.

The Waccamaw Indian People

History & community · 300 years at Dog Bluff — and a culture kept by law
The People: the settlement, the living culture, and the traditions written into tribal law.

Self-Government

Three constitutions · three branches · the machinery of a small sovereign nation
How the Waccamaw govern themselves — the constitutions, the branches, and the safeguards.

The Tribe on the Web

waccamaw.us → waccamawindians.us → waccamaw.org · every incarnation, preserved and browsable
Twenty years of the tribe's web presence, self-hosted as living snapshots.

About this museum

How these exhibits are made — primary records, verified, cited
The method: a verified archive of the tribe's own documents behind every exhibit.