KING PHILIP'S WAR.
I have now reached the story of the longest and bloodiest war which
the colonists had yet waged with the Indian. It is known in colonial
history as King Philip's war, and belongs more to the histories of
Massachusetts and Connecticut than to that of Rhode Island, although
two of its bloodiest battles were fought on Rhode Island soil. Like all
wars with barbarians it is filled with strange mixtures of barbarism
and heroism, the savage warrior often rising in the pursuit of his
ideal to a moral grandeur which his civilized antagonist failed to
attain. And although like the war with the Pequots it was fatal to
those who began it, it has left one of great names of Indian history,
and brought into play some of the greatest traits of Indian character.
First and most faithful of the allies of the English was Massasoit,
Sachem of the Wamponoags. A pestilence too malignant to be controlled
by the medical science of the natives had decimated his tribe and
exposed him to the ambition of the Narragansetts, his immediate
neighbors, a little before the arrival of the Pilgrims. Perceiving
only the present danger, he looked upon the advent of the white man
as a means of preserving his independence, and eagerly made a covenant
with him which he faithfully kept to the end of his life, (1661). At
his death his eldest son, Wamsutta, or Alexander as he was called by
the English, succeeded to his authority, but not to the confidence of
his allies. Suspicion arose; he was accused of plotting against the
colonists, and though an independent chief, summoned to appear at the
General Court at Plymouth. Disobeying the summons, he was threatened
with personal violence, and reluctantly yielding set forth with his
warriors and women, some eighty in all, under the escort of a small
body of troops commanded by Major Winslow. The indignity was too great
for the unfortunate chief. Winslow saw that he was sinking under
fatigue--for the weather was very hot--and wounded pride, for wrong was
hard to bear. "Take my horse," he said, touched with compassion. "No!"
replied the chief with a last touch of pride, "there are no horses for
my wife and the other women." When they reached Winslow's house, which
was on the way he sickened, and though allowed to turn back, quickly
died. Deep was the indignation of the Indians at this treatment of
their sachem, and even some of the colonists felt that they had gone
too far.
But there was one among them into whose breast the wrong sank deepest,
for it called him to avenge not only a chief but a brother. That
brother was known in colonial history as Philip of Pocanoket. The story
of Philip has been variously told, some looking upon him as a crafty
savage loving the wiles and cruelty of Indian warfare and fighting with
no other object than immediate success; others as an Indian patriot
contending for the independence of his country. In either case, if we
judge him by the standard of his own people, he was a great ruler in
peace and a valiant leader in war.
We are told that it was a sore grief to the young sachem to see the
white man daily taking a firmer hold of the soil, and the red man
melting before him. But how could the march of the invader be stayed?
The arrow was a feeble weapon with which to oppose the firelock, the
tomahawk even in the strongest hand was no match for the sabre. The
foresight, judgment, method and power of combination of the white man
enabled him to provide for the future while making wise provision for
the present. While he was well supplied with food, the Indian was
starving. While he was warmly clad, the Indian was exposed almost naked
to the rudest blasts of winter. Philip saw the danger and resolved to
face it.
His first step was to secure allies by winning over the neighboring
tribes. It was a broad field for diplomacy, wherein Indian not
Christian ethics prevailed, and was well suited to his bold and wily
nature. Yet with all his wiles he could not so completely cover his
track as not to excite the suspicions of the English. He was summoned
to Plymouth and closely questioned. But the hour for action was not yet
come and he succeeded in allaying suspicions by giving up his arms.
But treason beset his path. A "praying Indian," as the converts of
Eliot were called, who had lived some years with Philip as secretary
and counselor, betrayed the secret of the sachem's preparations. The
betrayal cost him his life but saved the Colony by compelling Philip to
begin his outbreak before his preparations were completed. It is said
that when he saw the necessity he cast himself upon the ground and wept
bitterly.
But there was no escaping it, and collecting his forces he fell upon
the settlements with fire and sword, and what was still more dreaded,
the scalping knife and tomahawk. The first to feel his fury was the
border town of Swanzey, where houses and barns were burnt and nine of
the inhabitants put to death and seven wounded. Succor came promptly
from Plymouth and Boston. The Indians fell back upon Mount Hope,
Philip's favorite seat. Mutilated corpses and burning dwellings marked
the track of the pursued. The pursuer looked round him in vain for an
enemy. A few dogs prowled round the deserted wigwams, but not an Indian
was to be seen.
And here comes into view one of the boldest leaders of the colonists
in their wars with the natives, Benjamin Church, of Plymouth, a man
skilled in all the arts of Indian warfare, and in whose ardent nature
a sound judgment and self-control were combined with intrepidity and
enterprise. He pressed close upon the track of the enemy, crossed the
bay to Aquidneck, and after a six hours' fight with a superior force
was compelled to take refuge on board a sloop just as his ammunition
began to fail.
The war was fairly begun, and for over a twelvemonth raged with various
fortunes but unabated fury. Plymouth and Massachusetts suffered most,
but it left bloody traces in Rhode Island also.
For unfortunately for Rhode Island, Philip's favorite seat was that
beautiful range of hills, some twelve miles long, which separates the
Taunton River and Mount Hope Bay from Narragansett Bay, thus bringing
him within the limits of the present Town of Bristol. Tradition
still points to a rock on the southernmost hill where the "noble
savage" loved to sit and gaze on the waters as they held their way to
the Atlantic, revolving, perhaps, in his embittered mind, a bloody
vengeance upon his arrogant foe. It was from Mount Hope that he set
forth to strike his first blow, and thither that he returned to fall by
the hand of a traitor. "But a small part of the domain of my ancestors
is left," he said to his friend, John Borden. "I am determined not to
live till I have no country."
Part only of the bloody record as I have already said belongs to Rhode
Island. In the modern Town of Tiverton, known in those earlier colonial
days as Pocasset, there was a swamp--seven miles in length--one of
those difficult spots wherein Indian warriors love to concentrate
their forces in the hour of danger. Here, amidst intricate paths and
trembling morasses Philip first awaited the assault of the enemy. The
colonists came up bravely to the charge, but were bravely repulsed
with the loss of sixteen men. Then they resolved to take possession
of the avenues to the swamp and starve the Indians into surrender.
But the wily Philip after standing a siege of thirteen days made good
his escape by night and took refuge on the Connecticut River, where
he was joined by the Nipmucks, a Massachusetts tribe which he had won
over to his fortunes. Surprises, pursuits, gallant stands, fearful
massacres follow. At Brookfield it is an ambush followed by a siege.
At Deerfield there was a battle in which the Indians were worsted,
then a second trial of strength in which the town was burnt. At Hadley
the enemy came while the inhabitants were in the meeting-house engaged
in their devotions. For a while the men, who had brought their arms
with them and were well trained to the use of them, thus held their
ground firmly. But the surprise had shaken their nerves, and they were
beginning to cast anxious glances around them, when suddenly in their
midst appeared a venerable man clad in the habiliments of another age
and with a sword in his hand. With a clear, firm voice he roused the
flagging courage of the villagers, reformed their ranks and led them
to the charge. A Roman would have taken him for one of the Dioscuri--a
Spaniard for St. Jago. What wonder that the Hadleyites thought him a
divine messenger, and if with such a proof of God's favor to inspirit
them, they sprang forward with dauntless hearts and drove their enemy
before them. When the victory was won, the same clear voice bade
them bow their heads in prayer, and when they raised them again the
mysterious speaker was gone. None but the village preacher knew that it
was Goffe, the regicide.
A surprise and massacre have left their name to Bloody Brook.
Springfield was burned. But at Hatfield Philip received a check, and
having laid waste the western frontier of Massachusetts, turned his
steps toward the land of the Narragansetts. For the success of the war
depended mainly upon the decision of that still powerful tribe. In the
beginning a doubtful treaty had been patched up between them and the
English. But their hearts were with their own race, and when Philip
came they resolved to cast in their fortunes with his. The colonists
prepared themselves sternly for the contest. Fifteen hundred men were
enlisted in Massachusetts, Plymouth and Connecticut; a body of friendly
Indians joined them, and though it was mid-winter, thinking only of
the necessity of striking a decisive blow they began their march.
Volunteers from Rhode Island joined them on the way, but Rhode Island
as a colony was not consulted.
The Narragansetts were on their own ground and had chosen the strongest
point for their winter quarters. It was an island of between three and
four acres in the midst of a vast swamp in the southwestern part of the
State, three or four miles from the present village of Kingston. To the
trees and other natural defences the Indian chief had added palisades
and such appliances as his rude engineering suggested. Here he had
built his wigwams and stored his provisions, and prepared to pass the
winter.
Towards this fated spot at the dawn of a December Sabbath the little
army of Puritans took their way. The snow was falling fast and the
wind dashed it in their faces, but bated not their speed. By one they
were in front of the stronghold, and though weary with the long march
and faint with hunger they pressed eagerly forward. The only entrance
was over the trunk of a tree. The Indian guns and arrows covered every
foot of the way. The colonists undaunted rushed on--officers in the
van. First to feel the murderous Indian aim was Captain Johnson, of
Roxbury. Captain Davenport, of Boston, fell next, but before he fell
penetrated the enclosure. More than two hours the battle raged with
unabated fury. At one time the English made their way into the fort,
but the Indians rallied and forced them back again. But over-confident
in the natural strength of their fortress they had neglected to secure
with palisades a strip which they had thought sufficiently guarded by
a sheet of water. The English discovered it, and crossing took the
astonished natives in the rear. At the same time some one shouted,
"Fire their wigwams." The fatal flame caught eagerly the light boughs
and branches of which the frail tenements were made, and in a few
moments the fort was all ablaze. Imagination shrinks appalled from the
scene that followed. Night was coming on. The snow storm had set in
with fresh violence. A thousand Indian warriors lay dead or wounded
within the fort. Five hundred wigwams were burning within the same
narrow compass--consuming alike the bodies of the wounded and the
dead. The women and children, like their protectors, perished in the
flames. Eighty of the English, too, were killed--a hundred and fifty
were wounded. Had the wigwams been spared there would have been food
and shelter for the victors. But victors and vanquished were driven
out into the bleak night, weary and spent with long marching and
fasting--the Indian to crouch in an open cedar swamp not far from the
fort--the English to return to the spot from whence they had set out
in the morning for this dreadful victory--Smith's plantation, near the
present village of Wickford. Several of the wounded died by the way.
Even after this blow Philip succeeded in arousing the Maine and New
Hampshire tribes to his support, and the war still raged for a while
through the New England settlements. Rhode Island suffered severely.
Warwick was burned, and the cattle driven off. Tradition says that when
the enemy approached Providence, Roger Williams, now a very old man,
went out to meet them. "Massachusetts," he said, "can raise thousands
of men at this moment, and if you kill them, the King of England will
supply their places as fast as they fall." "Let them come," was the
reply, "we are ready for them. But as for you, brother Williams, you
are a good man; you have been kind to us many years; not a hair of your
head shall be touched." Fifty-four houses in the northern part of the
town were burned, but the fearless old man was not harmed.
Many of the colonists took refuge on Aquidneck, where the inhabitants
of Newport and Portsmouth received them with great kindness. To protect
the island a little flotilla of four boats, manned each by five or six
men, was kept sailing around it day and night. There was no rest for
old or young. April opened a brighter prospect. Canonchet, chief of
the Narragansetts was taken prisoner. A young Englishman attempted to
examine him. "You much child; no understand matters of war. Let your
brother or your chief come. Him I will answer," was his haughty reply.
He was offered his life if his tribe would submit, but refused it.
The offer was renewed and he calmly said, "Let me hear no more about
it." He was sent to Stonington, where a council of war condemned him to
death. "I like it well," said he; "I shall die before my heart is soft,
or I have said anything unworthy of myself." That as many as possible
of his own race should take part in his execution Pequots were employed
to shoot him, Mohegans to cut off his head and quarter him, and the
Niantics to burn his body. When all this had been done, his head was
sent to the Commissioners at Hartford as "a taken of love and loyalty."
Throughout the spring and early summer the war still raged with
unabated violence. The Rhode Island Assembly was so hard pushed that
it was compelled to repeal the law exempting Quakers from military
service. A few days before the capture of Canonchet he had surprised
a party of Plymouth men near Pawtuxet. A battle was fought in an open
cedar swamp in Warwick. But at last fortune seemed to turn towards
the English. Philip's allies began to fall from him. His wife and
children were taken prisoners. Captain Church with a chosen band was
on his trail. Hunted from lair to lair he sought refuge at Mount Hope.
A few followers still clung to his fortunes. His mind was harassed by
unpropitious dreams, and in his weariness his pursuers came upon him
unawares. As he rose to flee he was shot down by a renegade Indian. The
victors drew his body out of the swamp, cut off his head, and dividing
the trunk and limbs into four parts hung them upon four trees. The head
was sent to Plymouth where it was hung upon a gibbet. One hand was sent
to Boston where it was welcomed as a trophy, and the other was given to
the renegade who shot him, by whom it was exhibited for money. His son
was sold into West India servitude.
With the death of Philip the war ended, although there were occasional
collisions and bloodshed. For two members of the New England
confederacy it had been a war of desolation. Connecticut, the third,
escaped unharmed. Rhode Island, which had never been a member of it
and had never been consulted concerning the war, although some of its
leading incidents occurred within her borders, suffered most. Her
second town was burned, her plantations laid waste and the inhabitants
of her main-land driven for shelter to the island.
With the vanquished it went hard. Many were killed in battle, some were
shot in cold blood by the sentence of an English court-martial. Many
were sold into slavery--with this distinction in favor of Rhode Island,
that while the other colonies sold their prisoners into unqualified
servitude, she established for hers a system of apprenticeship by which
the prospect of ultimate freedom was opened to all.