The Pequot tribe--Their first chief-sachem known to the English,
Pekoath--succeeded by Sassacus--An embassy sent to Boston in
1631--Residence and strong-holds of Sassacus--His earliest intercourse
with the English--Murder of Captain Stone--Justification of it by
Sassacus--He proposes a treaty of peace in 1684--Sends deputies to
Boston twice--Treaty concluded--Anecdotes--His wars with the
Narraghansetts--Fresh controversy with the English--They send an armed
party to demand damages--Conduct of the party, and consequences of
it--War with the Pequots in 1636--Political movements of
Sassacus--English expedition against him in 1637--He is
defeated--Driven from his country--Killed by the Mohawks--The English
policy in his case briefly considered.
The Pequots, or Pequods, inhabited that part of the southern coast of New
England, which is now comprehended within the limits of Connecticut. They
are said to have been originally an inland tribe, and to have gained
possession by mere force of arms of the fine territory which they occupied
at the date of their first acquaintance with the English. They were in the
meridian of their glory and power about forty years previous to that
period, and were then the most considerable tribe in New England,
mastering as many as four thousand bowmen. Their principal settlements
were now about New London and Groton; the former of which was their chief
harbor, and called by their own name. The Nipmuck Indians, on their north,
were still tributary to them. So also were a part of the Long Islanders,
and most of the Indians on the Connecticut river. The Narraghansetts alone
of the neighboring tribes had been able to oppose them with success, and
against that nation they waged an implacable and almost perpetual war.
The first great sachem of the Pequots known to the English was Pekoath,
from whom they probably derived the national name. He appears to have been
a great warrior. He was going on conquering and to conquer, when the
earliest settlements of the English were made upon the Massachusetts
coast. Tribe after tribe retreated before him as he advanced, till his
terrible myrmidons were at length in a situation to locate themselves at
their ease on the best soil, and beneath the most genial skies, of New
England.
As early as 1631, Waghinacut, a sachem of one of the expelled or subject
tribes just mentioned, travelled across the wilderness to Boston; and
attended by a Massachusetts Sagamore, and one Jack Straw (an Indian who
had formerly lived with Sir Walter Raleigh in England,) made application
for the alliance or assistance of the Massachusetts government against
Pekoath. He gave a glowing description of his native land; and promised,
if some of the English would go there and settle, that he would supply
them with corn, and pay them eighty beaver-skins yearly. This proposition
being rejected, he desired that at least two men might be permitted to
accompany him, with the view of examining the country. He showed great
anxiety to effect that object, but to no purpose; the governor suspected
some stratagem, and politely dismissed his visiter with the compliment of
a good dinner at his own table. [FN]
* * * * *
[FN] _Winthrop's Journal._ Waghinacut persevered, however, and succeeded.
He went to Plymouth, and Governor Winslow sent out a party, at his
suggestion, who are understood to have been the first discoverers of
Connecticut river and the adjacent parts.
The successor of Pekoath, and the last as well as first great sachem of
his tribe known personally to the whites, was Sassacus, a warrior of high
renown, who, when the English commenced their settlements in Connecticut,
soon after the transaction last mentioned, had no fewer than twenty-six
sachems or war-captains under his dominion, and could at that time muster,
at the smallest calculation, seven hundred bowmen. The site of his
principal fortress and residence, was on a most beautiful eminence in the
town of Groton, commanding one of the best prospects of the Sound and the
adjacent country which can be found upon the coast. Another strong-hold
was a little farther eastward, near Mystic river; and this also was finely
situated upon a verdant swell of land, gradually descending towards the
south and southeast.
Sassacus, and his warlike Pequots, are almost the only American chieftain
and tribe who, in the light of history, seem to have been from the outset
disposed to inveterate hostility against all foreigners. They were, as
Trumbull observes, men of great and independent spirits; and had conquered
and governed the nations around them without control. They viewed the
English especially, as not only strangers but mere intruders, without
right or pretence of right to the country, who had nevertheless taken the
liberty to make settlements and build forts in their very neighborhood,
without asking their consent--and even to restore the Indian kings whom
they had subjected, to their former lands and authority. Under these
circumstances, it is no matter of wonder, that the whites had scarcely
located themselves within the bounds of Connecticut, when "that great,
spirited and warlike nation, the Pequots, began to murder and plunder
them, and to wound and kill their cattle." [FN]
* * * * *
[FN] Trumbull.
And yet--setting aside the general offence committed, or at least by
Sassacus understood to be committed, in the act of making settlements
without leave--it does not clearly appear whether the first particular
provocation was given on the one side or the other. It is only known, that
in the summer of 1633, one Captain Stone, on a voyage from Maine to
Virginia put into the mouth of the Connecticut river, and was there
murdered by the natives, with all his crew. Three of them, who went ashore
to kill fowl, were first surprised and despatched. A sachem, with some of
his men, then came aboard, and staid with Captain Stone in his cabin until
the latter fell asleep. The sachem then knocked him on the head; and his
crew being at this time in the cook's room, the Indians took such guns as
they found charged, and fell upon them. At this moment, all the powder on
board the vessel, in the hurry of sudden alarm, was accidentally exploded.
The deck was blown up; but most of the Indians escaping, returned,
completed the massacre, and burned the wreck.
Such was the English account of the proceeding. The Pequots had a
different story to tell. In October, 1634, Sassacus sent a messenger to
the Governor of Massachusetts, to desire friendship and alliance. This man
brought two bundles of sticks with him, by which he signified how many
beaver and otter skins his master would give, besides a large quantity of
wampum. He brought also a small present. The Governor received it, and
returned a moose coat of the same value; but sent word to Sassacus withal,
that a treaty could not be negotiated, unless he would send men proper to
negotiate, and enough of them. [FN]
* * * * *
[FN] Winthrop Vol. I.
Accordingly, but a fortnight afterwards, (though the distance to the
Pequot country was a five-days journey,) two more messengers arrived at
Boston, bringing another present of wampum. They were told, in answer to
their renewed application, that the English would willingly come to
amicable terms with Sassacus, but that his men having murdered Captain
Stone, he must first surrender up the offenders to justice. The messengers
readily replied, that the sachem concerned in that transaction had since
been killed by the Dutch; and that all the other offenders had died of the
small pox, excepting two. These, they presumed Sassacus would surrender
_if the guilt were proved upon them._ They asserted, that Captain Stone,
after entering their river, had taken two of their men, and detained them
by force, and made them pilot the vessel up the river. The captain and two
of his crew then landed, taking the guides on shore, with their hands
still bound behind them. The natives there fell upon and killed them. The
vessel, with the remainder of the crew on board, was blown up--they knew
not how or wherefore.
This--in the words of the journalist who gives the particulars--was
related with so much confidence and gravity, that the English were
inclined to believe it, especially as they had no means of proving its
falsity. A treaty was concluded on the following terms.
1. The English to have as much land in Connecticut as they needed,
provided they would make a settlement there; and the Pequots to render
them all the assistance they could.
2. The Pequots to give the English four hundred fathoms of wampum, and
forty beaver and thirty otter skins; and to surrender the two murderers
whenever they should be sent for.
3. The English were to send a vessel immediately, "to trade with them as
friends, tho' not to defend them," and the Pequots would give them all
their "custom."
The agreement was put in writing, and subscribed by the two messengers
with their marks. The chief object proposed by Sassacus in effecting it,
appears to have been, not the assistance of the English in his wars, but
their commerce in peace. He thought himself competent to fight his own
battles; and perhaps would have made no attempt to conciliate even the
English, but for having quarrelled with the Dutch of New York, who had
hitherto supplied him, and thereby lost their trade as well as incurred
their hostility.
Meanwhile, he was at deadly war, as usual, with the Narraghansetts. The
very next morning after the treaty was concluded, and while the messengers
still tarried in Boston, news came, that a party of two or three hundred
of the tribe last named had come as far as Neponsett, (the boundary
between Milton and Dorchester) for the purpose of laying wait and killing
the Pequots on their way home. The English immediately despatched a small
armed force, to request a visit from the Narraghansetts; and two sachems,
with about twenty of their men, obeyed the summons. They said they had
been hunting round-about the country, and came to visit the Indians at
Neponsett, according to old custom. However this might be, they showed
themselves quite ready to gratify the English in their requests; and the
Pequots were permitted to return home unmolested.
A passage in the Journal of Winthrop, relating to this occasion,
illustrates the spirit of Sassacus and his subjects. The Narraghansetts
were privately told by the Governor, that if they should happen to make
peace with the Pequots, they should receive a goodly proportion of the
wampum just sent.--"For the Pequots held it dishonorable to offer them any
thing as of themselves, yet were willing we would give it them, and indeed
did offer us so much to that end."
Thus matters remained until 1636. During that season one Oldham, an
Englishman who had been trading in Connecticut, was murdered by a party of
Block-Island Indians; several of whom are said to have taken refuge among
the Pequots, and to have been protected by them. On the strength of this
fact and this supposition, the Governor of Massachusetts--Mr. Oldham being
a Dorchester resident--despatched a force of ninety men, under Captain
Endecott, commissioned (as Mr. Winthrop tells us,) to put to death the men
of Block-Island, but to spare the women and children, and bring them away,
and take possession of the Island. Thence they were to go to the Pequots,
"to demand the murderers of Captain Stone and other English, and _one
thousand fathom of wampum for damages_ &c. and some of their children as
hostages which if they should refuse the were to obtain it by force."
The proceedings which ensued upon the attempt to execute these orders
ought not to be overlooked. From Block-Island, the English sailed to
Pequot harbor. Here an Indian came out to them in a canoe, and demanded
who they were, and what they would have in the country of the Pequots.
Endecott replied, that he came from the Governor of Massachusetts, to
speak with the Pequot sachems. The Indian answering that Sassacus was gone
to Long-Island, he was directed to communicate Endecott's message to
another sachem. He returned to the shore, and the English meanwhile made a
landing. The messenger came back, and the Indians began to gather about
the English. Several hours passed in desultory conference, until Endecott,
growing impatient, announced his commission to the crowd which surrounded
him, and at the same time sent word to the sachem, that unless he would
come to him or satisfy his demands, he should try forcible measures. The
messenger, who had been several times running to and fro between the
parties, said that the sachem would come forward if the English would lay
down their arms, the Indians also leaving their bows and arrows at a
distance.
Endecott was incensed by the proposal, considering it a pretext for
gaining time. He therefore bade the Pequots begone, an take care of
themselves; they had dared the English to come and fight with them, he
said, and now he was ready for the battle. The Pequots withdrew peaceably
to a distance. When they were beyond musket-shot, "he marched after them,
supposing they would have stood it awhile, as they did to the Dutch,"
[FN]--but they all fled, letting fly a few arrows among the English, which
did no damage. Two of their own number were killed and several more
wounded; and the English then marched up to their village, and burned all
their wigwams and mats. At night, concludes the historian, they returned
to their vessels; and the next day they went ashore on the west side of
the river, and burnt all their wigwams and spoiled their canoes in that
quarter; and so set sail and came to the Narraghansett country. There they
landed their men, "and on the 14th of 7ber they came all safe to Boston,
which was a marvellous providence of God, that not a hair fell from the
head of any of them, nor any sick nor feeble person among them."
* * * * *
[FN] Winthrop.
The sequel of the tragedy must be gathered from other authorities. A
detachment of Endecott's party was appointed to reinforce the English
garrison at Saybrook. Lying wind-bound off Pequot harbor, after his
departure, a part of these men went on shore to plunder the Pequots, and
bring off their corn. Their ravages were interrupted by an attack from
these Indians. The skirmish lasted till near evening, and then both
parties retired, the English with one man wounded, and the Pequots with a
loss unknown. We have given the particulars of this transaction,
(according to the English version of course) because it throws light upon
the subsequent relations between Sassacus and the English.
Whatever was the disposition of the Pequots previous to this date, there
is no question about them ever afterwards. They determined to extirpate
the whites from the limits of Connecticut; and to that great object
Sassacus now devoted the whole force of his dominions and the entire
energies of his soul. The forts and settlements were assaulted in every
direction. In October, five of the Saybrook garrison were surprised, as
they were carrying home their hay. A week afterwards, the master of a
small English vessel was taken and tortured; and several others within the
same month. The garrison just mentioned were so pressed before winter,
(1636-7) that they were obliged to keep almost wholly within reach of
their guns. Their out-houses were razed, and their stacks of hay burned;
and so many of the cattle as were not killed, often came in at night with
the arrows of the enemy sticking in them. In March, they killed four of
the garrison, and at the same time surrounding the fort on all sides,
challenged the English to come out and fight, mocked them with the groans
and prayers of their dying friends whom they had captured, and boasted
they could kill Englishmen "_all one flies._" Nothing but a cannon
loaded with grape-shot, could keep them from beating the very gates down
with their clubs.
Three persons were next killed on Connecticut river, and nine at
Wethersfield. No boat could now pass up or down the river with safety. The
roads and fields were everywhere beset. The settlers could neither hunt,
fish, nor cultivate the land, nor travel at home or abroad, but at the
peril of life. A constant watch was kept night and day. People went armed
to their daily labors, and to public worship; and the church was guarded
during divine service. Probably no portion of the first colonists of New
England ever suffered so horribly from an Indian warfare, as the
Connecticut settlers at this gloomy and fearful period.
Nor was the employment of his own subjects the only measure adopted by
Sassacus against his civilized enemy. He knew them too well to despise,
however much he detested them. He saw there was need of all the ingenuity
of the politician, as well as the prowess of the warrior, to be exercised
upon his part; and he therefore entered upon a trial of the arts of
diplomacy with the same cunning and courage which were the confidence of
his followers in the field of battle. The proposal of alliance offensive
and defensive which he made to his ancient rival and foe, the chief sachem
of the Narraghansetts, was a conception worthy of a great and noble soul.
And such was the profound skill with which he supported the reasonableness
of that policy, that, (as we have heretofore seen,) Miantonomo himself
wavered in his high-minded fidelity to the English cause. But for the
presence and influence of Roger Williams, [FN] the consummate address of
the Pequot must have carried his point.
* * * * *
[FN] That gentleman, in one of his letters preserved on the Mass.
Records, writes--"That in ye Pequt Wars it pleased your honoured
Government to employ me in ye hazardous and waighty Service of
negotiating a League between Yourselves and the Narigansetts; _when ye
Pequt messengers (who sought ye Narigansett's league against the English)
had almost ended yt my worck and life together._"
The measures taken by the other colonies, in consequence of the state of
things we have been describing, and the minutiae of the famous expedition
of Mason, are too well known to be repeated at length. The contest was not
long continued, but it required the most serious efforts on the part of
the English; and not only did Massachusetts and Plymouth feel themselves
under the necessity of aiding Connecticut in the suppression of this
common and terrible foe, but many of the Narraghansetts also were called
on to aid, with the Nianticks, the Mohegans and other tribes upon the
river.
Sassacus must have felt, that the day of restitution and reparation was
indeed come upon him for all his ancient victories and spoils. Every
people in his neighborhood who had suffered, or expected to suffer, from
his pride or his power, now gladly witnessed the onset of a new enemy
against him; and large numbers availed themselves of the opportunity to do
personal service. Not less than five hundred Indians of various tribes
accompanied Mason in his march against the great Pequot fortress. Not a
few of them, without doubt, remembered old times as well as Miantonomo
himself; though they acted very differently in consequence.
These gallant allies were so eager to go against the Pequots, that nothing
but the van of the army could satisfy them for their own station. "We
hope," said they, (--or something, no doubt, to that purpose--)
"We hope it will offend not you nor yours
The chiefest post of honor should be ours."
Upon which
"Mason harangues them with high compliments
And to confirm them he to them consents.
Hold on, _bold men,_ says he, as you've began;
I'm free and easy; you you shall take the van."
But,--("as we always by experience find,
Frost-bitten leaves will not abide the wind")
These formidable veterans had gone but a few miles, when every man of them
fell in the rear, and that unluckily to such a distance that not one could
be found. They were in the enemy's country, and the truth was, they
"--Had so often, to their harm,
Felt the great power of Sassacus's arm,
That now again just to endure the same,
The dreadful sound of great Sassacus' name,
Seemed every moment to attack their ears,
And fill'd them with such heart-amazing fears,
That suddenly they run and seek to hide,
Swifter than leaves in the autumnal tide." [FN]
* * * * *
[FN] Wolcott's Account.
This was in the evening. As the English approached the fortress about
day-light, they halted at the foot of a large hill, and Mason sent word
for his allies "to come up." After a long time, Uncas and Wequash [FN]
alone made their appearance. "Where is the fort?" inquired Mason. "On the
top of that hill," answered they. "And where are the rest of the
Indians?"--Uncas said, "they were behind, exceedingly afraid;" and the
most that Mason could induce them to do, was to form a semi-circle at a
particularly respectful distance, for the purpose of witnessing the attack
of the English upon the enemy's fort, and waylaying such of the Pequots as
might escape _their_ hands.
* * * * *
[FN] Vide "A Brief History of the Pequot War: Especially of the
_memorable Taking of their Fort at Mystic in Connecticut in_ 1637,
written by Major John Mason, a Principal Actor therein, as the chief
captain and commander of Connecticut Forces: Boston: Printed and Sold by
S. Kneeland and T. Green in Queen St. 1736." The following is the motto
of this tract.--"We have heard with our ears, God, . . . how thou didst
drive out the heathen with thy hand, and plantedst them; how thou didst
afflict the people and cast them out," &c.
The author of New England's First Fruits calls this man a famous captain,
a proper man of person, and of very grave and sober spirit. He became
religious after the Pequot war, lived sometime among the whites, and then
preached to his countrymen until his death, which was occasioned by a
dose of poison wherewith some of them repaid him for his labors. A
Massachusetts clergyman says of him, in 1648: "He loved Christ, he
preached Christ up and down, and then suffered martyrdom for Christ; and
when he dyed, gave his soule to Christ, and his only child to the
English, rejoycing in this hope, that the child should know more of
Christ than its poore father ever did."
The resistance was manly and desperate, but the whole work of destruction
was completed in little more than an hour. The extent and violence of the
conflagration kindled by the assailants, the reflection of this pyramid of
flames upon the forest around, the flashing and roar of arms, the shrieks
and yellings of men, women and children within, and the shouts of the
allies without, exhibited one of the most awful scenes which the pens of
the early historians have described. Seventy wigwams were burnt, and five
or six hundred Pequots killed. Parent and child alike, the sanop and
squaw, the gray-haired man and the babe were buried in one promiscuous
ruin.
It had been Mason's intention to fall upon both the principal forts of the
enemy at once; and finding it impossible, he says, "we were much grieved,
chiefly because the greatest and bloodiest sachem there resided, _whose
name was_ Sassacus." The execution of this design would have saved him
much subsequent loss and labor. That great warrior was so little
discouraged by the horrible havoc already made among his subjects, that
immediately on receiving the intelligence he despatched, perhaps led on in
person, a reinforcement of three hundred warriors, who pursued the English
very closely for a distance of six miles, on their march towards Pequot
harbor.
But the reception which this body met with from the English, drove them to
desperation. The whole remaining force of the nation repaired to the
strong-hold of Sassacus, and vented all their complaints and grievances
upon his head. In their fury they even threatened to destroy him and his
family; and perhaps nothing but the entreaties of his chief counsellors,
who still adhered to him in his misfortunes, prevented his being massacred
by his own subjects in his own fort. A large number deserted him, as it
was, and took refuge among the Indians of New York. The fort was then
destroyed, and Sassacus himself, with seventy or eighty of his best men,
retreated towards the river Hudson.
To kill or capture him, was now the main object of the war; and the
Pequots were pursued westward, two captured sachems having had their lives
spared on condition of guiding the English in the surprisal of their royal
master. The enemy were at last overtaken, and a great battle took place in
a swamp in Fairfield, where nearly two hundred Pequots were taken
prisoners, besides killed and wounded. Seven hundred, it was computed, had
now been destroyed in the course of the war. As Mason expresses himself,
they were become "a prey to all Indians; and happy were they that could
bring in their heads to the English--of which there came almost daily to
Windsor or Hartford." So Winthrop writes late in the summer of 1637-"The
Indians about still send in many Pequots' heads and hands from Long Island
and other places." &c. [FN]
* * * * *
[FN] _Journal,_ Vol. I.
But Sassacus was not destined to fall by the hands of the English,
although thirteen of his war-captains had already been slain, and he was
himself driven from swamp to swamp, by night and day, until life was
hardly worthy of an effort to preserve it. Even his own men were seeking
his life, to such extremities were they compelled by fear of the English.
One Pequot, whose liberty was granted him on condition of finding and
betraying Sassacus, finally succeeded in the search. He came up with him
in one of his solitary retreats; but finding his design suspected, and
wanting the courage necessary for attacking a warrior whom even his
Narraghansett enemies had described as "all one God," [FN] he left him in
the night, and returned to the English.
* * * * *
[FN] Mason's _History._
The sachem was at last obliged to abandon his country. Taking with him
five hundred pounds of Wampum, and attended by several of his best
war-captains and bravest men, he sought a refuge among the Mohawks. These
savages wanted the magnanimity to shelter, or even spare, a formidable
rival, now brought within their power by his misfortunes. He was surprised
and slain by a party of them, and most of the faithful companions who
still followed his solitary wanderings, were partakers with him of the
same miserable fate. The scalp of Sassacus was sent to Connecticut in the
fall; and a lock of it soon after carried to Boston, "as a rare sight,"
(says Trumbull,) and a sure demonstration of the death of a mortal enemy.
Thus perished the last great sachem of the Pequots; and thus was that
proud and warlike nation itself, with the exception of a small remnant,
swept from the face of the earth. The case requires but brief comment.
However this tribe and their chieftain might have been predisposed to
treat the English, and however they did treat their Indian neighbors, they
commenced their intercourse with the whites, ostensibly at least, in a
manner as friendly and honorable as it was independent. Previous to the
treaty, indeed, complaints had grown out of the murder of Stone; but the
English had no evidence at all in that case, while the evidence of the
Pequots was, according to their own acknowledgement, cogent if not
conclusive, in support of their innocence.
We may add, that it was confirmed by what is known incidentally of the
character of Stone. Governor Winthrop, speaking of his arrival at Boston
in June 1633, on board a small vessel loaded with "corn and salt," adds,
that "the governor of Plymouth sent Captain Standish _to prosecute against
him for piracy._" The particulars of the accusation need not be stated,
for only a few months after this, we find the same person mentioned as
charged with another infamous crime; "and though it appeared he was in
drink, and no _act_ to be proved, yet it was thought fit he should abide
his trial," &c. He was fined a hundred pounds, and expelled from the
Massachusetts jurisdiction.
As to the next proceeding recorded--the expedition of the English in
1635--we have only to remark, 1. That the demand of one thousand fathoms
of wampum, with no justifiable nor even alleged reason for it, was an
imposition and an insult. 2. The English should at least have taken time
to see Sassacus himself, his subjects having no more authority than
disposition to treat without him. 3. The English, with no apparent
provocation, not only insulted but assaulted the Pequots, merely to see if
they would "show fight;" and then burnt their towns and boats; not a hair
of their own heads being meanwhile injured, and Sassacus himself being
still absent.
With such inducement, the chieftain began a war of extermination; and then
indeed it became necessary that one of the two nations at issue should be
completely disabled. No, civilized reader entertains a doubt as to the
result which, under such an alternative, was most to be desired. But he
may nevertheless have his opinion, respecting the moral propriety as well
as the state policy of the measures which brought on that horrible
necessity. Let the whole truth, then, be exposed. If it shall be found,
(as we believe it must be,) that under the influence of strong and sincere
though fatal excitement, a rashness of the civilized party was the
ultimate cause of the ruin of the savage, let that injustice be
acknowledged, though it should be with shame and with tears. Let it be
atoned for, as far as it may be.--in the only way now possible--by the
candid judgment of posterity and history, upon the merits and the
misfortunes of both.