USA > Connecticut > The Connecticut River and the valley of the Connecticut, three hundred and fifty miles from mountain to sea; historical and descriptive > Part 11
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The united forces marched back to Deerfield with the wounded, and spent the night there. The next morning, Sunday, they returned to the field to bury the dead. Scouts were sent out and sentinels posted to prevent a sur- prise while the work was in progress. A common grave was dug some rods from the fatal morass, and here the "Flower of Essex " were buried with a soldier's tribute.
The spot where the attack began was marked with a little wooden monument by the settlers who came in after the close of the war, and the sluggish stream was given the crimson name it has since borne. A century and a half later, the common grave of the slain was identified and marked by a flat stone, which one may now see in a front yard close to the sidewalk of the South Deerfield main street. At the same time the present monument, a shaft of stone, was erected to mark the battlefield. This monu- ment stands near the edge of the morass in which the Indians formed their ambuscade. It was at the laying of the corner-stone, on the 30th of September, 1835, that Edward Everett delivered his oration on the Battle of Bloody Brook, passages from which school-boys of past generations have eloquently declaimed. To the same occasion, Mrs. Sigourney, the " bard of Hartford," contrib- uted a poem. At subsequent observances of the anniver- sary the Rev. Edward Everett Hale, nephew of the first orator, and William Everett, the orator's son, contributed poems which survive in the literature of the Valley. The modern electric car, thundering through the peaceful vil- lage, between Deerfield and Hatfield and Northampton
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below, skirts the scene of "Bloody Brook," and passes close by the quaint monument inscribed with its story.
On the face of South Sugarloaf, in a recess in the cliff below a great shelf of rock jutting out from the front, is the sheltered "King Philip's Chair," whence, as runs the tradition of the Valley, the great chieftain beheld the affair at the brook, of his planning. But as Sheldon, best of authorities, asserts, "there is no evidence that Philip was present, and the probabilities are against it." Still the place and the legend survive, and doubtless will survive, fixtures in history, unscathed by the assaults of iconoclasts. The spot is most sightly and commands a superb sweep of view. In the little village the sanguinary name of the tragic brook is preserved in local titles ; most conspicuously appearing on the inn with its vine- covered double front piazzas. Standing back from the pleasant main street, it bears some resemblance to the country tavern of simpler days than these, which we term and sometimes welcome as old-fashioned.
While Captain Moseley and Major Treat were on the battle-ground with their men engaged in burying the dead, Deerfield was having another experience with the enemy. A lot of them were passing by the garrison in an attempt to return to the prey at the brook. As a challenge they hung up in sight of the garrison some English garments probably taken from the bodies of the slain in the battle. But Captain Appleton frightened them away by the clever and not uncommon stratagem of causing his trumpeter to sound a call as if summoning troops in reserve. Three or four days later Deerfield was finally abandoned. The troops were ordered back to Hadley, and the inhabitants were scattered in the several
Salmon River. " By mossy bank and darkly waving wood."
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towns below. Shortly after the Indians wholly destroyed the settlement.
The eventful month of September closed with a series of sporadic attacks in various sections. On the 26th (O. S.) Major Pynchon's farmhouse, barns, and crops on the west side of the River opposite Springfield were burned. On the 28th two Northampton men, "Praisever Turner and Uzackaby Shackspeer," were killed, when outside that village to cut wood. "The Indians cut off their scalps, took their arms, and were gone in a trice." On the 30th (O. S.) Pynchon wrote from Hadley to Governor Leverett in Boston, "We are endeavoring to discover ye enemy, dayly send out scouts, but little is effected. We find ye Indians have their scouts out. .. . We are waiting for an opportunity to fall upon ye Indians if the Lord please to grant it to us." The war councils were plan- ning a general movement to clear the Valley of the enemy. It was proposed to regain the Northfield post and establish headquarters there for the Connecticut troops. The commissioners at Boston were arranging to send out a flying army of a thousand men.
At the same time Philip's chieftains were planning a wider campaign. The settlement at Springfield was marked next for destruction. The " hostiles," now in alliance with the Springfield Indians, were gathering in force in a hid- ing place about six miles from the town, ready at the word to spring on their foe.
XI The Burning of Springfield
With Pledges of Fidelity the Agawam Indians concoct a " Horrible Plot " __ Bands of Philip's Warriors secretly admitted to the Indian Fort on the Outskirts of the Town - A Night Alarm - Early Morning Attack upon Messengers Riding out to Reconnoitre -The full Pack soon upon the Village - The People crowding the Garrison House - A wild Scene of Havoc with the Town in Flames - Major Pynchon's Forced March from Hadley to its Relief - Grave After-events.
T THE Springfield or Agawam Indians had been the staunchest friends of the English. At the outbreak of Philip's War they had made pretentious display of their loyalty, and were implicity trusted by the colonists. Wequogan, their chief, had given hostages for their fidelity who were quartered at Hartford under slight guard. On October 3 (O. S.), the pledges were renewed with much show of sincerity while they were secretly plotting a rising. The following day, under orders, but against his judgment, Major Pynchon started off with the garrison for the head- quarters at Hadley, thus leaving the town entirely unpro- tected. The only other troops in the immediate region were Major Treat's command at Westfield, back from the West side of the River. Just before Pynchon's departure Wequogan had cunningly withdrawn his hostages from Hartford; and after nightfall, when the troops were all gone, some three hundred of Philip's warriors were se- cretly admitted to the Indian fort.
This fort was on Long Hill, about a mile south of the
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The Burning of Springfield
centre of the settlement. It is supposed to have stood on a plateau at the head of a ravine which extended from the top of the hill. Its presumed site is now pointed out on the way to Longmeadow. Springfield then spread along the west side of a single thoroughfare, now the Main Street, running north and south less than three miles, each house-lot extending from the street to the River. It com- prised not over forty-five dwellings. Chief among these was Major Pynchon's house, standing just north of the present Fort Street. His was the only brick house, the others being wooden, mostly with thatched roofs. It was the principal one of three fortified houses : the other two situated near the southerly end of the single street. The minister's house stood near the head of the present Vernon Street. The principal landing place on the River was at the foot of Elm Street, off the present Court Square.
The rising was timed for early morning of the 5th (O. S.). But most unexpectedly the scheme was divulged the night before, delaying its execution a few hours. The dis- closure was curiously made at Windsor twenty miles down the River. A friendly Indian, Toto by name, domesticated in the home of Oliver Wolcott there, had become possessed of the secret, and "it stirred the very depths of his na- ture." His agitation was so intense as to disquiet the family. Urged to tell what troubled him he finally let out the whole " horrid plot." Immediately Wolcott despatched messengers on horseback, one to warn Springfield, the other to inform Major Treat at Westfield. The swift rider for Springfield entered the town at midnight, and roused the villagers with his startling tale. All fled with their portable belongings to the garrisoned houses. Pelatiah Glover, the minister, removed his " brave library," one of the best in the Valley, to the Pynchon house.
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The night wore on without event, and the morning opened peacefully. No sign appeared of a hostile move- ment, nor a single threatening Indian. Therefore the people felt assured that the night alarm was a false one, and most of them prepared to return to their own homes. The minister set the example and carried his library back to the parsonage. Meanwhile Lieutenant Thomas Cooper, who for some reason had remained in the village, started off for the Indian fort, to learn the situation there. He had discredited the Windsor report and was firm in the belief that the Agawams were true. He had long been on friendly terms with the tribe, and for a quarter of a cen- tury had been a familiar figure among them. With him went Thomas Miller, the town constable. The two men rode their horses at a brisk pace down the town street and toward Long Hill. A quarter of a mile beyond the most southerly house they entered the woods which then skirted the settlement. Suddenly shots came from an ambuscade. Miller was instantly killed. Cooper fell from his horse mortally wounded. But being " an athletic and resolute man," although nearing sixty, he contrived to pull himself up into the saddle again. Turning his horse he dashed back at full speed to give the alarm. A horde of savages leaped from their ambush and ran after him, firing as they ran. He was hit by another ball, and had barely reached the Pynchon house when he expired.
Soon the whole force of "hostiles " from the fort were upon the settlement. The inhabitants again managed to get under cover of the fortified houses, and from the loop- holes looked out upon a wild scene of havoc. They saw their unguarded homes and their barns filled with winter stores plundered and set afire; and shortly nearly the whole town in flames. The trusted chief, Wequogan, was
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The Burning of Springfield
seen to be the " ringleader in word and deed." Another sachem loudly proclaimed that he "was one who had burned Quaboag [Brookfield] and would serve them the same way." Shots were exchanged between the Indians and the men in the fortified houses, and several of the as- sailants fell. One savage was using as a shield a large pewter platter taken from a dwelling, which marked him as a target. He received a mortal wound from a bullet smashing through it. Of the townspeople one woman was killed. She was the wife of John Matthews, the drummer, who had gone off with the garrison soldiers. Five others were wounded, one mortally. Within a short time thirty- two of the forty-five dwellings were in ashes. The minis- ter's house went down with his " brave library." All the barns, twenty-four or twenty-five of them, were in flames. Major Pynchon's grist and corn mills were burned. Most of the corn in the town stored for the winter was consumed.
Early in the forenoon Major Treat with his Connecticut troops reached the west side of the River. Five brave men left their cover, probably the Pynchon house, to help his command across. Though pursued by twenty Indians they got a boat to the opposite shore. It was quickly filled with some of Treat's soldiers, but the Indians on the east bank held them at bay, and they durst not venture over. Relief, however, was hastening forward from another di- rection. Major Pynchon, informed of Toto's story by a messenger sent out at the midnight alarm, was hurrying back from Hadley with two hundred men. Major Apple- ton was with them as second in command. Marching so rapidly that all were put " into a violent sweat," they ar- rived upon the scene at mid-afternoon. Till their approach the devastating work had gone on practically unchecked. But when they entered the burning town the assailants had
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all vanished. Their spies had signalled the coming of the soldiers by " hoops [whoops] or watchwords." Now Major Treat's force came across the River and joined Major Pyn- chon's men eager to give chase to the enemy. Scouting parties were at once sent out, and the woods were scoured. But not a brave was discovered. Their fort was deserted, and no trace of a new rendezvous could be found. Their tracks pointed in various directions manifestly with the design of throwing pursuers off the track. It was a masterly retreat, planned, as was the attack, later histori- ans conclude, by Philip. It is assumed that he returned with his clan and part of the Pocumtucks to the Narragan- setts' country, with a new plan to involve that tribe in the war; while the other bands worked their way back to their fastnesses about the deserted Deerfield and Northfield. The number engaged in the Springfield attack was given by the messenger to Pynchon as five hundred ; the Spring- field Indians, warriors, women, and children, numbered about two hundred.
Now of the upper River towns only Northampton, Had- ley, and Hatfield remained undespoiled, and the Connecticut towns below were imperiled. Two days after the fall of Springfield an alarm was raised in Glastonbury by the dis- covery of "hostiles " hovering about its neighborhood. They were probably of Philip's band on their way to the Narragansetts. Major Treat was then ordered back to Hartford for the protection of the lower towns. All was anxiety throughout this region. To stimulate the Mohe- gans to greater activity the Hartford government offered liberal bounties for scalps of the "hostiles " brought in. Men in the threatened towns went out in large parties to harvest the late crops, and to store the grain in safe places,
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while provision was made for the security of the women and children.
In ruined Springfield a strong disposition was manifest to abandon the place. This Major Pynchon deplored, for its desertion would encourage the "insolent enemy " and " make way for giving up all the towns above." Governor Leverett at Boston took a similar view. It " would be a more awful stroke that hath such a consequence as to break up a church and town," he wrote. But he could only advise that the matter be left "to the Lord, directing you on the place." Pynchon, sorely disturbed, asked to be relieved of his military command, his own and the townspeople's affairs requiring his undivided attention. The request was granted, and Captain now Major Apple- ton succeeded him as commander-in-chief. Pynchon re- peated his plea for the constant garrisoning of all the towns. The sack of Springfield was an awful instance of the result of the withdrawal of a guard. The Bay council, however, still clung to the policy of combined operations in the field. But no town was again left wholly unprotect- ed. Major Appleton left a good guard at Springfield, under Captain Sill, when he marched back to headquarters at Hadley. At Northampton Captain Sully was stationed with a small body ; and Captain Moseley at Hatfield. So Springfield was not abandoned ; the " awful stroke " that its desertion would entail was averted; and the settlement slowly recovered from its affliction.
With the advance of October, however, affairs grew steadily graver in the River towns and to the westward. The enemy appeared to be threatening nearly every settle- ment from Hartford to the frontier. Immediately upon his return to Hadley Major Appleton sent out scouting
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parties to seek the enemy's hiding places. On the 15th (O. S.) he himself marched out with almost his entire force, bound for Northfield, his scouts having learned that they were collected there. But when two miles on the way word came that Moseley's scouts had reported great num- bers assembled about Deerfield. Accordingly he changed his course and crossed the River to Hatfield. Thence a night expedition to Deerfield was attempted. Early on the march the report of a gun and distant Indian shouts warned the vanguard that the movement was discovered. So a hurried return was made to secure the defenceless towns. Next evening an urgent call for help came to headquarters from Northampton, which was threatened ; at the same time Moseley reported the enemy within a mile of Hatfield.
That night Moseley made a reconnoissance, but without result. He discovered, however, through an Indian captive, a great plot. A simultaneous attack upon Hatfield, Had- ley, and Northampton had been planned, and a large body of Indians were in the scheme. This captive was a poor old squaw who had been taken at Springfield after the burning. The record of her cruel treatment is one of the great black blots on the annals of colonial warfare.
On the margin of a letter to the governor at Boston re- porting this plot, Captain Moseley wrote: "The aforesaid Indian was ordered to be tourne in peeces by dogs & shee was so delt withall." What was the woman's crime, if any other than association with a treacherous foe, that brought upon her such an awful fate after she had divulged her important information and so put the English on guard, no record tells. Nothing in contemporary papers is found in mitigation of such a barbarous act by civilized men. The grim postscript to the Indian fighter's letter appears
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alone in the documents. The historian of Springfield de- clines to believe that the evil deed was done by order of the English. He would more readily accept a story that the squaw had returned to her people and suffered death for serving the colonists. But Moseley's postscript too definitely fixes the act on the whites. We know that dogs were employed in colonial Indian warfare. At the outset of this war the use of bloodhounds was proposed to hunt the enemy down. Later Parson Stoddard of Northampton, ordinarily kind of heart, earnestly urged this measure upon Governor Dudley, justifying it on the ground that the savages were like wolves in their conduct, and should be dealt with as wolves. Subsequently, in 1706, in Queen Anne's War, the Bay General Court offered bounties for raising and training war-dogs, and established the rank of hunt-sergeant for the military officer having charge of packs of hounds in ranging the woods for Indians.
At about the same time that Moseley learned from the captured squaw of the proposed combined attack upon the three frontier towns, the Hartford government was startled by word from Andros in New York of a plot for a general uprising of all the Connecticut Indians. Fiveor six thou- sand of them, Andros wrote, designed " this light moon " to attack Hartford and points westward so far as Green- wich. Thereupon Hartford and the other places indicated were fortified and troops were raised for defence. Thus this plot, if it existed (and the historians generally accept the report as true), was frustrated.
From another direction came a definite report of Philip's new schemes in the Valley campaign. Roger Williams, writing from Providence to Governor Leverett at Boston, told of hearing of Philip's great design,-to draw Captain Moseley and others "by trayning, and
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drilling, and seeming flight," into " such places as are full of long grass, flags, sedge &c. and then environ them round with fire, smoke, and bullets." "Some say," he added, " no wise soldier will be so catcht."
But several of Moseley's mounted scouts were just so " catcht." It was in a manœuvre preceding an attack in force upon Hatfield, according to the plan which the cap- tive squaw had divulged to Moseley. On October 19 (O. S.) at noon, fires were observed in the woods about Sugar- loaf, and the troopers sent out to reconnoitre. Two miles from the town they fell suddenly into a trap for which the fires were the bait. Six were killed, and three taken prisoners. Only one escaped, and he was an Indian. Gallop- ing back to Hatfield, he gave the alarm, which was repeated to Major Appleton at Hadley.
The attack upon Hatfield followed at about four of the October afternoon. It was met in unexpected fashion. Major Appleton coming over had taken a post at the south end of the town; Captain Moseley occupied the middle ; and Captain Poole the north end. The enemy began the assault from all quarters. But at each point they were checked by the English fire, and their every attempt to break in upon the town was resisted. The contest con- tinued hotly for two hours. Then Major Treat coming up from Northampton with a force of Connecticut men, the finishing blow was given, and the enemy broke and fled. Their loss had been considerable, while that of the English was light. Three of the English were carried off as pris- oners. One of these unhappy men was afterward horribly tormented and at length put to death. "They burnt his nails, and put his feet to scald against the fire, and drove a stake through one of his feet to pin him to the ground."
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The Hatfield experience was a great surprise to the In- dian war-chiefs, and changed their plans. Instead of fur- ther efforts to wipe out the towns by direct attack with large bodies, it was decided to break up into small bands and harass the settlements, kill, pillage, and burn as chance offered. During the next fortnight this course was pursued to some extent. In Northampton several houses and barns were burned. A few days later a group of farmers gather- ing crops in the Northampton meadows were fired upon and three killed. Two days before, Major Pynchon and several companions, returning to Springfield from Westfield, were caught in an ambuscade. Three were shot down; the rest escaped. Later a band were again prowling about Hatfield, but approaching soldiers frightened them off.
With the opening of November the woods for ten or twelve miles roundabout were scoured by troopers, but no enemy were found. They were now gone into winter quarters, mostly northward and westward. The campaign for this season was ended in the Valley, to be renewed the next spring. By mid-November the army withdrew from headquarters, leaving garrisons in each of the towns.
XII The Rising of the Narragansetts
Canonchet drawn into Philip's War - Flight of his Tribe toward the Valley -
Ravages of Frontier Towns on the Way - The great Indian Rendezvous about Northfield- Attacks upon Northampton, Hatfield, and Longmeadow - Death of Canonchet : A Hero of his Race -The Great Falls Fight : An English Victory followed by a Disastrous Rout. - A Chaplain's Experience - Final Attacks upon Hatfield and Hadley -End of Philip's War- Death of Philip, deserted and betrayed - Results of the War to the Colonists.
F IVE days after the burning of Springfield Philip reached the Narragansett country, "loaded with spoils from the English." Less than four weeks later the colonies declared war against the Narragansetts. The "young prince " of this tribe, Canonchet, son of Mian- tonomah, had as yet committed no overt act of hostility, but he was under suspicion and believed to be yielding to Philip's influence. He had, indeed, broken the treaty of neutrality forced from him at the beginning of Philip's War by the commissioners of the colonies " with a sword in their hands," in defiantly sheltering and refusing to surrender fugitive "hostiles." But this had been done openly, and with the emphatic declaration that he would not give up a Wampanoag, not even "the paring of a Wampanoag's nail." The colonial councils determined upon a winter's campaign in the hope of crushing the tribe with a quick stinging blow, when they were least pre- pared to parry it. For the winter was the Indians' hibernat- ing season ; and the frozen swamps made their fastnesses
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more accessible to beseigers. Accordingly an army of a thousand men, one-half of them troopers, was immediately levied, and set in motion for this adventure. Five com- panies under Major Treat were Connecticut's quota. Early in December Major Treat left the Valley with three hun- dred Connecticut troops and half as many Mohegans. Major Appleton was appointed commander-in-chief of the Bay forces. Governor Josiah Winslow of Plymouth, son of the first Governor Winslow, was named chief of the combined army.
Meanwhile the people of the Valley towns were living in a continual state of uneasiness. Attack from below, by way of the Narragansett country, was constantly feared. The season was largely spent in fortifying houses and in build- ing stockades around the towns. The palisades were sim- ple constructions of cleft wood, designed to break the force of a sudden assault rather than to serve as substantial de- fences, though, as after events showed, they did effectively fill the latter purpose.
The upper route eastward by the Bay Path was early closed by the hostile Nipmucks, and tidings from the new seat of war were received only through the soldiers in the Narragansett campaign. News therefore of the outcome of the expedition travelled slowly to the River towns. At length they learned of the downfall of the Narragansett stronghold in the " Great Swamp Fight " of December 19 (O. S.) in what is now South Kingston, Rhode Island, and of the scattering of the broken and infuriated tribe through the woods northward into the Nipmuck country, just as the Wampanoags had been shattered and dispersed with the opening onslaught of Philip's war. In this second and greatest "Swamp Fight " all the horrors of the Pequot massacre were repeated with the storming of the Indian
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