USA > Connecticut > The history of Connecticut, from the first settlement of the colony to the adoption of the present constitution, vol. I > Part 4
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43
* Trumbull, i. 43.
41
GOVERNMENT OF THE ABORIGINES.
public event or threatened public calamity,* and were con- ducted by a class of men set apart for that purpose-a kind of priesthood, who were called Powaws. At these solemni ties, they danced in rings around great fires, and made a variety of such hideous noises that the English pioneers regarded with aversion and horror these unholy rites, where they had good reason to believe the devil presided.
The government of the Indians was an hereditary mon- archy, in theory absolute, and virtually so, where the chief, like Sassacus, was a man of great prowess in war, and supe- rior wisdom in council .; But in all cases he was surrounded by an aristocracy, who claimed a right to be consulted in matters of public importance. This aristocracy was made up of men selected from the wisest and bravest of the tribe, who constituted not only the privy counselors, but also the body-guard of the monarch. From childhood they were inured to hardships and fatigue, fed upon coarse fare, and made to drink decoctions of bitter roots and herbs, that they might be the "more acceptable to Hobbomocko." They were called Paniese. They, in common with the Powaws, exalted themselves in the estimation of the lower orders, by visions and revelations of a spiritual kind, and by interviews with Hobbomocko, face to face. These they related to the credu- lous multitude in the most extravagant language, enforced by the wildest gestures.
When Winslow and his handful of Plymouth men first made the acquaintance of the powerful Massasoit, and when, at a later day, the chiefs that lived in the neighborhood of Boston walked into the new settlement to sate their curi- osity, by looking upon the humble state of the governor of Massachusetts, it seemed a pleasant thing to them that this little company of pale-faced men had come among them. It broke up for a while the monotony of savage life, and, besides, it promised to the politic sachem the advantages of a lucra- tive traffic. It gratified, too, his vanity, that court should be paid to him by men of such strange attire, and of wealth to
* Mather's Magnalia, iii. 192.
t Trumbull, i. 51.
42
HISTORY OF CONNECTICUT.
him so boundless. Even after he had learned how fatal to the moose and the deer, the wolf and the bear, were the weapons of the English planter, still it did not occur to him that the same weapons could be turned upon him with the like destructive effects; and after he had learned that guns were more deadly in war than bows and arrows, his mind was directed rather to the injury they might do to his enemies than intimidated by the anticipation that they might one day be turned against himself. Hence, each chief courted an alli- ance with the new race, never once dreaming that a few farmers, who busied themselves with tasks fit, in his estima- tion, only for women, would soon get possession of the choicest lands that had been transmitted through a long line of Indian kings, and, finally, rising up as one man, would sweep whole tribes from the earth, and blot out their proudest names from remembrance. Uncas was doubtless leagued with the Connecticut river sachems in urging the English to make settlements there. He felt that he had nothing to lose, and much to gain, by calling to his aid new men and a new mode of warfare, well adapted to strike terror into the minds of his enemies.
Scarcely had the first log cabin been built by the pioneers in the valley of the Connecticut, when the high-spirited Sas- sacus, forecasting the growth and fruitfulness of resources incident to the English race, began to devise means for their destruction. An Indian runner would carry news through the woods at the rate of eighty, and sometimes an hundred, miles a day, and the nimble couriers of this ambitious chief- tain were seen flying in every direction. They represented the white men as rapidly advancing, driving the Indian as the fire drives the deer, when it sweeps over a hunting- ground-that one or the other of these races must give place. They advocated a war of extermination, as absolute as was destined to overtake them.
Sassacus also sent out little depredating parties, who lay in ambush near the new settlements, and committed sad rav- ages upon the inhabitants. They stole cattle from them.
43
MURDER OF STONE AND NORTON.
[1634.]
They shot arrows, from their secret lurking-places, at the farmer when he went into his field in the morning, or buried the stone hatchet in the forehead of his wife, and dashed out the brains of his little children, when they were left unpro- tected at home.
In the year 1634, two traders, Captain Stone and Captain Norton, came up the Connecticut river with the design of trafficking with the Dutch at Hartford. They hired Indian pilots to direct them, as they were ignorant of the channel. Two of the crew were sent forward to Dutch Point, with those pilots. Faithless guides they proved to be, for they murdered both the Englishmen at night while they slept .*
There were twelve Indians on board Stone's vessel, and while it was anchored near shore at night, and while Stone was asleep in his cabin, they stole upon him and murdered him, hiding his body beneath some rubbish. They then made an attack upon the crew, with little resistance, and killed them all except Norton, who betook himself to the cook room, and fought desperately, and with such address, that it seemed for a long time doubtful how the battle would end ; when, at last, his powder, that had been put in an open vessel, took fire, and so blinded and mutilated him that he was disabled and slain. The booty that resulted from this treacherous skirmish was shared between the Pequots and the western Nihanticks. Sassacus and Ninigret, the sachems of these tribes, doubtless had a secret agency in the business, as they partook of the plunder.
Soon after this outrage, unprovoked, so far as can now be known, the deep-seated hostility that existed between the Narragansetts and Pequots began to exhibit itself. The Narragansetts had already dug up the hatchet, and were sending out their runners against their old enemy, Sassacus. They were making preparations for a general war. The Dutch, too, had paid an old debt of revenge for some injuries done to them, by killing a Pequot sachem, together with some
* Trumbull, i. 70; Winthrop, i. 146; Miss Caulkins' Hist. New London, 27, 28; Mass. Hist. Collections, viii. 130, new series.
44
HISTORY OF CONNECTICUT.
of his warriors, and taking others captive. Sassacus and his paniese, began to be alarmed. What was to be done ? There was much need of a good ally. At last, it was re- solved by the Pequots to send a messenger to the English in the Massachusetts, with the view of making a league, offen- sive and defensive, with them. In November of the same year, the Pequot courier presented himself before the gov- ernor at Boston, and made proposals for a treaty. But the governor, not satisfied with the credentials of the ambassador, and, doubting his rank, put himself upon his dignity as the representative of the people, and told him frankly that he did not like his quality, and that the Pequots must send men of more weight and consequence, or he could not treat with them. The messenger, rather humbled, one would think, in being the bearer of his own disgrace at a foreign court, seems to have done his errand faithfully, for in due time two ministers plenipotentiary appeared, armed with an acceptable present, and of a gravity of character suitable to the business in hand. His excellency said he was not averse to peace, but that there were some old scores to be settled between the two powers. He charged the Pequots with the murder of Captain Stone and his crew, and said that the perpetrators of it must be given up to him for punishment. The ambassadors made answer, that Stone was any thing but what he should have been ; that he had abused the Indians, and tempted them to kill him. They further urged, that their nation was not re- sponsible for this murder, as they had neither plotted nor sanctioned it; that it was the work of one of the inferior chiefs, who acted without authority from his master, and that he had already been slain by the Dutch. Finally, they alleged, that only two of the authors of this crime survived, and they promised to use their influence with Sassacus to induce him to deliver them up to justice. They begged the English to send a vessel with cloths to trade with them, and proposed to give them whatever title they had to the lands on the Connecticut river, if they would send men to live there. They also promised to give to their new ally four
45
JOHN OLDHAM KILLED.
[1635.]
hundred fathom of wampum, forty beaver skins, and thirty otter skins.
The treaty was at last established between the two powers, with the usual solemnities, much after the terms proposed by the Pequots.
How much sincerity there was on the part of the Indians in making these overtures, it is difficult to say. If honest at the time, their habitual fickleness and love of excitement pre- vented them from enjoying the blessings of an alliance that had cost them so much trouble in the making, and was liable to misconstructions of every sort, as well from the old jeal- ousies that beset it on every side, as from the different char- acter, habits, and languages of the contracting parties.
The next year, while Mr. John Oldham was trafficking with the Indians off Block Island, a large number of them made an attack upon him while on board his pinnace, and killed him. John Gallop, who was engaged in the same traf- fick not long after, sailing near enough to Oldham's vessel to see that her deck was swarming with Indians, readily divined what had happened. He bore down upon the pinnace, and, with one man and two boys, (his whole crew,) gave them such showers of duck shot that he soon drove them under hatches. He then stood off, and, with crowded canvas and a brisk sail, ran down upon the pinnace, striking her quarter with such violence that he nearly overset her. Six of the Indians, under the terrors inspired by this new mode of war- fare, plunged overboard and were drowned. He repeated this experiment, again striking the pinnace with such force that he bored her with his anchor, and might have had trouble in disentangling himself from her had not the terri- fied savages allowed him to have it all his own way. A third time he bore down upon her with such address, that several more of the savages leapt into the sea. Gallop then boarded her and took two prisoners, one of whom he bound and threw overboard .* Two or three others, who had taken refuge below and armed themselves, could not be driven from
* Miss Caulkins' Hist. New London, 29.
46
HISTORY OF CONNECTICUT.
their retreat. Oldham's dead body was found on board, the head split in half, and the trunk and limbs brutally mangled. It lay hidden under a fishing net .* Gallop had no difficulty in recognizing the remains, and exclaimed, as he washed the blood from the ghastly features of the murdered man, " Oh, brother Oldham, is it thou ? I am resolved to avenge thee !"t Mutilated as was the dead body, Gallop committed it to the sea with reverent hands. After these simple obsequies were over, they stripped the pinnace of her rigging and what- ever lading the Indians had left on board, and proceeded to tow her into port; but the wind rose as the sun went down, and they were obliged to cut her adrift.
There is little reason to doubt that Oldham was the victim of unprovoked, premeditated murder. He was from Dor- chester, and was a respectable trader. The Block Island and Narragansett Indians executed this plot, which was contrived, as was supposed, by several of the Narragansetts. Whether the Pequots helped to plan the murder, was never distinctly proved; but it is most probable that they did, as they secreted and protected several of the conspirators, who took refuge among them.
Had it been known to our ancestors, as it is known to us, how little power the great sachems had to control the con- duct of their petty chiefs, perhaps some of the darkest annals of our colony might never have been penned. Canonicus, the wise and noble sachem of the Narragansetts, disclaimed any knowledge of this murder, and felt keenly the suspicion that rested upon his tribe. He took the most stringent measures to find out the authors of it.
The governor, " by the advice of the magistrates and min- isters" of Massachusetts, resolved that the Block Island In- dians should be chastised. To execute this rash penalty, ninety men were sent under the command of John Endicott. Endicott was ordered to sail for Block Island, and put to death all the men on it, take the women and children prisoners,
* Savage's Winthrop, i. 226; History of Boston, by S. G. Drake, Esq., p. 198.
t History of Boston, by Drake, 199.
47
ENDICOTT'S EXPEDITION.
[1636.]
and carry them to Boston .* This was to avenge the death of Oldham. Having done this, he was directed to sail for Pequot harbor, demand of the Pequots the murderers of Cap- tain Stone, (whose death that tribe had already atoned for, as they supposed, by executing such terms of the late treaty as they could,) and one thousand fathom of wampum, as well as some Pequot children as hostages. If the Pequots failed to meet these demands, he was to use force.
Endicott repaired to Block Island, and arrived there on the last day of August. The surf rolled so high that he could scarcely land his men. Indian warriors, to the number of sixty, met him on the beach. But, in spite of the surf and the natives, he at length got his troops ashore. The island, called by the Indians Manisses, or the Island of the Little God, was mostly covered with small sand hills, that were over- grown with dwarf oaks. To the shelter afforded by this forbidding screen, the Indians betook themselves, firing their arrows behind them as they fled. There were two large plantations upon the island, with about sixty wigwams. The Indians had on these plantations two hundred acres of corn, a part of it piled in heaps and a part still standing. In two days, Endicott hunted out and killed fourteen Indians, de- stroyed the corn, staved in the canoes, and burned every wigwam that he could find .; He then set sail for the Pequot country. On his way he stopped at Saybrook, and reported to Gardiner, who commanded at the fort, what he had done. Gardiner, who thought the Narragansetts, and not the Block Island Indians, were guilty of the murder of Oldham, com- plained bitterly of this rash step. " You come hither," said he, " to raise these wasps about my ears, and then you will take wing and flee away."} This metaphor, as is often the case with figurative language, embodied a sad truth, that was but too well understood in Connecticut not long after.
The Massachusetts leader lost no time in reaching Pequot harbor. The Pequots were taken by surprise by this visit.
* Drake's History of Boston, 201. + Drake, 202.
# Savage's Winthrop, i. 231, 232; Trumbull, i. 73.
48
HISTORY OF CONNECTICUT.
They came cautiously down to the shore, and there learned from the invader the nature of his errand. This landing- place was on the eastern side of the harbor, and the ascent that the English toiled to gain, has since been consecrated by the blood of Ledyard and his brave compatriots, who have given to fort Griswold a fame that will'outlast the mon- ument that towers above the spot .* At length they reached a cultivated country, where the humble habitations of the natives rose out of the cornfields that stretched along the hill- sides, and looked off upon the harbor and river that bore the name of the Pequot, and afforded many a stealthy glimpse of the sea-shore.
Endicott had, from his first arrival, told the Indians that he must have the heads of the men who had killed Stone, or else, said he, " we will fight." He also demanded an inter- view with Sassacus. He was told that the chief was at Long Island and could not be seen.t He then asked to see the sachem who was next in rank ; and after much delay, and not until the English had reached the high land, whence they could see the Indian huts, were they told that the chief of whom they were in search, was found. Endicott ordered a halt, and here the cunning savages kept him in parley for four hours, while they could find time to remove their women and children to a safe hiding place, and secrete their most val- uble personal property. When this was done, the nimble- footed warriors began to retire, leaving the English leader in such ill humor with himself for having been outwitted, that he ordered the drum to beat and the troops to advance upon them. The savages let fly their arrows at a safe distance from behind the rocks and trees. Endicott now advanced upon the deserted wigwams, and burnt them to ashes. Then he destroyed the corn that was growing, and dug up that which had been buried in the earth by the Indians. He spent the whole day in this work of destruction, and at night re- embarked with his men.į
"Miss Caulkins' New London, 31. t Savage's Winthrop, i. 232.
# Drake, 202. This learned antiquarian and historian is free to acknowledge
49
BUTTERFIELD CAPTURED.
[1636.]
The next day they landed on the west side of the river, upon the site of the town of New London, and burned and desolated the country in a similar manner. They then sailed for Narragansett bay, leaving the twenty men who had joined the expedition at Saybrook fort to return at their leisure. Gardiner had furnished these men, though he was opposed to the enterprise. He had also provided them with bags to be filled with corn. "Sirs," said he, after entering his protest against the enterprise, "Sirs, seeing you will go, I pray you, if you don't load your barks with Pequots, load them with corn."
Pursuant to this advice, soon after Endicott had sailed, the men furnished by Gardiner went ashore and filled their bags with corn. They were on a second visit to the corn-fields, and had filled their bags again, when they were startled by frightful yells. The owners of the property had caught them in the very act, and their arrows sped so nimbly among the plunderers, that they were forced to drop their sacks and stand on the defensive. This they did so boldly, that the Indians, who fought in their usual irregular way, were soon checked. Yet the attack was so often renewed, that the English did not reach their shallops again until nearly night.
Thus ended this unlucky expedition of John Endicott; but it was followed by a long train of unhappy events. The wasps were indeed stirred up, and their sting was poisonous and deadly. The first attack was made upon the Saybrook fort, whither the corn had been transported. Perhaps the Pequots reasoned as the ministers and magistrates of Massachusetts had done, that they who shared the plunder were responsible for the bloodshed.
Early in October, as five men belonging to the garrison were carrying home hay from the meadows, the Pequots con- cealed themselves in the tall grass, surrounded them, and took one Butterfield prisoner. The rest escaped. Butterfield was
the impolicy as well as the injustice of Endicott's expedition. He did not cripple the enemy in the least, but only served to exasperate them, and arouse in their bosoms the most implacable hatred toward the English.
4
50
HISTORY OF CONNECTICUT.
roasted alive, with the most brutal tortures. During the same month, one Tilly, the master of a small vessel, was taken captive by the Pequots, as he was sailing down the Connecticut river. He had anchored his craft about three miles above the fort, and imprudently gone ashore in a canoe with a single attendant to shoot wild-fowl. The first dis- charge of his gun was a signal for a large body of Pequots, who lurked in the woods, to rush upon him. They took Tilly alive and killed his attendant. They then set themselves to the task of destroying Tilly by piecemeal. The captive knew enough of their war customs to be aware that any show of submission on his part would be treated with scorn. He therefore remained passive, as an Indian brave would have done in his situation. First they cut off his hands. He made no complaint. Then, in their barbarous way, they amputated his feet. Not a groan escaped him. Thus they continued to follow him up with their most ingenious modes of torture, until he died. Even in death, his features showed no traces of pain. His admiring tormentors left his remains with the merited eulogy that he was a "stout man."*
Nothing could exceed the activity of these Indians, now that they were thoroughly aroused. They lurked in the low- lands that surrounded the fort like a malaria. They stole up and down the river by night and day, watching for vic- tims. A house had been built for the uses of the garrison about two miles from the fort, and six men were now sent to guard it. Three of them went out upon the same errand that had cost Tilly his life, when one hundred Pequots rose against them and took two of them. The other escaped, wounded with two arrows. Success finally made them so bold that they destroyed all the store-houses connected with the fort, burned up the haystacks, killed the cows, and ruined all the property belonging to the garrison that was not within the range of their guns. The fort was literally besieged through the entire winter.t
In February, the court met at Newtown, and ordered that
* Trumbull, i. 57; Savage's Winthrop, i. 238. + Winthrop.
51
1
ENGLISH MURDERED BY THE INDIANS.
[1637.]
letters should be sent to the governor of Massachusetts, deprecating the evils resulting from Endicott's expedition, and calling on the governor for men to help prosecute the war with vigor. Soon after, Captain Mason was sent with twenty men to reinforce the garrison at Saybrook.
Lieutenant Gardiner went out one day in March, with about a dozen men, to burn the marshes. The Indians lay in wait for him, as he passed a narrow neck of land, killed three of his men, and mortally wounded another. Gardiner himself was also wounded. They pursued him to the very walls of the fort, and, surrounding it in great numbers, mocked the fugitives, imitating the dying groans and prayers of the English whom they had taken captive and tortured, and challenging the garrison to leave the fort and come out and fight like men. They said they could kill English- men "all one flies." Nothing but grape shot could quiet them .*
Soon after, the Pequots in canoes boarded a shallop as she was sailing down the river. She had three men on board. The Englishmen made a bold defence, but in vain. One of them was shot through the head with an arrow, and fell over- board. The Indians took the other two and killed them. They then split their bodies in twain, and suspended them all by their necks over the water, upon the branches of trees, hideous spectacles, to be gazed at by the English as they passed up and down the river.
The Indians united the keenest sarcasm with a power of imitation and grimace unrivaled even among children. They would put on the clothes of Englishmen whom they had roasted alive, and present themselves in little bands on the lawn in front of the fort, where they would enact over again the horrible drama, kneeling down and praying with the fervent voice and agonized gestures of the sufferers, and utter lamentations and cries indicative of the most unspeaka- ble anguish. This theatrical entertainment was usually ended with insults offered to Gardiner in broken English, or with
* Trumbull, i. 76.
52
HISTORY OF CONNECTICUT.
peals of demoniac laughter. Then they would take to their heels and run into the woods.
About this time, Thomas Stanton, who could speak the Indian language so well that he often acted as interpreter for the colonies, arrived in a vessel at Saybrook. While waiting at the fort for a fair wind, a few Indians were seen to come down one day to a hill within musket range of the palisades, and hide themselves behind the trees. Gardiner ordered that the cannon should be pointed at the place where they lurked, and fired off when he waved his hat. Three of the savages soon rose and cautiously advanced towards the fort under pretense of a parley. Gardiner, willing, perhaps, to amuse his guest, walked out with him a little way, that they might come within speaking distance of the Indians. When the Englishmen had reached the stump of a large tree they stopped. "Who are you?" asked the Indians. Stanton, replying to them in their own language, said, " That is the Lieutenant," and added that his own name was Thomas Stanton. The Indians replied, "It is false; we saw the Lieutenant the other day shot full of arrows." But as soon as Gardiner spoke they saw their mistake, for one of the In- dians knew him well. They then cunningly asked, "Will you fight with the Nihanticks? The Nihanticks are your friends, and we have come to trade with you." "We do not know one Indian from another," replied Stanton, "and we will trade with none of them." "Have you had fighting enough ?" asked the Indians. "We do not know that yet," returned the interpreter. "Is it your custom to kill women and children?" rejoined the other party to the dialogue. "That you shall see hereafter."
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.