USA > Massachusetts > Suffolk County > Winthrop > The history of Winthrop, Massachusetts ; 1630-1952 > Part 5
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This religion was in a sense administered by the medicine men. These may be considered as clergy. They were in the sense that they led in tribal prayers during council and gave counsel on ethical matters when desired, although most Indians made their own peace with God. Actually, the medicine men were more than priests. For one thing they were doctors. Per- haps their practice was worthless, for praying out an evil spirit with appropriate ceremonies and dances may not be as efficacious as a dose of sulpha drugs-but at least the patient was made to feel better, and that is commonly a good part of the battle. Then too the materia medica of the Indians was far from being con- temptible. They knew the herbs of the fields and forests as part of their professional training and many an English settler called upon Indian herb lore when sickness struck. Indeed, herbs are still widely used today; some of them being an integral part of modern medical treatment.
Finally, the medicine man was the tribal teacher. His duty was to preserve the traditions and the myths of his group. Of course Indians did not have any means of recording such things. Picture writing is well enough for elementary statements but it cannot replace the printed word. The Indians were very largely dependent upon tribal lore for their continued existence as a community, even as a tribe. Their religion, their history-all that they were and would be was crystallized in these legends and myths. It is a great loss to America that much of this material is now lost forever. What remains indicates great beauty and a remarkable understanding of creation. Perhaps America might have had a Homeric epic-but strictly American.
The medicine men, who passed on their considerable knowl- edge by word of mouth down through the generations, taught the children what it was fit and proper they should know. Then, when the tribe was in council, they would be called up to propiti-
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ate the spirits and also to recite such matter of history or legend as was appropriate to the particular circumstances. Upon this "information" the Indians commonly based their decisions- unless a great orator arose in opposition and swayed them with his tide of fluent ideas and images. Indian medicine men should not be dismissed with contempt as magicians. They were that- but they were also priests, doctors, teachers, historians and wise counsellors.
The men of the tribe had their own sphere of duties sharply prescribed-as did the women. Children were allowed to play at will until they were old enough to take on their share of duties. They were cute and playful as puppies and very com- monly treated with great indulgence, provided they did not over- step the bounds of good behavior.
The men had as their first job the duty of protecting the family and the tribe. Every boy was brought up to be a fighter and he spent his boyhood learning how to fight successfully. Next the men had the duty of providing food. This was no idle matter for it was often arduous to an extreme. There is a great differ- ence between a high-powered rifle and a bow and arrow; just as there is between a split-bamboo fishing rod and a sparkling, trout-fly and a rude line twisted of bark fiber with a bone hook at the end. The men also had the job of making their own weapons, their canoes and the clearing of land for planting.
Women had their duties, too; there was a very sharp divi- sion of labor between the sexes. Perhaps the greatest humilia- tion which could be heaped upon a captured warrior was to force him to perform women's work under the eye and the jeers of the squaws-who incidentally, usually performed the torture of captives, for they were more ingenious in causing excruciat- ing pain than were the dignified warriors.
Women cared for the houses and the children, wove mats and made boxes of bark, they prepared the bark coverings for the houses, they gathered seeds, roots and berries, they tanned the skins and made leather and, amongst many other chores, cultivated the gardens. It is common to think that the warriors loafed while the squaws worked. This is not true, save in the old sense that "man works from sun to sun; woman's work is never done."
The Indian agriculture is hardly worth the name; gardens is the better term. Aside from tobacco, the Indians grew princi- pally just three staple crops-corn, beans and pumpkins. The corn was very poor in quality compared to modern hybrids. The beans were probably of the type now known as "horticultural." Likely enough some of the old-time strains of these variously colored and marked beans are still grown in remote farms in
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the hills of New England. The pumpkins were far from the Blue Hubbards or the Red Turbans of today. Instead they seem to have been miserable little pumpkins of very small food value.
Lacking tools, fertilizer, insecticides and fungicides, Indian gardening was reduced to its simplest terms. The braves pre- pared the ground by killing trees. They could not chop them down; either they killed them by chopping a girdle around the trunk or by setting fire to the woods. Commonly gardens were moved about for fresh ground every few years; thus avoiding the need for fertilizing and also missing insect and disease troubles.
The squaws then took over. Without a plow of any kind, they just took forked sticks, or a bent stick to which a shell or sharp bone was lashed, and scratched holes here and there among the dead trees and stumps. Into each hole went a few grains of corn, a few beans and a few pumpkin seeds. The corn grew up and provided poles upon which the beans climbed. The pumpkins sprawled along the ground. This was a three story agriculture. Interestingly enough, typical corn fields with all three crops growing together, or two of them, may still be seen in the hill farms of New England. It saves space and labor. There is a story that the Indians did fertilize each hill by putting a fish at the bottom. This is rather doubtful because the decayed fish the first few months would hinder rather than help the crop. Instead of fertilizing this way, the Indians just moved their garden patch to a new spot whenever the crops ran down. It was a very good way indeed-for the virgin soil, although acid in pH value was very rich and fertile-and corn, beans and pumpkins do not mind a mildly acid soil. And of course the ashes from the burned trees provided a fertilizer rich in potash as well as neutralizing the acidity somewhat. Indian agriculture was crude but it was effective. The corn and beans were dried and stored for winter úse; the pumpkins were kept for a while but not very long for they spoiled easily. Sometimes the crops were stored in birch bark baskets or in baskets woven of canes from the marsh or red ash splints. Usually, however, large amounts were admirably stored by burying them in a pit beyond the reach of frost and of rodents.
As hunters, considering what tools they had, the Indian men were marvelous. The bow and arrow was the major tool and some of these were magnificently made. An arrow sent from a stout bow would knock over a deer or a bear, fox or wolf, much better than even a high-powered rifle can today. The reason is, of course that the shocking power of an arrow is far greater than that of a small, if high-speed bullet. Bows were usually made of walnut or ash, and strings were deftly twisted
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from moose sinew. Often they were beautifully decorated. Arrows were made of various wood, such as cedar and ash, which could be split straight. Elder shoots, being straight, were sometimes employed, especially in hunting small game. Sharp triangles of marble, flint or quartz were employed as arrow heads although as soon as possible, the Indians traded with the whites for brass and copper for this purpose. Bits of bone, deer antlers, spines of horse-shoe crabs and many other things were also employed for arrow heads but of them all, save metal, the flint head was considered best-if flint could be found. Eagle feathers were used for war arrows while turkey feathers served for hunting.
Deer were hunted by stalking with the bow and arrow but they were also driven into traps where they could be clubbed to death. Bears and other animals were as a rule trapped although no Indian would hesitate to shoot an arrow into a bear and then leap upon the infuriated animal with only his knife. Moose, and all the rest, were hunted similarly. Trapping was used in Win- ter, especially, because in warm weather it was difficult to pre- serve any quantity of meat very long. It could be, and was, cut into strips, sun dried and then smoked, but the resulting product was sort of an emergency ration and fresh meat was greatly preferred. The Indians, after the settlers came, found they vastly preferred cow to deer, bear and moose, and a great deal of friction resulted.
As fishermen, the Indians were equally skilled. Hooks and lines were used but not commonly. Instead, the Indians wove nets, built traps and even shot fish along the shore or in brooks with bow and arrow. This was something of an art, due to the refraction of the water-but then the Indians had to be good fishermen and hunters, or else they would starve. Fur bearing animals were taken at first only for clothes but when the white traders came and offered muskets, blankets, rum and all manner of gimcracks, then the Indians turned to hunting for fur in a big way, often neglecting to provide food for their families in sufficient amount.
The Indians in Winthrop, as all along shore caught cod and haddock and eels and the rest in season in quantity. These were split and dried for winter use. Clams, oysters and lobsters were taken and enjoyed as well. Winthrop Indians were very for- tunate in this respect for they could find sea food along the beaches at all times of the year. Often after a bad storm, they would simply just walk along the beach as the tide went out and pick up all they and their families could eat.
Wild roots and berries were taken, enjoyed in season, and dried for storage to some extent. Primarily, however, the In-
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dian was a meat and fish eater with his corn and beans as a sup- plementary ration. Commonly, most of the year they feasted in plenty but sometimes in the bitter deeps of the Winter, they went hungry for considerable periods. They were really not provident; being rather childish on the whole. They trusted to the forest, the streams and the beaches to keep them fed.
In war, the bow and arrow was employed somewhat but the typical Indian battle was a brief hand to hand struggle, launched by a surprise attack, usually at dawn. Knives, made of sharpened quartz or flint were silent and the Indian dearly loved to kill silently. War clubs were used too. These were made from the basal sections of small trees, a ball-shaped knob being carved out from the thickened portion where the roots branch off. They were a formidable weapon, although not as silent as a knife. The tomahawk was of various kinds. An English axe was dearly prized as a weapon, because it would take and hold an edge. Before steel became available, the Indians made their tomahawks in two major types. One was simply a hammer. This was made of a lump of stone, spindle shaped, inset into the end of a cleft handle and then lashed in place. This was a clumsy but useful weapon. The other type of tomahawk consisted of the same cleft stick with a thin wedge of stone lashed in place. This stone was quartz or flint, split as much as desirable into a plate, and then with the edge chipped off painstakingly and finally whetted to a cutting edge by endless abrasion against another "hone" of the same or a harder stone. Some of these tomahawks were beautiful, light, well-balanced and formidable weapons.
Indians had little use for transportation facilities on land at least. They simply picked up their burdens, and walked. On water it was very different, for they made canoes. Some of these were dugouts; sections of great logs, cut down and hol- lowed out by burning and scraping. These were heavy and awk- ward craft, liable to capsize. The real Indian accomplishment, probably the flower of the Indian culture, was the birch bark canoe. The framework was of cedar poles, carefully split and shaven to proper size and evenness. The sheets of birch bark were lashed over the framework with root fibers and any holes sealed with spruce gum. The result was a craft so light it could be easily carried on a man's back and yet large and strong enough to carry considerable burdens with ease in water of surprisingly little depth. The settlers, marveling and soon building their own, used to say, "a good canoe was one which could float across a meadow in a heavy dew." The most interesting thing about these frail but very strong and seaworthy canoes was the per- fection of their lines. The design has never been improved upon-and probably never will for it was completely functional
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and was developed through many generations of practical em- ployment.
The Indians made fire by striking a spark from two stones and allowing it to fall upon dry tinder made from shredded bark. The best stones were dual in nature-one was a lump of iron pyrites; the other a flint. There was some use of the bow-drill, too, but in general, the Indians avoided this difficult means of making fire by always keeping at least one burning in every village. Elderly squaws were the fire tenders and were held strictly accountable.
Household utensils were crude. Bowls were carved out of wood, basswood being favored. Spoons were also made of bass- wood. The settlers soon adopted the Indian's bowls and spoons. Baskets, bags and boxes were made of woven grass, ash splints and the like and served many purposes. Some pouches were also made of deerskin. Birch bark was freely employed for baskets and boxes, too. All these things were handsomely dyed with colors taken from roots, barks and berries. Sometimes designs would be made of porcupine quills, also dyed in bright colors. Some clay and pottery vessels were made, too, but the Indians lacked heat enough to bake clay properly and their pots were both clumsy and fragile. Meat and fish were cooked by being turned on a spit over hot coals. Sometimes stews would be made in earthen pots but not very often. For ovens, a hole was dug in the ground, heated by an intense fire, and then, the food was placed on top of the coals, properly protected, and the hole covered over until the food was done. Sometimes fish, for ex- ample, would be wrapped in clay and thrust into a fire. When the fish was done, the clay would be cracked off, taking the skin with it-and there the fish would be ready to eat. Naturally, when traders and settlers came, the Indians eagerly traded off land and furs for copper and iron pots. Only a musket or steel axe was more prized than a brass kettle or iron pot.
Most Indians existed upon what was available under their hands. There was some inter-tribal trading, however. Flint from Michigan has been found in Indian graves in New England. Probably much material as flint passed hand to hand from tribe to tribe over lengthy periods. The Indians did not use money in our sense. Instead they employed barter; trading what they had for what they wanted. Wampum, made of bits of shell beads woven into strips of intricate design, was hardly money in the sense we use the term. It was simply an article which had value; just as did a bear skin, a beaver pelt or a fine tomahawk.
For just a final word about the Indians; they were not always dull and stolid ; such was their attitude towards strangers. Indeed, Indians were fond of amusement and played as strenu-
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ously as they fought. The beaches, such as those at Lynn and Revere were great meeting places for inter-tribal contests. In the Summers, when food was abundant and living easy, prob- ably hundreds of Indians would assemble and pass not days alone but weeks in ceremonious sportings.
These contests were both by individuals of ambition, de- termined to distinguish themselves, and by groups of young war- riors from rival tribal groups who sought to gain honor. Often a line was drawn in the sand and this line represented neutral ground. Before any contest, whether group or private, the con- testants would stand on either side of this line, and express amity. By this means any danger of a reprisal by those who had been defeated was prevented-for according to his lights, the Indian was an honorable man.
In the center of this line, also, a tall pole with cross arms, probably the stubs of branches, was erected, and on which the contestants or their advocates would hang their wagers on the forthcoming game or trials. Sad to say, the Indian was an inveterate gambler and would often wager all that he possessed upon a single game. The contests were mostly of a crude nature, according to white witnesses. There were races-run- ning, leaping, shooting and other tests-even contests for oratory and singing-for the Indians had their own music strange as it may have sounded to English ears. The most interesting game of all for the Indian was a sort of football. The ball, about the size of a basketball, or smaller, was kicked into the air at the start of the game. The object was to keep this ball in the air while at the same time the contending teams attempted to ad- vance it beyond the "goal" line of the other team. The Indians played this game on the sand in their bare feet so there was seldom any harm done by a misplaced kick. There seems to have been no limit to the number of contestants and the games must have frequently degenerated into a rowdy business.
The Indians were also very fond of their own games of chance and often wagered their entire possessions upon what corresponds to the turn of a card in modern play. They had a sort of dice game played with bits of bone but one of the most popular was a game called hub-hub. To play this, the Indians sat in a circle and one of the players took a wooden bowl into which he dropped a number of flat pieces of bone, painted white on one side and black on the other. The "dealer" then struck the bowl smartly on the ground causing the bones to fly into the air. Allowed to fall back to earth, the number of white pieces turned up determined the player's score. Then he passed the bowl to the player on his right and so on around and around the circle for hours. The players all made a great noise by merely shouting
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the word Hub-hub-hub in a sort of chant. Thus the word Hub- hub was applied by the English to the game.
A great part of the interest in these Summer sports encamp- ments lay in the great feasts which were a nightly feature. While the braves played or watched the sports, some of the squaws would catch lobsters or dig clams while other braves would come back from an early morning hunting or fishing trip with meat, birds and fish. Then the savages, as darkness ended the sports, would join in a mighty feast; stuffing themselves till they could hold no more. Whereupon they rolled over and slept until the next morning brought more sports and the evening brought another feast. Pity the poor savage!
It may be remarked that the settlers, who, as said, did not approve of either idleness or gluttony, discouraged these sports and, when liquor was obtained by the Indians the resulting melees were enough to justify the authorities in putting a stop to them. However, this official frown did not interfere with young Englishmen horse racing on the sands of Revere Beach early in the mornings when no one was about.
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Chapter Three JOHN WINTHROP
JOHN WINTHROP, the man for whom our town was named, is one of the least appreciated leaders of the settlement of America. Men who accomplished much less have been more honored. Personally, he was a man of great strength of char- acter and yet, modest, quiet and kindly. Undoubtedly, he exem- plified sincere and deep religious convictions. He also demon- strated an assured belief in the supreme importance of his leadership of the establishment of Boston. It is difficult to dis- tinguish between the two parts of his personality, because they were closely related-but it is certain that he found strength in both. He was in great need of support of both religion and an awareness of the importance of his work. He suffered domestic bereavement, financial and administrative troubles, constant checks and disappointments-yet he laid the solid foundation of the Colony of Massachusetts Bay. He was "The Father of New England" and beyond all doubt, a great man of the beginnings of the United States.
In the Cambridge Modern History, Winthrop is described as follows: ". .. Cast in the same mould and trained in the same school as John Hampden, John Winthrop represented all that was best and most attractive in Puritanism. His definiteness of mind and his constructive statesmanship were invaluable to a young Colony, while his modesty, humility and sweetness of temper enabled him to work with men of a narrower and more austere cast of mind, and to moderate what might have been evil in their influence."
John Winthrop was born 12 January 1588, near Sudbury, Suffolk, England, a descendant of Adam Winthrop, to whom the manor of Groton, formerly a part of the property of the mona- stery of Bury St. Edmunds, had been given by Henry VIII. Winthrop entered Cambridge University in 1602 but studied there only a short time for, when but 17 years of age, he married Mary Forth, daughter and heiress of John Forth of Great Stam- bridge, Essex. Mary, who was four years older than her hus- band, bore John Winthrop three sons and three daughters. She
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died in 1615. About Mary very little is known. John Winthrop simply said she was a "right, godly woman."
Within six months of her death, Winthrop married his sec- ond wife, Thomasine Clopton of Castleins Manor, Groton. She died a year and a day later and her child, a daughter, died soon after birth. Of her, Winthrop wrote: ". . She was a woman wise, modest, loving, and patient of injuries. She was truly religious, and industrious therein ; free from guile, and very hum- ble-minded. ... Her loving and tender regard of my children was such as might well become a natural mother; as for her car- riage towards myself, it was so amiable and observant as I am not able to express."
Then, in 1618, John married, at Great Maplestead, Essex, Margaret, daughter of Sir John Tyndal. With Margaret he lived in great happiness, until June of 1647 when she died. Early in 1648, John married, for the fourth time, Martha, daughter of Captain William Rainsborough, and widow of Thomas Coytmore. One son was born of this fourth union. In all, his four wives gave him sixteen children.
Of the four wives, it was Margaret, the third, with whom he lived for thirty years, who exercised the greatest influence. She was the wife for whom he had the greatest affection, apparently. Certainly, it was due to her influence that his original religious attitude, one characterized by typical, self-accusing Puritan ex- tremes, was tempered by common-sense. John in his youth was very zealous and this attitude continued for several years. While at Cambridge he had planned to take holy orders but his prac- tical father persuaded him to turn to law instead and, probably, encouraged his first marriage as a means of turning him to more worldly interests. Accordingly, John Winthrop was admitted to the Inner Temple in 1628-an experience which undoubtedly was of considerable value to him when he became the leader of the Colony at Boston.
John Winthrop was, of course, a very earnest Puritan- and such in a day when religion was of more influence than now. Thus, when Parliament was dissolved in 1629, he was profoundly depressed, fearing not only for the welfare of all England poli- tically, socially and economically, but also seeing the end of liberty. He wrote in fact that "evil times are come when the Church must fly to the wilderness." From this he went on to propose to prominent Puritan leaders that a colony in New Eng- land should be erected in so far as possible as a self-governing unit. Thus, he pointed out, not only would religious and political freedom be assured but there, overseas, in the howling wilder- ness, a new England could be created, an England purged of all but the good and true. This proposal of Winthrop's was of great
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importance because it directed the attention of the promoters of the Boston Colony to him, particularly as good material for its leader.
John Fiske, in his The Beginnings of New England, reports ". . . On 26 August, 1629, twelve men among the most eminent in the Puritan party held a meeting at Cambridge and resolved to lead an emigration to New England provided a charter of the Massachusetts Bay Colony and the government established under it could be transferred to that country. On examination it appeared that no legal obstacle stood in the way. For Governor, the choice fell upon John Winthrop, who was henceforth to occupy the foremost place among the founders of New England. Winthrop, at that time 41 years of age, was a man of remarkable strength and beauty of character, grave and modest, intelligent and scholarlike, intensely religious yet withal liberal in his opinions and charitable in disposition. When his life shall have been adequately written he will be recognized as one of the very noblest figures in American history. .
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