USA > Rhode Island > Newport County > History of Newport County, Rhode Island. From the year 1638 to the year 1887, including the settlement of its towns, and their subsequent progress > Part 20
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an answer that "if Uncas had done him or his friends wrong and would not give satisfaction he might take his own course " with them. Miantonomi took the field with a thousand warri- ors and was defeated in a bloody fight. By the treachery of two of his own captains he was given up to Uncas. An attempt was made by his subjects to obtain lis liberty under ransom which, as appears by the letter of the owners of Shawomet who were interested in the effort, was "given and received" by his captors. He was then taken to Hartford and delivered over to the English there to be held prisoner, as he himself entreated, until the meeting of the commissioners of the United Colonies at Boston. These, it is claimed, were prejudiced against him because of his sale of Shawomet, which was coveted by Massachusetts, to men, some of whom, like Williams, they had exiled as heretics. The commissioners were all of opinion that it would not be safe to leave him at liberty nor yet had they grounds to put him to death. In their dilemma they called in five of the most judicious elders who, adding another to the sum of villainies perpetrated in hypocritical godliness, recommended his death. He was accordingly again delivered over to Uncas with orders to execute him and two Englishmen were delegated to witness the deed. Uncas was promised protection and assist- ance in case his territory were invaded in retaliation. The In- righteous sentence was carried out.
Thus fell one of the truest friends, most generous benefactors and earliest patrons of the Rhode Island settlement. To the lasting disgrace of the United Colonies its records bear witness among the earliest of its proceedings to its sanction of this hid- eons crime, mean in its inception, cowardly in its close. The deception of Massachusetts was only equalled by the ingrati- tude of Connecticut. The absence of Roger Williams, then in England on the business of a charter for the Providence settle- ment, was a public calamity. Yet it is doubtful whether his in- fluence could have stayed the hand of the "clerico-judicial murderers," as the judges of Miantonomi have been styled.
The Narragansetts long and bitterly mourned their noble chief. Canonicus was broken with grief. Pessieus, the brother of Miantonomi, succeeded him as chief sachem, together with Canoniens, who appears to have already abandoned the chief control of the government even in name, though still taking part in the councils and joining in all acts of sovereignty. The
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Narragansetts now enter on a new and the last phase of their national or political existence. Crippled in their resources by the heavy ransom of which they had been wronged, yet thirst- ing for revenge ; fearful also of the interference of the Massa- chusetts power to thwart their warlike purpose, they resolved to throw themselves upon the protection of the English king. In the absence of Roger Williams the Narragansett chiels, on the murder of Miantonomi, took advice of the settlers of Shaw- omet, of whom the leading spirit was the heretic, Gorton, whom the general court had banished by another of their atrocious decrees. These settlers had, it appears, sided in the effort at ransom.
On the 19th of April, 1644, Canoniens and Pessicus invited Gorton, who had taken refuge from the pursuit of the Massa- chusetts government on the island of Aquidneck, and his friends to cross over to Conanicut. Here they found the sachems in solemn conncil. The result of the deliberations and conference was the voluntary and free submission of the chief sachem and the rest of the princes, with the joint and unani- mons consent of the whole people, with their lands, rights, in- heritances and possessions, to King Charles, acknowledging themselves his servants and subjects, to be ruled, ordered and disposed of according to the laws of that honorable state of Old England, "upon condition of his majesty's royal protection and righting of the wrong done or to be done to them : not that they found the need thereof in respect to their relation with any of the natives in these parts, knowing themselves sufficient defence and able to judge in any matter or cause in that respect, but that they had just cause of jealousy and suspicion of some of his majesty's pretended subjects." They express their desire to have their matters and canses tried in his majesty's pleasure under just and equal laws but with this express understanding, best given in their own words: "Nor can we yield over our- selves unto any that are subjects themselves in any case; having ourselves been the chief Sachems or Princes successively of the country time out of mind." This deed or act of submission, signed by Pessicus as chief sachem and successor of Miantono- mi, Canoniens as " protector of the late deceased Miantonomi in the time of his nonage" and Mixan, son and heir of that above- said Canonicus, was entrusted to Gorton and his associates, who
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are named commissioners in the instrument, and by them some months later taken to England.
This act brought the Narragansetts into direct antagonism with Massachusetts, which had been seeking covertly or overtly to ob- tain an outlet into the Narragansett bay. They summoned the sachems to appear at the next meeting of the court in the spring. The sachems on the 24th of May peremptorily refused, pleading their press of business preparing to avenge the death of their chief and asking their reasons of Massachusetts for advising them not to " go out against their inhuman and ernel adversary," who had taken not only their ransom but the life of their prince also. They give formal notice of their late subjection to King Charles, declare their intention of referring all serious matters of dispute to the English government, and ask for and offer free passage and conduct to their respective people desir- ing to have commerce. The general court, startled by the tone of this dignified document, sent messengers to dissnade the Narragansetts from their warlike purpose. The envoys were coldly received.
In June the settlers of Shawomet in their turn addressed the general court of Massachusetts, notifying them that they had themselves witnessed the deed of subjection and that they, the general court, need take no further trouble concerning the In- dians in their neighborhood since the home government could be appealed to in case of disagreement. They also assured the court that the Narragansetts would take a sharp and princely revenge for the indignity done to their sovereign ; and further warned them that they had lately met abroad one of the great sachems of the Mohawks, the most fierce and warlike people in the country with some of his men, and that they were furnished with 3,700 guns, plenty of powder and shot and defensive furni- ture for their bodies in time of war ; that the Mohawks deeply sympathized with the Narragansetts in the loss of their sachem and the unjust detention of the ransom given for his life, and were determined to wage war to the nttermost against any that should assault them. Both the tone and the contents of this letter must have been as gall and wormwood to the gentlemen addressed.
The air was full of war and the settlers of Aquidneck were in alarm all of the summer. To add to their anxiety they were short of powder and Massachusetts, either from inability or
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malice, refused to give them a supply. Their religious opinions were, as Governor Winthrop phrased it, too " desperately er- roneous" for their distress to awaken much sympathy from the self-elected saints of the Puritan colony.
In February, 1645, the Narragansett sachems sent messengers to Boston declaring that unless Uncas made amends by the pay- ment of one hundred and sixty fathoms of wampum or agree to a new hearing of the dispute within six weeks, they should make war. No redress forthcoming, one thousand warriors, some armed with guns, fell upon the Mohegans and defeated Uncas with much slaughter. Connecticut troops marched to his aid. The general court again ordered the Narragansetts to stop the war. Negotiations ensued. A second time messengers were sent to both the Mohegans and Narragansetts, on this oc- casion by the New England commissioners. Roger Williams, now returned, was called on by the sachems. The embassy on their return carried a letter from Williams stating that terms of neutrality had been agreed upon by the sachems and the Rhode Island colony and that the Narragansetts would continue the war. They were resolved to have the head of Uncas.
The United Colonies now declared war on the Narragansetts and began to raise troops. A mounted troop was despatched in advance. The Narragansetts, alarmed at this joint action of the colonies and at last awake to the real value of King Charles' protection, sued for peace. Roger Williams again interposed and for the second time within eight years saved the general peace. Pessicus, with other sachems and a large train, went to Boston. A treaty was concluded, onerous in the extreme to the Narragansetts. They were condemned to pay two thousand l'athoms of wampum within two years, a sum the magnitude of which best appears when compared with that demanded by them of Uncas. Captives and canoes were to be exchanged with the Mohegans : all claim to the Pequot country conquered partly by their arms was abandoned by the Narragansetts. sachems, helpless, signed the treaty. A part of the first install- ment of the tribute was sent to Boston the spring of the next year. The venerable Canoniens died in June (the 4th) of this year. "He was laid to sleep," says Williams, " in the same most honorable manner and solemnity in their way as was Governor Winthrop himself." The burial of a Narragansett sachem was
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an imposing solemnity not unlike the ceremonies of the Chinese at the funeral rites of their dynastic emperors.
Pessicns, summoned by the commissioners to answer for the neglect to fulfill the treaty, and charged besides with an at tempted conspiracy with the Mohawks, excused himself on plea of illness, declared that he had only accepted the treaty under dnress, and sent Ninegret, sachem of the Niantics (or the West- erly tribe), to answer in his place. The Niantics were not prop- erly Narragansetts but a tributary nation. Ninegret was, how- ever, related to the great sachems, his sister, Quiapen, having married Mexham, the son of Canoniens. He escaped from the commissioners under promise to pay one thousand fathoms of wampum within twenty days after his return, the remainder in the spring. The tribute was not paid. Ninegret again appeared to answer for the failure and also a charge of an attempt to as- sassinate Uncas, of whose territorial and personal rights the commissioners were exceedingly tender. The next year an ofli- cer and gnard of men were sent to Narragansett, who surprised Pessiens in his wigwam, and dragging him by the hair from his attendants, made him prisoner. The sum was gathered, the debt paid, and the troops withdrew.
Thus ended, in an act of personal outrage, of all the most of- fensive to Indian pride, seven years of Indian protest and English brutality. Yet, as Roger Williams stated later, "the Narragansetts had long been confederates with the English, faithful allies, true in the Pequot wars and the means of draw- ing the Mohegans to the alliance. Never had they stained their hands with any English blood neither in open hostilities nor in secret murders. Through all their towns and country many and ofttimes one Englishman travelled alone with safety and loving kindness,"-and this was their reward.
For three years, from 1644 to 1647, owing to a break in the records, there is no information as to the legislation of the col- ony upon Indian matters. In 1649 an order was made against the taking of black wampumpeage of the Indians at less than " four a penny " under penalty of total forfeiture, from which it appears that the value of this currency had fallen, owing in part to the greater abundance of commodities and in part to the gradnal substitution of other money, which it was of course in the interest of the whites to foster. In 1651, whether to protect the Indians or the original grantees of the land, it was ordered
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that no purchases should thereafter be made of the natives for a plantation without the consent of the state, except for the clearing of the Indians from particular plantations already set down upon ; from which the theory already advanced of Indian right of occupancy, if not of domain, is confirmed. A breach of this order carried a forfeiture of the land thns bargained for. But this seemingly having been evaded, the law was again en- acted in 1658 with the addition of the forfeiture of twenty pounds to the colony in case of transgression.
There was no doubt early regulation of the sale of liquors to the Indians, but drunkenness was now common among them. In 1654 the general sergeant was authorized to collect the fines from those offending in the sale and to take one half for his fees. The next year, for the preventing of the great mischief of the Indian drunkenness two ordinary (tavern) keepers were ap- pointed in each town to whom it was alone permitted to sell any sort of strong drink either to English or to Indians by retail, that is under a gallon, under penalty of five pounds for each offense, one half to go to the constable and the other to the in- former; and further, that neither of these ordinary keepers should sell more than a quarter of a pint of liquors or wines a day to an Indian ; and in case an Indian were found drunk, the ordinary keeper by whose means he was made drunk was fined twenty shillings for each person's transgression, the Indian to pay ten shillings or be whipped or "laid neck and heels." The clause of the law authorizing the sale of a quarter of a pint in a day to an Indian was repealed in 1656, and in 1659 a stringent statute was passed against either selling or giving either strong drinks or wine directly or indirectly to any Indian, any person being allowed to seize from any Indian carrying it and convert it to their own use : only it was allowed to give a dram to an hired Indian servant. In this year also an elaborate statute regulated punishment for Indian thefts ; their petty robbing and pilfering and inability to make restitution proving of great damage. The value of white peage is here fixed at six a penny, and in case of inability to pay the penalty and costs of trial, it was made lawful for the judges of the court where the trial was had to condemn the Indian offender "to be sold as a slave to any foreign country of the English subjects."
Although, as has been seen, the crushing blow in the destruc- tion of the Pequots was struck by the troops of Connecticut
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and their allies of the Narragansett tribe, neither the one nor the other was considered in the distribution of the spoils. Prompted either by wisdom or disdain, or perhaps even deeper motives of a Machiavellian order of policy, the English did not ap- parently contest the tribal sovereignty of the Narragansetts over the sachems of the intervening tribes, but confined their demand to the lion's share of the conquest, the soil itself, and the commissioners of the United Colonies assigned to Massa- chusetts the entire Peqnot country. We have seen also the imprudent sale by Miantonomi and Pumham of Shawomet, in 1642, to a company of settlers who were in quarrel with the Massachusetts colony. The next year the authority of the Narragansetts being rudely shaken by the death of Miantonomi, Pumham repudiated the sale he had himself authenticated as a witness, and apparently assuming an independent authority, made formal submission (June, 1643) to the jurisdiction of Massachusetts. The sachems of the Pawtnxet, also under the tribal sovereignty of the Narragansetts, made similar submission at the same time. By this defection the sovereignty of the Narragansetts was narrowed almost to the original limits of the tribe. The Wampanoags and the wandering Nipmucks of the northern country had long since accepted English pro- tection; the Niantics who lived about the Pawcatuck river alone held firmly to their ancient allegiance. It was not long before the general court made the sachems of Pawtuxet and Shawomet to understand the meaning of submission. They were held to obey the summons of the court.
It was at this meeting of the court that a final insult was put upon the Narragansetts by a grant to Captain Atherton, the brutal insulter of the sachem Pessicus, of five hundred acres of land in the Narragansett territory. The Narragansetts seem to have understood the folly of an attempt to resist this con- stant encroachment of the English with a front so broken. But the white men were by no means at their ease. The breaking ont of war between the English and the Dutch (1652) was a fresh cause of alarm; not from any fear of their neighbors of the New Amsterdam colony on Manhattan island, but from the uncertainty of the attitude of the Indian tribes. The Maqnas or Mohawks, by far the most powerful of the Indian nations, had long been the faithful friends of the Dutch, to whom they were bound by the famous treaty of Corlear. Should the Dutch
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enlist them in their service and they in turn form a league with the Narragansetts, the peril would be supreme, even though the Mohegans should stand fast or even hold aloof from the con- test. In April, 1653, the council of Massachusetts sent messen- gers to question Pessiens, Mexham, the son of Canoniens, and Ninegret, the three chief sachems of the Narragansetts. Their answers to the several queries did not satisfy the commisioners. But while unwilling to affront the English power by direct act of hostility, the sachems took advantage of the occasion to pun- ish the defection of the Long Island tribes, whom they assailed in the September following. For this they were again called to account by messengers from the commissioners, and their answer being again unsatisfactory, war was declared by the commis- sioners. But Massachusetts prudently pronouncing the cause insufficient, this declaration was not carried into effect.
According to Roger Williams' account, John Endicott, the governor of the Massachusetts colony, had expressly given consent to Ninegret to right himself against the "insolent challenges of the Long Island sachem." Ninegret took his revenge, but at the request of the English restored the captives. The next year (1654) the Long Islanders treacherously broke the peace and slanghtered at midnight near thirty of the Narra- gansetts at Block Island, one of whom was the nephew of Nine- gret. The war broke out afresh and the Narragansetts from Aquidneck went to the assistance of their chief. The United Colonies, alarmed again, sent messengers to Ninegret summon- ing him to Hartford; he returned a hanghty reply, refused to go to Hartford and asked to be let alone by the English. Roger Williams, the president of the Providence colony, addressed the general court of Massachusetts. defending the fealty of the Narragansetts to the English and justifying their war of self- defense against the Long Island tribes. In this interesting document he describes the Narragansetts and " Mohawks as the two great tribes of Indians in the country, as confederates and long having been and both yet friendly and peaceable to the English," and urges the need of friendship with one if ever the English should go to war with the other. From this letter it is also learned that these two nations had of late not been friendly, but that their differences were now healed and some of the Narragansetts had gone home with the Mohawks on a visit. He expresses the fear that in case of any great defeat to
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the English, Mohawks and Narragansetts, Long Islanders and Mohegans would unite against them.
However this just appeal and sound reasoning may have affected the Massachusetts government, it did not prevent the dispatch of a force by the commissioners. The Indians with- drew to the refuge of a swamp and the troops returned unsnc- cessful, to the mortification of the commissioners at Hartford. The influence of Massachusetts brought the struggle to a close. The nnavenged murder of Miantonomi still haunted the con- sciences of his tribe. The perfidious retention of his ransom by Uncas shocked the sense of justice, one of the strongest traits of Indian character, not only of the Narragansetts but of the Mohawks. Alike they looked upon the renegade Pequot chief of the Mohegans as an ontlaw. In the interview of the Mohawks with the Narragansetts measures of concerted action were agreed upon, and the Mohawks sent out a large force against the common enemy in the summer of 1657, but all their plans of surprise, an essential part of Indian tactics, were set at naught by information given to the Mohegans by the English scouts. It is strange to understand the determined effort of the English settlers in the Pequot conntry to thwart all efforts of the Narragansetts against the Mohegans, unless it be that they held their expeditions to be an invasion of the soil which they sought to bring within jurisdiction of the Connecticut colonies. So constant was this interposition that, on the request of the Narragansett sachems, the general court of commissioners held for the colony of Providence Plantations at Warwick in July, addressed a remonstrance to the English settlers at Pequot, in- timating in a plain way that it was the opinion of the Narra- gansetts that the English scouts were acting, not under the orders of the colony but in the pay of Uncas himself. They give notice also that the Mohawks were coming down in numbers and would pay little regard to any scouts they might find giving notice to the enemy.
In May, 1660, the final act in the series of villainies was committed by the commissioners of the United Colonies upon the Narragansetts. For alleged injuries on the Mohe- gans, which their sachems denied, a heavy fine was levied upon the Narragansetts and an armed force sent down to compel them to mortgage their entire territory for the payment of a sum of six hundred fathoms of wampumpeage within four
.
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months. Six months were allowed for redemption. The Indians were unable to effect the redemption and in the spring of 1662 the sachems delivered formal possession. The mortgage deed was signed by Suequansh, Ninegret, Senttup and Wiquanka- mitt, chief sachems of the Narragansetts, and bears date 13th, 1660.
The history of the Narragansett empire ends here; and yet the sachems retained somewhat of their dignity. In 1664, soon after the restoration of Charles the Second, a royal commis- sion was issued to reduce the Dutch provinces in America to subjection, and further, to determine all questions of appeal and jurisdiction and all boundary disputes arising in the New England colonies. On their arrival in Rhode Island the Narra- gansett sachems confirmed to them the formal submission they had made by writings to the crown in 1660, and they agreed to pay an annual tribute of two wolf skins and not to make war or to sell land without the consent of the authorities appointed over them by the crown. While they had parted with their territory they still acknowledged no sovereignty except that of the English king.
KING PHILIP'S WAR .- A new and startling figure now ap- pears upon the scene ; the hero of a dramatic episode similar in character and not inferior in interest to that which Parkman has made famous in his glowing page : that vast plot, which the Puritans call in their quaint phrase, "the Design of Philip," was the prototype, and perhaps, though a century earlier, the suggestive cause of the "Conspiracy of Pontiac."
The name of the proud young chief of the Wampanoags, Philip of Pokanoket, first appears upon the records of the colony with a simplicity which denotes his consequence : in an order of disarmament of all the Indians on Aquidneck island because of information from Seconek of "such deportment of the Indians, especially of Philip, which giveth great occasion of suspicion of them and their treacherous designes." Not otherwise does history name its heroes, its sages, its kings.
Massasoit, the sachem of the Wampanoags, whose dominion spread along the coast from Narragansett bay to Cape Cod, died in the winter of 1661 to 1662, and with him closed the era of peace and good will between the lords of the soil and the Eng- lish invaders. For forty years he kept sacred the treaty made with the Pilgrim fathers. In the early days of the weak Ply-
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mouth settlement, when, wasted by disease and famine, they would have fallen an easy prey to concerted action among the many tribes whom he swayed, he not only held to his compact, but with generous hand gave to them of his abundance. As years went by the annoyances and encroachments of the white men increased.
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