USA > Rhode Island > The lands of Rhode Island : as they were known to Caunounicus and Miantunnomu when Roger Williams came in 1636 : an Indian map of the principal locations known to the Nahigansets, and elaborate historical notes > Part 17
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Mr. Tooker continues: "An early notation has been brought to * light and published ; it is displayed on the plat of the land comprised in the original purchase of the Providence Plantations made about 1677 in the form Na-cheek, and in a declaration made the same year 'a place called ye Indians Natick or Nachick' " (p. 18). This refers to one of my own publications ( Hist. Tract, Sec. Ser. 4, p. 100). There was never any original purchase of the Providence Plantations. But that was my own error, in so fixing the name of this plat. On this plat appears the name Na-check. In no other place in Rhode Island publications does this name so again appear. It is merely the whim or ignorance of the man who made the plat. He was a surveyor of land, but not an Indian linguist.
But the unfairness of Mr. Tooker in printing opinions to sustain his views appears in these few words, "and in a declaration made same year a place called by the Indians Natick, or Nachick" (page 18).
This "declaration" was nothing less than the "Declaration in the case Pawtuxet Partners vs. John Greene and the town of Warwick." It was written by William Harris in October, 1677.
Mr. Harris had at that time lived forty-one years in the closest contact with the Indians of Rhode Island ; he was in continual and incessant contact with them to obtain their lands. No man knew them better than did Mr. Harris. In the Declaration which was prepared under the orders of the King-Harris used this language, "At or near ye place called by ye Indians Natick, or Nachick" (R. I. Hist. Tract, Sec. Ser. 4, p. 86).
In effect Mr. Harris states that the Indians, in 1677, he living among them, and being within four miles of the Indian village Natick, "called that place Natick or Nachick." Hence both were synonymous. But for Mr. Tooker to say "This indicates positively
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196
"DEACON" EPHRAIM'S IDEA.
..
to students of the language that Na-check was nearer to the true native pronunciation than Natick," it is sheer audacity. He con- tinues, "The Narragansett Na-check (there never was any such word ) or Vachick, is the equivalent of the Massachusetts Nashik (Eliot, Jeremiah, xlix 14-32), 'a corner,' and was bestowed on Rhode Island soil because the locality was 'a boundary place'-'a corner'-where the lines met in some conveyance of lands by the Indians, to the whites ; or else was 'a corner' or some Indian path, or , trail" (pages 19, 20).
In the first of these two paragraphs Tooker states that the former Nacheek was nearer the true native pronunciation ; but in the latter the two forms are equivalent.
The idea that Natick was "a boundary place" or "a corner" is sheer nonsense. He derived this idea from the imaginary lines drawn by the draughtsman of the plat of 1677, which I first pub- lished.
These lines indicate what somebody, to wit, the Pawtuxet Part- ners, wanted, but which they never succeeded in obtaining ( Forgeries Connected with the Original Deed, by Sidney S. Rider, 1896).
The definitions of the word Natick are positively ridiculous. Perry gives one by Deacon Ephraim thus, "When asked the meaning of the word Natick, this Indian is reported to have promptly replied, 'It is a place of hills' " ( Perry's Jones' Book of Minutes, p. 13). This Indian Deacon was a servant of Deacon Jones between 1760-1801. As an authority he was worthless.
Perry declares that Natick and Nittauke were the same, meaning 'my land" ( Book of Minutes, 13).
Brinton suggests, "as a place of observation some knoll near Natick, R. I., was prominent enough to receive the appellation" (Book of Minutes, 14).
Tooker defines it. "a boundary place"-"a corner," an idea with positively nothing behind it. This is his language: "The Plat shows distinctly that Na-cheek as spelled was a corner on the Paw- tuxet river where several lines terminated. The river at this par- ticular point makes quite a noticeable turn, first flowing southwest and then abruptly turning southeast." All of which is pure non- sense-the plat shows no such corners, nor do such corners exist.
197
NATCHIC.
. These "several lines", which "terminated" on the Pawtuxet river had nothing whatever to do with Natick, or Na-cheek, as the man who drew the plat chose to write the name. There are twelve of these lines which terminated on the Pawtuxet, but not one of them, ac- cording to the plat, touched exactly the location of Natick.
Tooker gives also this definition : "The place of our search" (page 32). Ile also informs us that Eliot used the form Natick and Natik (page 21), and that it meant "fetches he" (page 29).
Mr. Downs, a Town Clerk, once in New Hampshire, gives the meaning of Natick as "a clearing"-"because the grass was cut, and the timber felled." Who ever heard of an Indian cutting the grass ? And yet that was soberly printed in the Proceedings of the R. I. Hist. Soc., v. 2, 262, in 1804. Here Mr. Downs cites Potter, a New Hampshire Judge, defining the word as meaning a clearing. He also cites Rasle, who defines it being Natauke, and meaning a clear- ing. Rasle could not have known, having been dead a century and a half, that Amos Perry would have defined it as meaning "my land". Mr. Downs makes still another citation. A clergyman named Ballard gives Natick as being synonymous with Naddock, and meaning "an intervale."
Now after this clear and elaborate setting forth-what do you know ; or what does anybody know concerning the meaning of the word Natick? Positively nothing.
Mr. Perry used this expression, "The town of Natick, R. I." (Book of Minutes, 14). This has been followed by Mr. Tooker (page II). There was never any such town in Rhode Island.
There were two places in Massachusetts named Natick; one in Middlesex County, the other on Martha's Vineyard ( Tooker, page 19), besides the one here in Rhode Island.
The form Natchic appears in the Acts and Resolves, Oct., 1742 ( page 14).
Mr. S. G. Drake defines the word as meaning "a place of hills" ( Book of the Indians, 1841, page 114. Book 2). But Mr. Drake could never, at that time, have heard of Deacon Ephraim's definition which Mr. Perry gives, defends, and then admits is worthless. ( Book of Minutes, page 13.)
Nachecot was a name given to a bridge over the Pawtuxet river,
198
NINE MEN'S MISERY.
in the town of Warwick. It was at or near Natick -( Acts and Resolves, Feb., 1769, page 84).
NINE MEN'S MISERY. (3)
The story connected with this spot is almost wholly legendary. It was told first by Mr. John Daggett ( Ilist. Attleborough, p. 51) «in 1834, and it has now crept into all the histories, until now it is told with much detail; but all these details are the work of the imagination. Some twenty years ago the writer asked Mr. Daggett, a very aged man at the time, to give to the writer the authorities on which he had founded the story. This he did in an elaborate manu- script. It rests, as I have said, upon legends. These legends have assumed this form: During the Pierce massacre nine men were captured by the Indians, taken north to "Camp Swamp," there tor- tured and murdered: later their bodies were found by the people from Rehoboth and buried. Mr. Daggett visited the spot a century and a half later, talked with the people then living in the neighbor- hood, and wrote his story. He describes the spot and the heap of memorial stones piled upon the grave. 'This must have been about 1830. Mr. Daggett in his manuscript told of the dis-interment and about the skull of Bucklin with double teeth which was then ex- humed. These teeth filled the jaws ; there were no "single" teeth. This identical story was at the very time running the rounds of the newspapers about William Morgan, whom the Freemasons abducted and murdered. It can be found in Niles' Register (3rd November, 1827, p. 146). The grave of these nine men was then on the farm of Elisha Waterman. In 1866 I myself visited the spot and saw it exactly as John Daggett described it : but it is all gone now, having been moved north not less than a mile. Legends and locations are migratory. Leonard Bliss published his History of Rehoboth in 1836, two years after the story told by Mr. Daggett was published. Mr. Bliss entered more elaborately into the story ( page 94), but no authentic record supports the tale. The Daggett manuscript men- tioned above is now in the Sidney S. Rider Collection at Brown University.
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NOOSENECK-NOOZAPAUG.
NOOSENECK. (23)
In the town of West Greenwich, R. I., there is a locality known as Nooseneck. It is one of the post offices of the town. The sin- gularity of this name has often excited curiosity. The only at- tempt at an explanation, so far as I know, is to be found in the so-called History of Rhode Island, 4to, 1878, p. 342, in these words, ' "The word Nooseneck is said to have been derived from the setting of running nooses for catching deer in the Nooseneck Valley." Whatever may be the derivation of the word, this explanation is, of course, nonsense. 1 therefore propose advancing a theory of my own concerning it. The tract of land designated by the name Nooseneck is a narrow neck lying between two small streams, which unite and become tributary to the Pawtuxet. As you approach the sources of these streams, the land rises to a considerable height, and is known as Nooseneck hill. The narrow neck, which consists of the lands through which the streams flow, is an exceedingly beauti- ful valley. The name Nooseneck is affixed to this locality on Benoni Lockwood's map of Rhode Island, made in 1819, where it is printed as here written. I have been peculiarly struck by the pronunciation by the residents, of this name, and I have frequently inquired the name of the locality for the purpose of observing this singularity. They invariably pronounce it Noozeneck, pronouncing the s like z. This appears to me to possess peculiar significance. There was once held in the Narragansett country a large tract of land by Harvard University. On this tract was a fresh water pond which appears in the old records ( 1675) by the name Noosapoge. This word. Mr. Trumbull informs us, came from two Indian words, noosup and pang, which mean beaver pond. Mr. Williams, in his Key, defines noosup as a beaver. The corrupt spelling in the old record indicates the pronunciation, which the inhabitants of Nooseneck have uncon- sciously preserved down through generations. Their name arose no doubt from this Indian word noosup, beaver. The small rivers with their beautiful valleys became the home of the beavers. The sites of their dams are very numerous. Hence the locality became known as Noosup neck, corrupted in time as we now see it. I have noted
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200
NAIIGONSET-NARIGANSET.
this pronunciation by peculiarity in spelling, in a pamphlet printed here in 1831, thus, Neusneck. That this spelling is corrupt appears from the Loekwood map cited above, and printed thirteen years pre- viously. Henee it is significant only as indicating the pronunciation of the period.
There is one other point upon which I wish to touch. There has been a suggestion to me that the name arose from the transmission of news by means of signals on top of the hill. Had this been the ease, how eame the word neck to be used in naming a hill? More- over, this hill is far inland and not in the line for communication with any specially important point ; and, morcover, it is quite elear that the term "Nooseneek Hill" followed the use of the term "Noose- neck Valley." The valley was first named, hence the use of the word neck was a rational use. This, of course, is simply a theory sus- tained by such arguments as could be easily brought to bear upon it, but it seems plausible and certainly worth consideration until something better can be set up. The neck bounded by the two streams mentioned above is well shown with the name Noose Neck affixed on the Harris map of Rhode Island made in 1795.
I-NANILIGGONSICK. 2-NARIGANSET. 3-NAHIGONSET.
4 -- NANHIIGONSET. (27)
These are four forms of the name now written. Narragansett, taken from original manuseripts written by Roger Williams, save only the second, which is taken from the Key to the Language of the natives, printed in London, 1643. The first is from the original Deed given to Williams in 1638. The second is from the Key, as aforesaid : and the third and fourth are from the manuseript Testi- mony of Roger Williams relative to his first coming into the Narra- gansett country, given 18th June, 1682. This manuscript is now in the possession of the Rhode Island Historical Society.
In the edition of Mr. Williams' Key, edited by J. Hammond Trumbull ( Narr. Club 1, 82), there is an elaborate note by the latter concerning this word. He eites the five following forms,
THE LITTLE ISLAND "NAHIGONSET."
201
ORIGIN OF THIS NAME.
from letters written by Mr. Williams, and printed in the Mass. Hist. Soc. Coll. Ser. 4, v. 6:
Nanihiggonsicks-Nanhiggonsicks, Narriganset-Narrogonset Nahigonsicks.
These forms have not, so far as I know, been recently compared with the original manuscripts.
Edward Winslow in his "True Relation," published in London, 1624. speaks of the "people of Nanohigganset". Here I am obliged to follow the reprint by Mr. Young ( Chronicles of the Pilgrim Fathers, 1844, p. 285), never having seen the original edition.
Samuel Gorton, one of the most learned men then living in New England, wrote in 1646: "In their subjection of themselves and their lands to the English Crown in April, 1644, the Sachems de- scribe themselves as 'the Princes, or Governors of the Nanhygan- set'." Again,-"Declaration hereof unto his Grace, being done upon the Lands of the Nanhyganset". Again,-"They ( the Massachusetts Bay Colony ) having expelled us (in 1643) there being onely a little island called Road Island situate in Nanhyganset Bay from which they had not expelled us" (Simplicitie's Defence, London, 1646, pp. 76, 82, 83).
Winthrop, writing in 1646, concerning the extermination of the Pequot tribe, said the Massachusetts troops "set sail and came to the Narragansett, where they landed their men" ( Winthrop's Hist. New Eng., Ed. 1853, v. 1, 233). This landing was at what is now Wickford. It took place in May, 1637.
In 1629 the Earl of Warwick, under Charles the First, gave to William Bradford a new Patent covering "the lands from Conahas- set rivulet, towards the north, and the River, commonly called Narragansets River towards the south". This River is now the Narragansett Bay. This is the proof: "From the mouth of said river called Naragansetts river to the utmost Limitts and Bounds of a Country, or Place in New Englande commonly called Pokenacutt, alias Sowamsett" ( Hazard's Hist. Col. 1, 300).
"There is a Tract of land in the Continent of America aforesaid called by the name of the Narragansett Bay" (Charter of 1643 as given in R. I. Hist. Coll. v. 4, p. 222).
202
AS ROGER WILLIAMS SAW IT.
These are the earliest forms of writing or spelling the name Narragansett. The last three specimens are not to be relied upon as being the genuine spellings used in the original manuscripts ; they are used for another purpose. A note here concerning the first Plymouth Patent, that granted in November, 1620, by James the First, is interesting to Rhode Island students of history, by reason of the claims made under it upon the lands of Rhode Island. No landmarks or boundaries are indicated in this Patent other than «from the Fortieth (40th ) to the Forty-eighth (48th ) degrees north throughout all the maine land from sea to sea, together with the Firme lands, Soyles, Rivers, Waters, Royall Mines of Gold and Silver, &c., and all and singular, other Conditions, Royalties, Pre- leminences, &c., both within the same tract of Land upon the Maine, and also within the said Islands and seas adjoining ( Hazard's Hist. Coll. I, III). The King undertook to grant a strip of the Continent Five Hundred and Sixty miles wide, and extending from the At- lantic to the Pacific oceans. This abused omission of territorial limits was the great cause of the charter of Charles the First, of 1629, granted to William Bradford in his individual right, and which for eleven years he held. The western bound is given above : it does not reach to the waters of the Narragansett, but to the utmost limits and bounds of a country or place called Pokenacutt alias Sowamut. This did not include those Indian lands. Notwithstanding this limitation Plymouth claimed 'the lands and the islands in the Bay. and these claims Massachusetts continued after the absorption of Plymouth and until the King's Decree of 1746 .
Concerning the origin and meaning of the name Narragansett. Roger Williams has left us this interesting note :
"I also profess that being inquisitive of what 'roote' the title, or denominative, Nahigonset should come, I heard that Nahigonset was so named from a little island between Puttaquomscut and Mishquom acuk on the Sea and fresh water side. I went on purpose to see it, and about the place called Sugar Loaf Ilill 1 saw it, and was within a Pole of it, but could not learn why it was called Nanhigon- set" (Original Manuscript, 18 June, 1682 ; now in the possession of the R. I. Historical Society ).
Saving some convulsion of nature, "this little island" must still
203
THE ISLE NAILIGANSET.
exist where Mr. Williams saw it. Let us attempt to find a spot which it seems strange no one has ever attempted to find. It is an island on the sea and fresh water side"; it is near Sugar Loaf Hill"; and it is between Pettaquamscut and Mishquomacuck". That means that the island is in fresh and salt water, between what is now South Kingston and Westerly. Such conditions place it at the head of Point Judith Pond-"about a place called Sugar Loaf Hill". This Hill is a well-known landmark near the village of Wakefield, and one mile northwest from "the little island". The location is thus fixed at the head or northernmost part of Point Judiah Pond, and on the western shore. There are two small islands answering these requirements. One bears the Indian name, Cumnoc, and the other has been nameless. It is the Isle Nahiganset. Mr. Williams says he "was within a pole of it". A pole was sixteen and a half feet. Upon an ebb tide Mr. Williams could easily have approached within a pole of it, for now, while there is very little ebb, or flow, of the tide, the depth of the water varies from eight to fifteen inches. Under any condition of the tide Mr. Williams could not have ap- proached within a pole length of any other island than that which is here identified and existing in Point Judith pond and on its northwestern shores.
Mr. Trumbull has written an interesting note on the word and its meaning, which I venture to reproduce (Narr. Club 1, 82). Speaking of Mr. Williams' note, above printed, Mr. Trumbull says : "It may be hardly prudent to venture a conjecture as to the significa- tion of a name whose origin Roger Williams failed to discover : vet I may be permitted to suggest that nai "having corners", and naiag. or naiyag (as Eliot wrote the word), 'a corner,' or 'angle,' gave the name to many points of land on the sea coast and rivers of New England, e. g. Nayatt Point in Barrington, R. I. (18). and Nayack in Southampton, L. I., etc. ; Na-ig-an-cog (or Nahiganeuck ) would signify 'the people of the Point, and Na-ig-an-set the 'ter- ritory about the Point.' Possibly one of the islands in Point Judith pond may have received the name". Mr. Trumbull continues by remarking that the name was applied "possibly to one of the many indentations or points of land running ( more properly extending ) into the pond : or possibly, again, the great Point Judith". All this
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204
ATTEMPTS AT DEFINING.
is ingenious, but not worth present consideration. Mr. Williams has declared that the name was that of "a little island". Con- clusively, then, it did not apply to a point, nor to the people of a Point, nor to great Point Judith. If the name meant what the speculations of Mr. Trumbull suggest, is it conceivable that Roger Williams did not know that fact? The Nahigonsets were not the people of the Point, for Mr. Williams bought Moshausic lands from their Sachems; these lands were those on which Providence was planted ; and the Narragansett tribe was dominant over all the lands now known as Rhode Island. All that we know of this tribe, or shall ever know, is what happened subsequent to 1620; all be- fore that time is mere speculation. Roger Williams says that the name by which the Narragansett tribe knew itself was Nanhig- gan-cuck ( Narr. Club 1, 82, Indian Key ). Mr. Trumbull says that Nahiganeuck "would signify the People of the point". Why did not Roger Williams state such a fact, if such a fact then existed ? Mr. Williams says "the endings wock, uweock, uwog. in general, mean Folke, Men, People". But that certain particular endings, or, for instance, cuck, oock, oog, meant the same. In other words. different Indians in utterance gave different sounds ; so different English cars expressed these sounds by various and different letters.
Na-ig-an-eog is not Nanhigonset : both forms may not have meant the same to the Indians. Mr. Trumbull suggests an island in Point Judith pond as the origin of the name: but Mr. Williams has deliberately stated that "it was a little island". How, then, could the people around this island be called "the people of the point", while they covered all the lands, or nearly all the lands, now in Rhode Island.
It is not necessary here to draw the line between sense and non- sense. I will merely give an illustration. In 1704 Madame Knight made her journey from Boston to New York along the Pequot path through these Narragansett lands. She slept a night at the home of a Mr. Havens, near Wickford. She complains of being kept awake "by some of the town tope-ers in the next room, who were entered into a strong debate concerning the signification of the name of their country, viz, Narraganset. One said it was named so by the Indians, because there grew a Brier there of a prodigious
THE LITTLE ISLAND "NAHIGONSET." Taken from a Tree Top.
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205
MADAME KNIGHT'S STORY.
height and bigness, the like hasdly ever known called by the Indians Narragansett. He quoted an Indian of so barbarous a name, for his author, that I could not write it. His antagonist replied-No,- it was from a spring it had its name, which he well knew where it was; which was 'extreem' cold in Summer, and as 'hott' as could be imagined in the winter; which was resorted 'too' by the natives, and by them called Narragansett-Hott and Cold -- and that was the origin of their Place's name" (Journal of Madam Knight, 1825, 22, 23 ).
The "Little Island Nahigonset" is today an object of ideal beauty, considered as a picture representing actual scenes of land and sea. It lies in a beautiful cove, the eastern bound of which is Crown Point. The view, which is here presented, was taken for this use for the writer by Mr. J. Raleigh Eldred of South Kingston. It was taken high up in a tree in order to show that the object is an island. The dark land extending out into the pond upon the right is Crown Point .. The tree from which the picture was taken stands upon the estate of Col. Arthur H. Watson, and the Island Nahigonset forms a part of Colonel Watson's estate. In order to present a front view of this beautiful Island the accompanying pic- ture has been taken. It was taken from a slight elevation on Colonel Watson's estate.
It is an interesting fact that Colonel Watson's first English ancestor in Rhode Island, John Watson, was an owner of an undivided interest in these lands. This ownership came in this way : John Porter, then of Boston, became, in January, 1657-8, one of the five original purchasers of the lands which became known as the Pettaquamscut lands. This name came from the Rock known to the Narragansetts by this name, and near or at which the pur- chase was made. The bounds of the purchase were, as in all these Indian Deeds, loosely defined they covered "all the land and the whole hill called Pettaquamscut, bounded on the south and south- west side of the rock with Ninegrets' land," etc. Ninegrets' land on the map herein were the Niantic lands ; but there is no way of which the writer has knowledge by which the eastern or the north- ern bounds of these lands can be shown. All these Indian Deeds were given almost unbounded elasticity by the English purchasers.
206
NOTAQUONCKANET.
But in this case elasticity was not required. This second Deed. 20th March, 1657-8, covered all lands "seven miles west from Pettaquamscut Rock, and all the lands between said rock and the sea" ( Potter's Early Hist. Narragansett, 275, 276). Ninegret recognized this title on the 9th September, 1662 ( Potter, page 277), and it covered the lands now known as Matunuck, of which the Watson estate now forms a part. John Porter owned a one seventh interest in the Pettaquamscut lands at the time of his death. This interest was bought by the Gardners and John Watson. The Gardners consisted of Benony, George, William, and Nicholas ( Pot- ter, 279). Henry Gardner became a prominent man in the founda- tion of certain towns which grew out of these Narragansett pur- chases, as, for instance, Exeter, West Greenwich, and the first Kingston. John Watson became prominent only in Kingston, and especially that part of Kingston now known as South Kingston ; and it is in that town that the he served the town in 1688; he was a Conservator of the Peace in 1690, and he served the town in the Colonial General Assembly in 1690-1691; and in this town a de- scendant now owns the "Little Island Nahiganset". "On the Post Road below Wakefield toward the road to Matunuck stands the Watson or Congdon house, with a stone chimney in the center. It may date back to 1690-1700. It is framed of cedar, and the summer runs Massachusetts fashion, that is across the room parallel with the chimney girt" ( Isham and Brown Early R. I. Houses, 65).
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