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 20
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230
PASCOAG-ASKUG.
.
ferred from Warwick to East Greenwich, but nothing came from the' pttition, and the peninsula still forms a part of Warwick-so that people dwelling in Warwick proper must travel through the town of East Greenwich to reach the southern part of the town. In 1679 a law was enacted, in which occurs this clause: "Whereas there were three purchasers of a place called Maskachusett those three person's are esteemed to be three proprietors of East Green- wich" (R. I. Col. Rec. 3, 55). This locality is the most southern point of Potowomut. As civilization developed the name of the Narragansett Sachems, Potowomut for these lands became in 1703 Potaomitt and Potaomet.
PASCOAG. (4)
This is a pretty, thriving manufacturing village in the north- western corner of Rhode Island. The first appearance of the name as an independent local habitation was in the census of 1865, wherein Dr. Snow says it was without boundaries, and had a population of 722. The name Pascoag plays small part in the legislation or his- tory of Rhode Island, but it figures in literature. In the opening of the account of the Great Slocum Dinner, given by the Journal in March, 1843, it is related that "a detachment of the Harmonious Reptiles and the Pascoag Loafers" were to escort Slocum to the Smithfield line on his way to Providence to partake of this imaginary dinner. The late Senator Anthony, the author of the Dorriad, also alludes to the name, in that chaste and polished manner in which the Journal discoursed of those who differed politically from it. The subject was the attack on the Arsenal :
"When the Invincibles turned tail The other corps began to quail, And looked which way to fly, The Harmonious Reptiles turned about, The Pascoag Ripguts joined the rout, With Gloster's chosen chivalry."
These "Harmonious Reptiles" and "Pascoag Ripguts," and "Johnston Savages," differed only from Senator Anthony in that
PASKHOAGE. 231
they thought a constitution ought to be substituted for the charter in 1842. Mr. Anthony was opposed to having a constitution, and in these terms he classed those who thought differently. So far as I ean now recall, these allusions cover the references in literature to Paseoag.
The locality came into, what eame subsequently to be, the Colony of Rhode Island, by one of the "confirmation" deeds obtained by William Harris in 1659. First it was in the town of Providence; in 1731 Gloeester was erected, and Pascoag was in Glocester; in 1806, Burrillville was erected, and Paseoag was in Burrillville ; and there it still remains.
Paseoag plays no part in the history of Providence ; in the history of Gloeester ( Mrs. Perry's) it appears but indirectly, thus-"The Nipmuck Indians extended from Massachusetts and Connectieut into the northwest corner of this state; * * the small Passcoag tribe roamed a little south of the Nipmucks." This question of Indian jurisdiction is incapable of solution, and least of all, the territory of the Nipmuck; but whence comes the authority for the statement that there was an Indian tribe named Passcoag over here : the present writer does not know ; he believes it is mythological. It is evident that sufficient interest exists in the name to make a passing note. Let us begin. Mr. Perry, in the eensus of 1885, gave no population to villages ; but eoneerning the name Pascoag, he gave it to a village, a river, a pond, a granite quarry, and a tribe of Indians. Dr. Usher Parsons, in his Indian Names of Places, gives two spellings, thus-Pascoag, and Pascoage, and applies the name to a River, and a Falls, which he says is on the south side of Bur- rillville, which means, of course, that it ( whatever it is) is outside of the town. Dr. Parsons, with his accustomed stupidity, eites as his authority, Registry of Deeds, Providenee, page 160. Mr. James H. Olney, in his Olney Genealogy, page 16, gives the name as from a Will of Epenetus Olney, 1735, and spells it Pask Koorge. Mr. John Austin gives the name in his Genealogical Dictionary, page 353. from the same Epenetus Olney Will, but spells it Pas- khoge. Certainly, both cannot be correct, and the truth is, neither is correet, for the word as elearly written as if it were printed, is spelled Paskhoage. I have purposely left until the last to be noticed,
.
232
SWEATE FEARN PLAINE.
that which should have been first, to wit, Mr. H. A. Keach's History . of Burrillville. This book, written by a young lawyer never trained in historical research, was published in 1856. Concerning Pascoag, Mr. Keach says: "There was another tribe called Pas-co-ag Indians ; one of our villages still retains the name ; it is a ledgy place, and furnishes among the rocks around a secure retreat for snakes. In the Indian dialect the term coag meant a snake, and when they (quere, the snake or the Indian) went by this locality, they said, Pass-coag."
The historical literature of Rhode Island is specially rich in absurdities of this character; but there is certainly nothing in this line superior to this by Mr. Keach. He says the word is Indian- actually the name of a tribe; it is a compound word, half English, "Pass," and half alleged Indian, "coag." Whence did the Indian get the English word to prefix to their "coag"? Did they exist unnamed until the arrival of the English? It is too absurd for argument. But this is the source of the Indian tribe story, which the later writers have followed. Where did Mr. Keach find it? Nowhere. The name Pascoag is not of great antiquity in Rhode Island history ; it does not appear in the Early Records of Providence. The word Pageacoag occurs in the Early Records ( 1667), vol. 15, p. 115. The locality as given in the record is between the seven mile line and the four mile line, and on the hitherside of Setemechut Hill. This fixes the place as being in (10) and hence it cannot be Pascoag. So far as we now know, the earliest mention of the name, documentary mention, occurs in a deed by William Gulley in March, 1720; following this comes the Olney Will of 1735. The Gulley deed is the authority which Dr. Parsons attempted to cite, but failed. It will be found in Records of Deeds, v. 4, p. 160. These two items discredit the statement by Mr. Keach (page 23) that "the earliest English settlers at Pascoag were of the Salisbury family, in or near, 1786." There must have been Englishmen dwell- ing there half a century carlier : and the name of one of the planta- tions so occupied was Sweate Fearn Plaine, which Epenetus Olney gave to liis son in 1735. Now, then, concerning the meaning of Pascoag, and its construction, for upon both points I am about to suggest new opinions. Dr. J. Hammond Trumbull, long regarded
THE ROCK "PETTAQUAMSCUT."
ـنهــ
233
PUTTAQUAMSCUT ROCK.
as the chief authority in these Indian languages, says "the name belongs to land at the branch or crotch of the rivers." By rivers, Trumbull here refers to the Pascoag river and Branch river; but the village of Pascoag is not near this place of union of the streams. There is another village not far from Pascoag, but in the town of Glocester, with the Indian name Chepachet; this name Dr. Trumbull defines "as the place of division or the fork of the river." There is still another word defined by Trumbull as "at the crotch of the river," to wit, Woonasquatucket. Now it seems impossible that all these words mean the same thing ; the Indian languages were not so copious. With no pretension to a knowledge of Indian philology, it seems to me that this word, Pascoag, has an altogether different meaning. Roger Williams gives the word, "askug," which he says means a snake, and he gives the pronunciation of it, "askoog." Now all that the English did was to prefix a P, and we have Pas- koog. The origin and the meaning is too obvious.
PUTTAQUAMSCUT. (27)
It is an Indian name of one of the Indian purchases-that of 1657-and also of a river. In spelling the word Trumbull cites Roger Williams, thus "Puttuckquomscut, Puttaquomscut." Trum- bull derives the word from puttuckqui-omosk, meaning "the Round Rock". It is the starting point of the purchase half a mile northeast from the Tower Hill Church ( Narr. Club 6, 177; also Potter's Hist. Narr. 304). The name as written by Williams in the Original Manuscript, Testimony, 18th June, 1682, is as it stands at the head of this note. It was the scene of great intrigues on the part of the English to get possession of the Indian lands. It is one of the most interesting localities in Indian History of the Rhode Island lands. All the great sales of Indian lands were made here. The famous Turf and Twig transfer to the Atherton partners was made here. It was here in 1664 that the King's Commissioners fixed the title of all the Narragansett lands in the Colony of Rhode Island (R. I. Col. Rec. 2, 9, 60, 93). These Records are unique in the
234
THE INDIAN BROOK IN ROGER WILLIAMS' PARK.
varieties of spelling given, thus-Petaqumskocte (2, 93), Petus- quamscutt (2, 94), Petasquamscutt (2, 95), Petequomscutt (2, 95).
PAWCATUCK. (28)
The controversy covering more than a century touching the lands along the cast bank of this river-continued by Massachusetts and by Plymouth until Massachusetts secretly absorbed that Colony ; and by Connecticut-enter largely into the History of Rhode Island. An idea can be obtained by referring to the R. I. Colonial Records 4, 278, 491, 510, 516. These troubles came to an end partly in 1728 and finally in 1746.
PASCONUQUIS. (17)
This name appears on the Walling map of 1854 applied to a small cove just north of Occupassnetuxet cove, also on this map. These names upon this map were fixed by the late Judge Elisha R. Potter-where he found the name above I have been unable to iearn. It was the "Lower Bailies Cove" of 1661. The land along the south bank of the stream which flows into Pasconuquis was called by the Indians Capanaganset ( Prov. Early Rec. 1, 79).
PAPAQUINEPAUG. (10-12)
The name was applied both to a brook and to a pond. The name so used seems to be in opposition to the rule laid down by Trumbull, that in compound words "the inseparable generic name for 'river' or 'stream' was -tuk- denoting water in motion, as pog or fang denoted water at rest" (Narr. Club 6. 119). Papaquinepaug is a brook which runs through Roger Williams Park and into Papa- quinepang Pond, now Fenner's Pond. Mr. Trumbull also gives the word baug as meaning still water, but Quinebaug is the name of a river.
235
THE PEQUOT PATH.
PONAGANSET.
(4-7)
It is the name of a pond (4) and of a stream running south- casterly from the pond (7) and becoming the north branch of the Pawtuxet river (17). The usual varieties of spelling these Indian names are particularly barbarous in this case. There are but few -- Punhungansth ; Punhungun ; Pumganset ; Punhanganset ; Pushane- ganset ; Posneganset ; etc. The original Indian name of the town of Dartmouth, Mass., was Ponaganset ( Records of Portsmouth, R. I., 415). These lands were not far from the northern bounds of Little Compton (Plym. Col. Rec. 4, 65). In 1708 lands were conveyed on the easterly side of a river, Apehunqunset; another form of the name is Poquantuck.
THE PEQUOT PATH.
Frequent references in the later histories will be found to the Pequot Path. It was the earliest travelled highway used by the English settlers of Rhode Island; but before their advent it was the travelled path of the Indians from Moshassuck, now Providence south, and westward to the Pequot country ; hence it came to be known as the Pequot Path. It ran along the western shore of the Bay to Pawtuxet ; thence to Apponaug; thence to East Greenwich ; thence across the western end of Potowomet, across the Muschachug river to Wiekford; then south, on the west side of the Petta- quamscut. Its course in Acquidneset (22) ran by Devil's Foot rock, which Dr. Trumbull suggested may have been the English meaning of the word cawcumsqussuck. It ran over Tower Hill, thence westerly to what is now Wakefield, crossing the Saucatuck river ; thence southerly, and westerly, near the shore until it reached the Paucatuck river. The late Judge Potter says: "It was long known as the Pequot Path, afterwards as the King's highway, then as the Queen's highway, and later still as the Old Post road" ( Madam Knight's Journal, ed. 1865, p. 26). Mr. Williams speaks thus of the Indian paths: "It is admirable to see what paths their naked hardened feet have made in the wilderness in the most stony and rockie places" ( Indian Key, 95).
236
THE APPROACHIES TO THE QUEEN'S FORT.
THE QUEEN'S FORT.
(23-24)
This rude fortification stands upon a small elevation exactly on the line separating North Kingston from Exeter. It is now sur- rounded by timber and huge rocks. It stands upon the road run- ning parallel with the Ten Rod road, and about one mile north from that road. The Fort is about two miles from the Wickford Junc- tion Station on the Consolidated Railway. The accompanying map shows the locality.
To Scrabble town
N
School
W
E
Queen's)
Fort
S
Scale ' inches 1 mile
Asparansuck now Exeter Hill
0
0
Ten rod road
Railway
Wickford
Junction
Let me enter upon some accounts of this interesting spot ; inter- esting not alone for its historical association with the last of the Narragansetts, but also interesting because of the extraordinary character of the surface of the country. It is the extreme eastern spur of the hills which extend east and west through Exeter. The drawing which follows fairly well represents the form of the Fort. The builders, taking advantage of huge boulders, laid rough stone walls between them, making a continuous line. A military friend who made the rough drawing says: "There is a round bastion, or half moon, on the northeast corner of the Fort; and a Salient, or
-
237
DIAGRAM OF THE QUEEN'S FORT.
V-shaped point, or Flanker, on the west side." From the south the Fort is unapproachable because of the immense mass of huge boulders with which the hill is covered ; the passage by men in force among them is impossible. East, north and west the approaches are extremely difficult from the precipitous nature of the hill. The climbing of this hill is difficult even with a friend to help. What
Road
N
A
Boulders
5
Boul ders,
20
16.0
60
30
90
801
6
170
00
0
C
0
0
ENge Boulders
must it have been with an Indian, with his rifle in front? Many boulders lie within the walls of the Fort; beneath some of them are excavations sufficient to give shelter to one or two persons. but these are as nothing taken in comparison with the Queen's Chamber. This extraordinary chamber is not within the Fort, but outside, west.
Rough Diagram of Queens tout- 2 miles wat of Which ford quation
Northupso
238
THE QUEEN'S BED-ROOM.
and distant perhaps a hundred feet. It consists of an open space beneath an immense mass of boulder rocks; the tallest men can stand within it; the "floor" is fine white sand; the entrance is so hidden that six feet away it would never be suspected ; the boulders piled above it represent a thickness of fifty or sixty feet. Such is my rough description of the Queen's Chamber. The earliest mention by a direct name, in history, is that by Elisha R. Potter in 1835 (Early History of Narragansett, p. 84). Mr. Potter continues in a foot note: "These are the remains of an Indian Fort still known by the name of Queen's Fort, near the line between North Kingstown and Exeter; it is on the summit of a high hill completely covered with rocks, and the Fort appears to have been surrounded with a strong stone wall; there is a hollow in the rock which has been always known as the Queen's bedroom, and a large room, the entrance of which is nearly concealed, which is supposed by tradi- tion to have been a hiding place for the Indians, and in which arrow heads and other things have been found". This was written in 1835. but it rests chiefly on a much earlier authority, a little historical Tract published in London in 1676, entitled "Farther account of the Indian Warr". In this little book it is related how the Massa- chusetts and Plymouth army "with three Puritan clergymen reached Capt. Richard Smith's house at Cawcumsqussuck, whose dwelling is about four miles off the Narragansetts dwellings". The dwelling places of Canonicus, Miantinomi and down the entire line of Chief Sachems were all within a radius of five miles from the Queen's Fort.
The ancient chronicler continues: "Orders were given for a march, according to discretion, towards the Narragansetts' country, or town, when finding no Indians, they were at a stand not knowing which way to go in pursuit of the Indians; but during their stay they discovered some place under ground wherein was Indian corn laid up in store; this encouraged them to look further, and they found several good quantities of that grain in like manner." There are other incidents mentioned in this scarce Tract to which I wish here to refer. "The next day (December 15th) an Indian, called Stone-Wall John, pretending to come from the Sachems intimating their willingness to have peace". That evening he (Stone-Wall
.
MEN SHOT FROM THE QUEEN'S FORT. 239
. Jack ) not being gone a quarter of an houre ( from Smith's House) his company that lay hid behind a Hill, killed two Salem men, and at a house three miles off, where I had ten men, they killed two; instantly Capt. Mosely, myself and Capt. Gardner were sent to fetch in Major Appleton's company, that kept three and a half miles off ; in coming they ( the Indians) lay behind a Stone wall and fired thirty shots on us" (Drake's Old Indian Chronicle, 1836, p. 142). These details are here touched upon solely for the purpose of fixing a solid historical basis or foundation for the location of the Queen's Fort, for it was just east from the fort that these things took place. Three days later, on December ISth, some of the soldiers acci- dentally espied an Indian, so the ancient writer writes; but the Indian doubtless purposely exposed himself ; this Indian was taken to the General, who, on the Indian's refusal to answer questions, ordered him forthwith to be hanged ; whereupon, to save his life, he told them where the whole body of the Indians were. This Indian's name was Peter. It was Peter who led the English army to the Great Swamp Fight.
The Queen's Fort was first shown on the Walling map of Rhode Island in 1854. It was a suggestion by Elisha R. Potter, whose history of Narragansett first recorded it. The Richard Smith house, where the English army was in camp, was three and three- quarter miles in a direct line, southeast from the Queen's Fort. From Smith's house to the Swamp Fort the distance in a direct line is ten miles, southwest. From the Queen's Fort to the Swamp Fort the distance in a direct line is nine miles, southwest. From the Smith house to Jirch Bull's house, on Nancook, burned by the Indians, 16th December, 1675, it was eight miles in a direct line, south. The question then is, where was the Indian town four miles from Smith's house where so much com was found; and where were the Stone Walls, three and a half miles from Smith's house. from behind which the Indians fired ( thirty shots ) at Capt. Moseley? These localities could not have been south from Smith's house, for no such town existed along that coast to Jireh Bull's house eight miles distant : it could not have been east, for Smith's house was on the shore of Narragansett Bay; it could not have been north or northeast, because the Puritan army had just marched over
240
THE QUEEN WAS QUAIAPEN.
that country ; it could not have been southwest, for the reason that from this advanced post to the Swamp Fort the distance Mr. Hub- bards gives as fifteen or eighteen miles, whereas had it been south- west the distance would have been less than six miles; hence it must appear that the point we seek must lie either west or northwest from Smith's house. It cannot be west, for the distances render that direction impossible. It must therefore have been northwest. It may therefore be stated with a reasonable degree of historical accuracy that the Queen's Fort was the spot around which lay the great "town" of the Narragansetts in 1675, and from behind the stone walls of which the Indians fired thirty shots upon the advance post of the English army on the 15th December of that year. The Queen was Quaiapen. She had been the wife of Mexanno, who was the eldest son of Canonicus. She was a sister to Ninegret. the Great Niantic Sachem, not one of the debased Ninegrets of the following century. This Squaw-Sachem had, like all distin- guished Indians, several successive names, thus, Magnus; Matan- tuck ; the Saunck Squaw, meaning the wife of a Sachem; and the Old Queen of the Naragansetts. She was the mother of Quequa- ganet, the great Sachem, who sold the great tract called Petta- quamscut and other large tracts to the English. She was also the mother of Scuttape, who signed one of the Confirmation Deeds in 1659. She was related by blood or marriage with the most dis- tinguished Sachems of both tribes, the Niantics and the Narragan- setts. Canonicus, Mascus, Ninegret, Miantinomi, Wawaloam, the wife of Miantinomi, and the mother of Canonchet Mexanno, Que- quaganet, Scuttape, all were her relations, either by blood or mar- riage ; all were Sachems, and all being dead. Quaiapen became the great Squaw-Sachem of the Narragansetts, and her last stronghold was the Queen's Fort. Late in the month of June, 1676, Quaiapen with the small remnant of her tribe left living after the Swamp Fight, left the Queen's Fort on an expedition the nature of which is unknown. She had passed Nipsachook and encamped not far from Nachek on the south bank of the south branch of the Paw- tuxet river, in what is now Warwick. It was on Sunday morning. . July 2nd, 1676, when she was attacked by a party of Connecticut horsemen on one of their warlike excursions through Rhode Island ;
€
241
STONEWALL JOHN, THE BUILDER.
her band was stampeded and destroyed. It was indeed a massacre; not one escaped. Major Talcott, who commanded the troop, gives the number killed as being 238; other authorities swell the number to 300. On that day was slain Quaiapen ; and Potuck, her coun- sellor, a man, considering liis education, of wonderful subtlety, as one of the ancient chroniclers relates ; here, too, was slain Stonewall John, the great Indian Engineer of the Narragansetts (Conn. Hist. Coll. 2, 458), also (Trumbull's Hist. Conn. 1, 347). In speaking of the death of Quaiapen, Major Talcott describes her as "that ould peice of venum the Saunk-Squaw."
On the 2nd of July, 1676, Quaiapen and her counsellor Potuck, and her chiefest engineer Stone Wall John were butchered by a Connecticut troop in the massacre near Natick, on the Pawtuxet river. On the 12th August following, in 1676, William Harris wrote, here in Providence, this account of the personal. character of the Queen and her counsellor : "A great counciller of ye Narragan- setts, & spetially of a great woman ; yea ye greatest yt ther was ; ye sd woman, called ye Old Queene ; ye fore sd counciller her great- est favoret ; he doth as much excel in depth of judgment, common witts, as Saull was taller than Israel; he bore as much sway by his Councill at Narraganset, according to his, and theyer small proportions as great Mazerreen among the french". Mr. Harris here refers to Cardinal Mazarin (Coll. R. I. Hist. Soc. 10, 175). According to Mr. Harris, Potuck was not killed at the time that Quaiapen was slain, but "was still at Rhode Island, but in danger of being killed" (page 176). It remains for me to commemorate Stone Wall Jolin, the designer of these Indian defences so celebrated as the Swamp Fight Fort, and the Queen's Fort, the subject of this narrative. The force of this opinion lies in the fact that the carliest writers contemporary with this Indian mention his skill "in build- ing their Forts"; one of these contemporary authorities is cited by S. G. Drake; it is a manuscript letter written by Capt. James Oliver. second officer in command of the Massachusetts army. Those who desire to learn the ingenious structure of the Great Swamp Fort in the center of Quawanchunk (27) must study the early chroniclers. But concerning the Queen's Fort, the case is different ; it is not a question of argument ; the demonstration is ocular. Go and look
242
THE QUEEN'S FORT NEVER CAPTURED.
at it, for it still exists practically intact, the only existing structure of its now extinct people. Every student of these things sees at once that both these positions and both structures were unusual in character among Indian works. The positions must be considered as military defences for the homes, and hunting grounds of the great masses of these Indian tribes. These were north of the
Swamp Fort and west of the Queen's Fort, while the Great Sachems all dwelt just east from the latter fortification and under the protec- tion of its walls. Both were positions naturally of great strength, and both had been selected with military sagacity, and strengthened by engineering skill. The reason why I think that "Stone Wall John" (his Indian name has been lost ) was the constructor of these works is because the contemporary English writers have said that he, and he alone, of all the Indians, could do such things ; and they
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