LIVING IN FEAR

At length they came and beset our own House, and quickly it was the dolefullest day that ever mine eyes saw ~ Mary Rowlandson

War sets the stage

The relationship between the English settlers and the indigenous people already living in the New World was always complicated. There was indeed mutual friendship, aid and trade. On the other side of the coin, there was never a time in the early history of English settlement in New England that didn't involve conflict with the Natives. For the colonists, threat of attack from Native people became a way of life. Few were the settlers that didn't, at some time or another, live through an assault on their town which killed their loved ones and destroyed part, if not all, of their villages.

Before the colonists arrived in the New World, the seeds of war had already been planted. The Pequot, Narragansett and Mohegan were the strongest and most warlike Native confederations in New England and these tribes were constantly vying for mastery of their domain. The arrival of Dutch, French and English settlers led to further factioning over land, lucrative trade deals and allies in times of war.

The Pequot war in 1636 had set the stage for further violence that was to come. Peace treaties made between war-weary factions turned out to be mere bandaids for festering sores. Forty-six years down the line, King Philip's War raged, ever more brutal with each passing month. Inhabitants of all ages in English towns were slaughtered, homes were burned to the ground and crops destroyed. From June 1675 to the summer of 1677, New England colonists suffered through at least 130 recorded raids and ambushes. One thousand men, women, children and soldiers were killed. Thousands more were displaced by the complete destruction of thirteen towns and the partial burning of six more.

The Natives, of course, eventually fared much worse than the settlers as entire villages and food sources were lost to them forever. Historian Douglas Leach aptly described the situation for both sides: "A number of communities which had once been thriving centers of human activity now existed only as jumbles of blackened ruins and weed-choked gardens."

We had many family members caught up in the violence surrounding them. Here are just three of of their stories.

Lancaster

The most famous Native attack during King Philip's War happened in February of 1676. The raid on the town of Lancaster, MA, became widely known due to a book written by Mary Rowlandson which was published six years after her ordeal. In one of the most destructive attacks of the entire war, about twenty settlers were killed and another twenty-four taken captive. Mary Rowlandson, her sister Hannah White Divoll and their children we among those marched north and later ransomed. Three years later, Hannah would marry our uncle, Samuel Loomis (8U) of Ipswich.

The far west frontier settlement of Lancaster, founded in 1643, had grown into a thriving town of more than fifty families when King Philip's War began in 1675. A succesful saw mill provided lumber for sturdy homes, a meeting house and a church. The rich soil provided abundant gardens and orchards for food and, in spite of its westerly location, relations with Native neighbors had remained peaceful for thirtly years.

Red = Lancaster

Hannah White, married John Divoll in 1663. Over the next twelve years the Divolls lived a quiet life in Lancaster raising their four children and managing their farm. King Philip's War began in earnest in June of 1675. Throughout the rest of that year, Lancaster suffered from scattered Native attacks on individual houses and farms in town. Garrison houses were established and the Lancaster residents, like those in all outlying New England towns, lived a life filled with ever increasing anxiety.

the attack

Their anxiety was well founded. On the morning of February 10, 1676, Lancaster was suddenly attacked on all sides by some 500 warriors from multiple tribes. The townspeople quickly scattered to assigned garrison houses which were immediatly set upon by the Natives. The garrison which suffered the most severe attack was the Rowlandson house.

Forty-two people huddled together in that garrison. Included were the Reverend Joseph Rowlandson and his family along with Mary Rowlandson's sister, Hannah Divoll, and her family. The best report we have of the attack and its aftermath comes from the book that Reverend Rowlandson's wife Mary wrote not long after she was released from captivity.

The attack on Lancaster began in the morning and, according to Mary, "quickly it was the dolefullest day that ever mine eyes saw." The men in the garrison made a courageous attempt to defend their families but, two hours after the fighting began, the Rowlandson garrison house was set ablaze. With no choice but to flee the burning building, most of the men and older boys were killed instantly. Only one man from that garrison escaped the assault with his life. Mary Rowlandson was shot through her side and her daughter, six years old, had a bullet go through her stomach. "Thus," wrote Mary Rowlandson, "were we butchered by those merciless heathens, standing amazed with the blood running down to our heels."

Mary wrote that her older sister (not Hannah Divoll), upon finding that her son was dead and her sister wounded exclaimed, "Lord let me die with them; which was no sooner said, but she was struck with a bullet, and fell down dead..."

With the men out of the way, the Natives turned to the business of plundering and burning the homesteads before driving off all livestock. All of the slain men were "stripped naked by a company of hell-hounds... Oh the roaring, and singing and dancing, and yelling of those black creatures in the night, which made the place a lively resemblance of hell...” Among the dead were Hannah Divoll's husband and her eldest son. Also killed were Hannah's older sister, and three of her nephews.

The remaining inhabitants of the garrison, about twenty-four women and children, were left alive for a reason. During the war years and for many years afterward, Natives found the taking of captives to be an extremely lucrative business. The settlers were willing to pay large ransoms to get their loved ones back. So began a grueling ordeal for these twenty-four survivors, written about in detail by Mary Rowlandson. "Now away we must go with those barbarous creatures, with our bodies wounded and bleeding, and our hearts no less than our bodies."

After the attack, the town of Lancaster was completely evacuated. Residents lucky enough to escaped death or capture were transported by soldiers with their remaining moveable propery to eastern towns where they found homes with friends until after the war.

Shortly after Lancaster was vacated, what remained of the town, except for the church and one dwelling, was burned to the ground by the Natives. "There was nothing left but smoking and blackened ruins in this lovely valley...the settlement was abandoned. The town was destroyed."

the march

Mrs. Rowlandson's account of the captive's ensuing misery is quite graphic, told in a series of what she calls "removes." The English prisoners were divided into different groups, most separated from their loved ones. Mary had only her wounded daughter with her. The Natives marched their captives north into ever harsher weather. On the second day, as the snow began, Mary wrote that "I must sit all this cold winter night upon the cold snowy ground, with my sick child in my arms." On the ninth day Mary's child died of her stomach wounds. She was six years old.

Captive Mary Rowlandson by Edward Whymper

After days filled with a slow trudge through the snow, the group came to a Native village where they were able to stay for some weeks. There, Mary was finally allowed to see her ten year old daughter who was being held "at a wigwam not very far off..." and one of her sons who "was amongst a smaller parcel of Indians, whose place was about six miles off."

Mary describes one particularly sad incident involving a woman who had a small child with her and was ready to give birth to another: "...she having much grief upon her spirit...being so near her time, she would be often asking the Indians to let her go home; they not being willing to that, and yet vexed with her importunity, gathered a great company together about her and stripped her naked...and when they had sung and danced about her...they knocked her on head, and the child in her arms with her. When they had done that they made a fire and put them both into it."

Note: On these marches it was common for the weaker captives to be killed along the way so they wouldn't slow down the progress of the party.

Finding food, always scarce in the cold winter months, became a major problem for both the captives and their captors. All would often go days without eating. Though the Natives had barely enough to feed themselves, they also had a keen interest in keeping their prisoners alive. The English captives were valuable not only for ransom money, but also as barter for much needed guns and ammunition. In addition, many Natives had familes interred on islands in the Boston Harbor. Prisoner exchanges became a fairly common occurance.

As the wife of a minister, Mary Rowlandson was particularly valuable and actually received better treatment than most. One day, the Natives allowed her to walk alone to a neighboring village to visit her son. Mary remembered that, as she walked that mile, she could not " but admire at the wonderful power and goodness of God to me, in that, though I was gone from home, and met with all sorts of Indians, and those I had no knowledge of, and there being no Christian soul near me; yet not one of them offered the least imaginable miscarriage to me."

the return

Some of the captives had unfortunatley succumbed to the trials of the long trek north. For the surivors, deals were eventually hammered out between the Natives and their families. After three long months, the remaining captives were brought back to the deserted town of Lancanster. The journey back, made in the beautiful springtime month of May, was far less demanding but the return was bittersweet. After ransoms had been duly paid, the captives were set free to be enveloped in the welcoming arms of their loved ones. Still, all who had endured the hardship of captivity came home to face the grevious loss of fallen loved ones and demolished homes. The ransomed captives and their famililes then left Lancaster to wait out the war in the safe zone.

Hannah Divoll's story most likely mirrored that of her sister, Mary Rowlandson. After Hannah and her three remaining children were ransomed, it seems likely that she made her way to Ipswich where she met our uncle Samuel Loomis. Samuel's wife had died two years earlier in 1674. Samuel and Hannah were married in 1678 and had one son together, born the next year.

Samuel had been given some property by his father, our grandfather Edward Loomis (9GGF), before Edward's death. Still, he was treated rather shabbily in his father's will. Edward left his house and all his property to his son Jonathan (8U). To Samuel, his first born, he left one yoke of oxen. To add insult to injury he included this passage: “and if my son Samuel should quarrel and not be satisfied with what I have given him, then my will is, that my executor shall enjoy it..."

Hopefully, in spite of their trials and tribulations, Samuel and Hannah lived a prosperous, happy life together and Hannah was able to put her horrific ordeal behind her.

a life filled with tragedy

Our cousin Samuel Richardson (1C8X) lived in the part of Woburn that is now Winchester, near Horn Pond. His farm, inherited from his father Samuel (8U), was on that stretch of land known as Richardson's Row.

(1) Grandpa Thomas Richardson (2) Uncle Ezekiel Richardson (3) Uncle Samuel Richardson

Samuel's life was, unfortunately, riddled with misfortune. His first wife, Martha, died in 1673 on the very day that her third child was born. Nine months later Samuel was lucky enough to find a new mother for his three young children. But less than a year after he and his new wife, Hannah, had been married, King Philip's War erupted and Samuel left his family to do his part in "defending the colony." While Samuel was fortunate enough to make it back to Woburn safely, more tragedy struck the family on April 10, 1676.

On that day, Samuel was hard at work out in the fields. He had his six year old son, also Samuel (2C7X), with him for company. Hearing screams from the direction of town, Samuel rushed back to his home. By the time he reached the house, all was quiet. Too quiet, as Samuel found out. Inside the house he found the bodies of his wife Hannah and his six year old son Thomas (2C7X), twin to Samuel, Jr. Searching further, Samuel found tiny week old Hannah (2C7X), slain as well. Only Samuel's four-year-old daughter Elizabeth (2C7X) survived, possibly taken from the home by a neighbor.

Revenge is a powerful emotion. Samuel feverishly gathered men from the town and went in pursuit of the Natives who had attacked his house. The men shot and killed the first Native they saw, standing on a rock. Two other Natives with him fled. It is, of course, impossble to know if the Native that was shot was actually responsible for the death of his wife and children. Sadly, these episodes of all encompassing rage and a desire for revenge became much too common on both sides.

Samuel didn't waste any time in his efforts to put his life back together. Only seven months after the attack on his house, Samuel had married our cousin Phebe Baldwin (1C8X). A year later, in 1677, they were blessed with a son, Zachariah (2C7X). A mere two years after Zacahriah's birth, Phebe was dead, leaving Samuel with two children from his first marriage and Phebe's two-year-old son.

In the course of six years, Samuel had lost three wives and two of his children. But he was evidently not down and out. Eleven months after Phebe's death, Samuel married a fourth and final time to new wife Sarah. Together they had nine children. Samuel lived to see most of these children grown. He died in 1712 at age 66 leaving only two children under eighteen.

the Grangers in Brookfield

Cousin Rebecca Granger (1C10X) was the daughter of Launcelot Granger and our aunt Joanna Adams Granger (9A) from Newbury. Laucelot had moved his family to Suffield in Connecticut and Suffield is where Joanna met her husband Joseph Woolcot. In 1687, Joseph moved his family to Brookfield, Massachusetts. As it turned out, this was a costly move. Only one year later, King William's War broke out.

Red = Brookfield, MA Blue = Suffield, CT

Connecticut, due to their extremely amicable relations with the Natives in that area, was the safest place to be during the war and Suffield, while a far western settlement, was still one of Connecticut's safest towns. Not one person was killed in Suffield during the entire string of wars that brought so much anguish to the first settlers of New England. Brookfield, on the other hand, had been one of the most heavily hit frontier towns in Massachusetts during King Philip's War. Still on the fringes of the colony, Brookfield was again ripe for attack in the new war that had just begun against the French and their Native American allies.

The Woolcott family survived five troubled years living in the line of fire. Then, in July of 1693, the governor of New France sent a party of forty Native Canadians out to attack various and sundry Massachusetts settlements. On 27 Jul 1693, they chose Brookfield. An account of the attack on the Woolcot family was written down by Brookfield resident John Pynchon two days later:

"...about noon the 27th of July, Joseph Woolcott came from his own house to the garrison house, with one of his children in his arms, crying Arm! Arm! and said he doubted (worried) his wife and other children were killed by the Indians, he seeing 2 or 3 Indians after her, so snatched up that child and come away himself being shot after and pursued, only turned into a swamp and hid from them."

Joseph was right to be worried. Joanna and their two children were later found. They and three other townspeople had been killed. Four others were missing and never found.

Brookfield, like Maine and other outlying regions, continued to be in the line of fire for many years. Sixteen years after Joanna and her children were killed, her brother Robert (1C10X) was killed by Natives in Brookfield. This happened towards the end of yet another war, Queen Anne's, begun in 1702. From town records of 1709: "Aug 8, Robert Granger and John Clary were passing along the road in Brookfield; and being fired upon by the savages, Granger was killed on the spot..."

These three accounts are only a small sampling of the extreme uncertainty the settlers and Natives Americans lived with every day of their lives. While sharing the land might seem like a noble idea, it appears to be an idea that doesn't sit well with human beings and that unfortunate trait has caused untold misery and suffering over thousands of years.