King Philip Part 14

At an appointed signal, Awashonks' chief captain stepped forward from the circle, danced with frantic gesture around the fire, drew a brand from the flames, and, calling it by the name of a tribe hostile to the English, belabored it with bludgeon and tomahawk. He then drew out another and another, until all the tribes hostile to the English had been named, a.s.sailed, and exterminated. Reeking with perspiration, and exhausted by his phrensied efforts, he retired within the ring.

Another chief then came out and re-enacted the same scene, endeavoring to surpa.s.s his predecessor in the fierceness and fury of his efforts.

In this way all the chiefs took what they considered as their oath of fidelity to the English. The chief captain then came forward to Captain Church, and, presenting him with a fine musket, informed him that all the warriors were henceforth subject to his command. Captain Church immediately drew out a number of the ablest warriors, and the next morning, before the break of day, set out with them for Plymouth, where he arrived in the afternoon.

It is said that when King Philip, in the midst of his acc.u.mulating disasters, learned that the Saconet tribe had abandoned his cause and had gone over to the English, he was never known to smile again. He knew that his doom was now sealed, and that nothing remained for him but to be hunted as a wild beast of the forest for the remainder of his days. Though a few tribes still adhered to him, he was well aware that in these hours of disaster he would soon be abandoned by all.

Proudly, however, the heroic chieftain disdained all thoughts of surrender, and resolved to contend with undying determination to the last. We can not but respect his energy and deplore his fate.

Receiving a commission from the governor, Captain Church that same evening took the field, with a company of eighteen Englishmen and twenty-two Indians. They saw gleaming in the distant forest the camp-fires of the Indians. Creeping stealthily along, they surrounded a small band of savages, took them by surprise, and captured every one. From one of his prisoners he learned there was another party at Monponsett Pond. Carrying his prisoners back to Plymouth, he set out again the next night, and was equally successful in capturing every one of this second band. Thus for some days he continued very successfully hara.s.sing the Indians in the vicinity of the Middleborough Ponds. From one of his prisoners he ascertained that both Philip and Quinnapin, the husband of Wetamoo, were in the great cedar swamp, which was full of Indian warriors, and that a hundred Indians had gone on a foray down into Sconticut Neck, now Fair Haven.

The main body of the Plymouth forces was at Taunton. Philip did not dare attempt the pa.s.sage of the Taunton River, as it was carefully watched. He was thus hemmed in between the river and the sea. Church, with amazing energy and skill, drove his feeble bands from point to point, allowing them not one moment of rest. One Sabbath morning a courier was sent to the governor of the Plymouth colony, who happened to be at Marshfield, informing him that Philip, with a large army, was advancing, with the apparent intention of crossing the river in the vicinity of Bridgewater, and attacking that town. The governor immediately hastened to Plymouth, sent for Captain Church, who was in the meeting-house attending public worship, and requested him to rally all the force in his power, and march to attack the Indians.

Captain Church immediately called his company together, and, running from house to house, collected every loaf of bread in town for the supply of his troops.

Early in the afternoon he commenced his march, and early in the evening arrived at Bridgewater. As they were advancing in the darkness, they heard a sharp firing in the distance. It afterward appeared that Philip had felled a tree across the stream, which was there quite narrow, as a bridge for his men. Some energetic Bridgewater lads had watched the movements of the Indians, and had concealed themselves in ambush on the Bridgewater side of the stream.

As soon as the Indians commenced pa.s.sing over the tree, they poured in upon them a volley of bullets. Many dropped from the slender bridge, dead and wounded, into the river. The rest precipitately retreated.

This was on the evening of the 31st of July.

Early the next morning, Captain Church, having greatly increased his force by the inhabitants of Bridgewater, marched cautiously to the spot where Philip had attempted to effect a pa.s.sage. Accompanied by a single Indian, he crept to the banks of the stream where the tree had been. He saw upon the opposite side an Indian in a melancholy, musing posture, sitting alone upon a stump. He was within short musket shot.

Church clapped his gun to his shoulder, and was just upon the point of firing, when the Indian who accompanied him hastily called out for him not to fire, for he believed it was one of their own men. The Indian heard the warning, and, startled, looked up. Captain Church instantly saw it was King Philip himself. In another instant the report of a gun was heard, and a bullet whistled through the thin air, but Philip, with the speed of an antelope, was gone.

Captain Church immediately rallied his company, crossed the river, and pursued the Indians. The savages scattered and fled in all directions.

Church and his men picked up a large number of women and children flying in dismay through the woods. Among the rest, he captured the wife of Philip and their only son, a bright boy nine years of age.

Quinnapin, the husband of Wetamoo, with a large band of the Indians, retreated down the eastern bank of the river, looking anxiously for a place where they might ford the stream. Captain Church followed upon their trail, pursued them across the stream, and continued the chase until he thought it necessary to return and secure the prisoners.

The Saconet Indians begged permission to continue the pursuit. They returned the next morning, having shot several of the enemy, and bringing with them thirteen women and children as prisoners. The prisoners were all sent to Bridgewater, while bands of soldiers scoured the woods in all directions in pursuit of the fugitives. Every now and then the shrill report of the musket told that the bullet was accomplishing its deadly work. Another night came. It was dark and gloomy. Some of the captives informed the English that Philip, with a large party of his warriors, had sought refuge in a swamp. The heroic chief had heard of the capture of his wife and son, and his heart was broken. Dejected, disheartened, but unyielding, he still resolved to bid defiance to fate, and to contend sternly to the last. The Indian captives, with their accustomed treachery, guided the English to all the avenues of the swamp. Here Captain Church placed his well-armed sentinels, cutting off all escape, and watching vigilantly until the morning.

As soon as it was light, he sent two scouts to enter the swamp cautiously, and ascertain the position of the enemy. At the same moment Philip sent two of his warriors upon a tour of reconnoissance.

The two opposite parties met, and the Indians, with loud yells to give the alarm, fled toward their camp. Terrified with the apprehension that the whole English force was upon them, the Indians plunged like affrighted deer into the deeper recesses of the swamp, leaving their kettles boiling and their meat roasting upon their wooden spits. But they were surrounded, and there was no escape. The following scene, described by Captain Church himself, gives one an idea of the nature of this warfare.

"In this swamp skirmish, Captain Church, with his two men, who always ran by his side as his guard, met with three of the enemy, two of whom surrendered themselves, and the captain's guard seized them; but the other, being a great, stout, surly fellow, with his two locks tied up with red, and a great rattlesnake's skin hanging to the back part of his head, ran from them into the swamp. Captain Church in person pursued him close, till, coming pretty near up with him, he presented his gun between his shoulders, but it missing fire, the Indian perceived it, turned, and presented at Captain Church, and missing fire also, their guns taking wet from the fog and dew of the morning. But the Indian turning short for another run, his foot tripped in a small grape-vine, and he fell flat on his face. Captain Church was by this time up with him, and struck the muzzle of his gun an inch and a half into the back part of his head, which dispatched him without another blow.

"But Captain Church, looking behind him, saw another Indian, whom he thought he had killed, come flying at him like a dragon. But this happened to be fair within sight of the guard that was set to keep the prisoners, who, spying this Indian and others who were following him in the very seasonable juncture, made a shot upon them, and rescued their captain, though he was in no small danger from his friends' bullets, for some of them came so near him that he thought he felt the wind of them. The skirmish being over, they gathered their prisoners together, and found the number they had taken to be one hundred and seventy-three."

With these prisoners the English returned to Bridgewater. Captain Church drove the captives that night into the pound, and placed an Indian guard over them. They were abundantly supplied with food and drink. These poor wretches were so degraded, and so regardless of their fate, that they pa.s.sed the night in hideous revelry. Philip had by some unknown means escaped. With grief and shame we record that his wife and son were sent to Bermuda and sold as slaves, and were never heard of more. One of the Indian captives said to Captain Church,

"Sir, you have now made Philip ready to die. You have rendered him as poor and miserable as he used to make the English. All his relatives are now either killed or taken captive. You will soon have his head.

This last bout has broken his heart."

CHAPTER XI.

DEATH OF KING PHILIP.

1677

Fallen fortunes of Philip.--Execution of Sam Barrow.--Character of Wetamoo.--The queen drowned.--Deplorable condition of Philip.--Indomitable resolution.--Summary punishment.--Disposition of the army.--Confident of the capture of Philip.--The carnage commenced.--Rushing into danger.--Death of Philip.--Delight of Alderman.--Reception of the news.--Ign.o.ble treatment of the body.--An Indian executioner.--n.o.ble character of Philip.--His reluctance to commence war.--His foresight.--His humanity.--His mode of warfare.--Do justice to his memory.--Feelings for him in 1677.--Cotton Mather's record.--"In his fate, forget his crimes."--Annawan.--Plan for his capture.--The march.--A violent gale.--Resolution.--Reluctance of the Indians.--Uncomfortable night.--Successful decoy.--The plan repeated.--Making proselytes.--Advantages to be gained.--A feast.--The Indians in good-humor.--Women captured.--Capture of an old man.--His story.--A new enterprise proposed.--Energetic resolve of Captain Church.--Enthusiasm aroused.--The old man a guide.--Arrival at Annawan's retreat.--Drake's description of the place.--Annawan's retreat.--Annawan's retreat.--Employments of the Indians.--Precipitous descent.--Mode of entering the retreat.--Annawan captured.--A quiet surrender.--A grand repast.--Attempted repose.--Effect of excitement.--Disappearance of Annawan.--A magnificent present.--Address to Captain Church.--Relation of early adventures.--Attempt to save Annawan's life.--Tuspaquin.--His exploits.--Superst.i.tious belief.--Discovery of the Indians.--Capture of Tuspaquin's relatives.--Outrageous violation of faith.

The heroic and unfortunate monarch of the Wampanoags was now indeed a fugitive, and almost utterly desolate. A few of the more n.o.ble of the Indians still adhered faithfully to the fortunes of their ruined chieftain. The colonists pursued the broken bands of the Indians with indefatigable energy. A small party sought refuge at a place called Agawam, in the present town of Wareham. Captain Church immediately headed an expedition, pursued them, and captured the whole band. A notorious Indian desperado called Sam Barrow was among the number. He was a bloodthirsty wretch, who had filled the colony with the terror of his name. He boasted that with his own hand he had killed nineteen of the English. Captain Church informed him that, in consequence of his inhuman murders, the court could allow him no quarter. The stoical savage, with perfect indifference, said that he was perfectly willing to die, and only requested the privilege of smoking a pipe. He sat down upon a rock, while his Indian executioner stood by his side with his gleaming tomahawk in his hand. The savage smoked a few whiffs of tobacco, laid aside his pipe, and calmly said, "I am ready." In another instant the hatchet of the executioner sank deep into his brain. He fell dead upon the rock.

On the 6th of August one of Philip's Indians deserted his master and fled to Taunton. To make terms for himself, he offered to conduct the English to a spot upon the river where Wetamoo had secreted herself with a party of Poca.s.set warriors. Twenty of the inhabitants of Taunton armed themselves and followed their Indian guide. He led them to a spot now called Gardiner's Neck, in the town of Swanzey.

At the beginning of the war, Wetamoo, flushed with hope, had marched to the conflict leading three hundred warriors in her train. She was now hiding in thickets, swamps, and dens, with but twenty-six followers, and they dejected and despairing. Next to King Philip, Wetamoo had been the most energetic of the foes of the English. She was inspired with much of his indomitable courage, and was never wanting in resources. The English came upon them by surprise, and captured every one but Wetamoo herself. The heroic queen, too proud to be captured, instantly threw off all her clothing, seized a broken piece of wood, and plunged into the stream. Worn down by exhaustion and famine, her nerveless arm failed her, and she sank beneath the waves. Her body, like a bronze statue of marvelous symmetry, was soon after found washed upon the sh.o.r.e. As faithful chroniclers, we must declare, though with a blush, that the English cut off her head, and set it upon a pole in their streets, a trophy ghastly, b.l.o.o.d.y, revolting. Many of her subjects were in Taunton as captives. When they beheld the features of their beloved queen, they filled the air with shrieks of lamentation.

The situation of Philip was now indescribably deplorable. All the confederate tribes had abandoned him; the most faithful of his followers had already perished. His only brother was dead; his wife and only son were slaves in the hands of the English, doomed to unending bondage; every other relative was cold in death. The few followers who still, for their own protection, accompanied him in his flight, were seeking in dismay to save their own lives. His domain, which once spread over wide leagues of mountain and forest, was now contracted to the dark recesses and dismal swamps where, as a hunted beast, he sought his lair. There was no place of retreat for him. All the Connecticut Indians had become his bitter foes, because he had embroiled them in a war which had secured their ruin. The Mohawks, upon the Hudson, were thirsting for his blood.

Still, this indomitable man would not think of yielding. He determined, with a resolution which seemed never to give way, to fight till a bullet from the foe should pierce his brain. In this hour of utter hopelessness, one of Philip's warriors ventured to urge him to surrender to the English. The haughty monarch immediately put the man to death as a punishment for his temerity and as a warning to others.

The brother of this Indian, indignant at such severity, deserted to the English, and offered to guide them to the swamp where Philip was secreted. The ruined monarch had returned to the home of his childhood to fight his last battles and to die.

Captain Church happened to be at this time, with a party of volunteers, at Rhode Island, having crossed over by the ferry from Tiverton. Here he met the Indian traitor. "He was a fellow of good sense," says Captain Church, "and told his story handsomely." He reported that Philip was upon a little spot of upland in the midst of a miry swamp just south of Mount Hope. It was now evening. Half of the night was spent in crossing the water in canoes. At midnight Captain Church brought all his company together, and gave minute directions respecting their movements. They surrounded the swamp. With the earliest light of the morning they were ordered to creep cautiously upon their hands and feet until they came in sight of their foes. As soon as anyone discovered Philip or any of his men, he was to fire, and immediately all were to rise and join in the pursuit. To make sure of his victim, Captain Church also formed a second circle surrounding the swamp, placing an Englishman and an Indian behind trees, rocks, etc., so that no one could pa.s.s between them. He also stationed small parties in selected places in ambuscade.

Having completed all his arrangements, he took his friend Major Sandford by the hand, and said,

"I have now so posted my men that I think it impossible that Philip should escape us."

He had hardly uttered these words ere the report of a musket was heard in the swamp, and this was instantaneously followed by a whole volley.

Some of the Indians had been discovered, and the murderous work was commenced. The morning had as yet but just dawned. An awful scene of dismay, tumult, and blood ensued. Philip, exhausted by days and nights of the most hara.s.sing flight and fighting, had been found soundly asleep. The few warriors still faithful to him, equally exhausted, were dozing at his side. A party of the English crept cautiously within musket shot of their sleeping foes, discharged a volley of bullets upon them, and then rushed into their encampment.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE DEATH OF KING PHILIP.]

The dreams of the despairing fugitive were disturbed by the crash of musketry, the whistling of bullets, and the shout and the onset of his foes. He leaped from his couch of leaves, and, like a deer, bounded from hummock to hummock in the swamp. It so happened that he ran directly upon an ambush which Captain Church had warily established.

An Englishman and the Indian deserter, whose name was Alderman, stood behind a large tree, with their guns c.o.c.ked and primed. As Philip, bewildered and unconscious of his peril, drew near, the Englishman took deliberate aim at him when he was but at the distance of a few yards, and sprung his lock. The night dews of the swamp had moistened the powder, and his gun missed fire. The life of Philip was thus prolonged for one half of a minute. The traitor Alderman then eagerly directed his gun against the chief to whom but a few hours before he had been in subjection. A sharp report rang through the forest, and two bullets, for the gun was double charged, pa.s.sed almost directly through the heart of the heroic warrior. For an instant the majestic frame of the chieftain, as he stood erect, quivered from the shock, and then he fell heavy and stone dead in the mud and water of the swamp.

Alderman, delighted with his exploit, ran eagerly to inform Captain Church that he had shot King Philip. Church ordered him to be perfectly silent about it, that his men might more vigorously pursue the remaining warriors. For some time the pursuit and the carnage continued. Captain Church then, by a concerted signal, called his army together, and informed them of the death of their formidable foe. The tidings were received with a simultaneous shout of exultation, which, repeated again and again, reverberated through the solitudes of the forests. The whole army then advanced to the spot where the sovereign of the Wampanoags lay gory in death. They had but little reverence for an Indian, and, seizing the body, they dragged it, as if it had been the carca.s.s of a wild beast, through the mud to an upland slope, where the ground was dry. Here, for a time, they gazed with exultation upon the great trophy of their victory, and spurned the dishonored body as if it had been a wolf or a panther which had been destroying their families and their flocks. Captain Church then said,

"Forasmuch as he has caused many an Englishman's body to lie unburied and to rot above the ground, not one of his bones shall be buried."

An old Indian executioner, a vulgar, bloodthirsty wretch, was then called to cut up the body. With bitter taunts he stood over him with his hatchet, and cut off his head and quartered him. Philip had one remarkable hand, which was much scarred by the explosion of a pistol.

This hand was given to Alderman, who shot him, as his share of the spoil. Alderman preserved it in rum, and carried it around the country as a show, "and accordingly," says Captain Church, "he got many a penny by it." We would gladly doubt the statement, if we could, that the head of this ill-fated chief was sent to Plymouth, where it was for a long time exposed on a gibbet. The four quarters of the mangled body were hung upon four trees, and there they remained swinging in the moaning wind until the elements wasted them away.

Thus fell Pometacom, perhaps the most ill.u.s.trious savage upon the North American continent. The interposition of Providence alone seems to have prevented him from exterminating the whole English race upon this continent. Though his character has been described only by those who were exasperated against him to the very highest degree, still it is evident that he possessed many of the n.o.blest qualities which can embellish human nature.

It is said that with reluctance and anguish he entered upon the war, and that he shed tears when the first English blood was shed. His extraordinary kindness to the Leonards, inducing him to avert calamities from a whole settlement, lest they, by some accident, might be injured, develops magnanimity which is seldom paralleled. He was a man of first-rate abilities. He foresaw clearly that the growth of the English power threatened the utter extermination of his race. War thus, in his view, became a dire necessity. No man could be more conscious of its fearful peril. With sagacity which might excite the envy of the ablest of European diplomatists, he bound together various heterogeneous and hostile tribes, and guided all their energies.

Though the generality of the Indians were often inhuman in the extreme, there is no evidence that Philip ever ordered a captive to be tortured, while it is undeniable that the English, in several instances, surrendered their captives to the horrid barbarities of their savage allies.

"His mode of making war," says Francis Baylies, "was secret and terrible. He seemed like the demon of destruction hurling his bolts in darkness. With cautious and noiseless steps, and shrouded by the deep shade of midnight, he glided from the gloomy depths of the woods. He stole on the villages and settlements of New England, like the pestilence, unseen and unheard. His dreadful agency was felt when the yells of his followers roused his victims from their slumbers, and when the flames of their blazing habitations glared upon their eyes. His pathway could be traced by the horrible desolation of its progress, by its crimson print upon the snows and the sands, by smoke and fire, by houses in ruins, by the shrieks of women, the wailing of infants, and the groans of the wounded and the dying. Well indeed might he have been called the 'terror of New England.' Yet in no instance did he transcend the ordinary usages of Indian warfare.

"We now sit in his seats and occupy his lands; the lands which afforded a bare subsistence to a few wandering savages can now support countless thousands of civilized people. The aggregate of the happiness of man is increased, and the designs of Providence are fulfilled when this fair domain is held by those who know its use; surely we may be permitted at this day to lament the fate of him who was once the lord of our woods and our streams, and who, if he wrought much mischief to our forefathers, loved some of our race, and wept for their misfortunes!"

There was, however, but little sympathy felt in that day for Philip or any of his confederates. The truly learned and pious but pedantic Cotton Mather, allowing his spirit to be envenomed by the horrid atrocities of Indian warfare, thus records the tragic end of Pometacom:

"The Englishman's piece would not go off, but the Indians presently shot him through his venomous and murderous heart.

And in that very place where he first contrived and commenced his mischief, this Agag was now cut in quarters, which were then hanged up, while his head was carried in triumph to Plymouth, where it arrived on the very day that the church was keeping a solemn thanksgiving to G.o.d. G.o.d sent them in the head of a Leviathan for a thanksgiving feast."

We must remember that the Indians have no chroniclers of their wrongs, and yet the colonial historians furnish us with abundant incidental evidence that outrages were perpetrated by individuals of the colonists which were sufficient to drive any people mad. No one can now contemplate the doom of Pometacom, the last of an ill.u.s.trious line, but with emotions of sadness.

"Even that he lived is for his conqueror's tongue; By foes alone his death-song must be sung.

No chronicles but theirs shall tell His mournful doom to future times.