The English victory at Acushnet marked a turning point in the war for the Dawnlands. In a single afternoon Metacom had lost enough dried corn and fish to feed his entire army and his followers for several months. The work of hundreds of hands laboring over the course of years had gone up in smoke. At the time, Benjamin Church wrote of it as the beginning of the end for the Wampanoag, and across New England a sense of relief spread as the myth of Metacom's invincibility was shattered.
In the days after the battle, Governor Winslow rested his army near the ruins of Acushnet and Dartmouth, along the western side of the outlet where the Acushnet River meets the ocean. Weeks of marching and fighting left the three companies under his command (two of Plymouth militia including Benjamin Church's and one of Massachusetts Bay militia under Captain William Bradford) physically exhausted, and the fight to take Acushnet had left them low on lead shot and gunpowder. Given these conditions some of Winslow's officers privately felt the expedition should build a new fortress at Dartmouth and then turn back to Plymouth, yet the Governor had his eyes set on bigger prizes.
Interrogations with captured Wampanoag civilians revealed the presence of a newly established fortified village named Nemasket on a strip of land sandwiched between Assowompset Pond, Long Pond, and Great Quittacas Pond near Middleborough. These informants reported that Metacom had made his war-time capitol there and that most of his remaining supplies and supporters now resided in that village. Throwing caution to the wind, Governor Winslow did not wait for a chance to resupply his troops or hand off his Wampanoag captives before proceeding against the village.
Instead, he waited until his troops had recovered physically from their previous ordeals and then led his entire force north up the old Indian path running between Dartmouth and Middleborough. Departing camp on the morning of August 2nd, Winslow led 250 militiamen north alongside 150 Wampanoag prisoners in a column that stretched along the trail for approximately 150 meters (500 feet). August 2nd, dawned sunny and without a wisp of humidity and Winslow's column made good progress throughout the morning, progressing through a swamp that marked the Wampanoag side of the pre-war border by the early afternoon.
Yet, at this point, Winslow's column came under attack. Metacom had learned of the militia's movements just two hours after they set off from camp, and he decided to engage them along the trail to Nemasket rather than allow them to reach the village. Moving out of Nemasket with nearly half the warriors remaining to him, Metacom organized a tiered defense of his village. Splitting his formation into three bodies, the first would be charged with engaging the English militia column in a long distance running skirmish, meant to wear them down. The second formation was supposed to organize small-scale ambushes on the approaching enemy, and the third was intended to deliver the coup de grâce. Metacom would take command of the third formation while he entrusted his top field commander Annawan with command over the other two. Annawan was to have the first two formations retreat into the third formation after offering limited resistance to the English.
The first formation encountered Winslow's militia around 13:00 and a vicious skirmish broke out in the woods. Winslow had posted Benjamin Church to the vanguard of his force, and Church's advanced scouts managed to spot and engage Annawan's warriors before they got into range of the main column. Casualties from the initial clash were light on both sides and after exchanging a few rounds of fire the Wampanoag skirmishers retreated north to regroup and rally more warriors before engaging Church's skirmish line again. This time Church's men began to run out of ammunition, and thus Winslow was forced to strip powder and lead from men in the rear of the column to keep the engagement in the front going.
The battle continued like this for a while until Winslow's army came upon an area along the path where Wampanoag axe men had felled several trees to create an obstruction for the English militia to overcome. Benjamin Church knew this meant an ambush was coming and led his men forward in a charge to secure the area around the felled trees so that the main column could hack them apart and clear the road. Seeing Church's line advance, Annawan ordered his marksmen to unleash two shots each into the charging English before melting into the forest once again. This meant that the English were successful at clearing the obstacle, however by the time they were past it, they'd taken several casualties and that only around 50% of the army still had ammunition for their firearms.
Just a short while later, Benjamin Church reported to Winslow that his scouts saw another felled-tree obstruction up the road from them. Winslow ordered it cleared once again, yet this time the Wampanoag resistance is far stiffer. Church organized his company and the Massachusetts Bay militia to charge and secure the flanks of the ambush site as he had before, but this time the Wampanoag warriors do not melt into the woods. Instead, they execute a feigned retreat against the militia, waiting for them to get tired tromping through the underbrush before turning around and peppering them with fire. This tactic proves devastating and results in Captain Bradford of the Massachusetts Bay militia, Suffolk Regiment, getting cut off from the main body of his troops and getting his head blown off.
Bradford'd death causes some of the Massachusetts men to break, yet Governor Winslow is able to rally them, eventually sending his last company forward to aid in the fight. This proves to be enough to impress Annawan, and he orders his warriors to withdraw again, back to the third echelon of Metacom's defense. Winslow took this respite to reorganize his command and clear the second obstacle. Hoping that the worst was now behind him, the governor proceeded north, reaching within a mile of Long Pond. Yet, Metacom was far from defeated and having his whole force now combined and reorganized under his command, he ordered an attack against the bedraggled militia. Extremely low on ammunition and exhausted from hours of fighting, Winslow's army simply disintegrated around him. The first to run are the men of Massachusetts Bay, followed by some militiamen from the Plymouth company.
During the combat, Winslow lingers in the rear of the column, keeping a close eye on the prisoners and baggage train, and watches as his men kill several of the prisoners before they all start to flee from the field as well. Benjamin Church and his company are the last of the English to run, but even they are essentially routed off the field after a few minutes. In the chaos, hundreds of weapons are dropped and dozens of Wampanoag prisoners freed and English prisoners taken. In the aftermath all discipline breaks down on the field as the victorious Wampanoag army begins looting the dead and captured, meaning they do not immediately attempt to pursue their opponents.
Eventually though a pursuit is organized and Metacom and Annawan chase Winslow all the way back to the ruins of Dartmouth. By then night has fallen though and over the 2nd and 3rd no further fighting happens between the two parties. Over the next day Metacom attempts to cut off the survivors and surround them, planning a final attack for the night of the 5th, yet that attack never comes. Instead, on the night of the 3rd/4th a thunderstorm rolls in off the ocean and Winslow uses it as his chance to escape. Leading the bedraggled remnants of his army north he manages to slip across the rapids on the Acushnet River without fighting the Wampanoag who now must contend with their own lack of usable gunpowder. Now free from encirclement Winslow is able to extricate his army from the situation and arrives back in Plymouth in the late afternoon on August 4th. In all some 100 Massachusetts and Plymouth militia are killed or seriously wounded in the encounter while 30 are captured by the Wampanoag and another 60 Wampanoag prisoners are freed -- all in exchange for 25 Wampanoag warriors.
Yet, while the victory was tactically decisive its strategic significance is still contested. With more English armies preparing to descend on the Wampanoag heartlands Metacom may come to regret his failure to destroy Winslow and his entire army while he had the chance. Even so the victory has bought him more time. What he does with it could make all the difference.
Major Simon Willard and Bashaba Passaconaway, father of Sachems Mono and Wonalancet
War in the Land Between
In the aftermath of the attacks on Quabaug and Quinsigamond, many prominent Massachusetts settlers grew even more hateful and prejudicial toward "that Heathen people amongst whom we live" (Increase Mathers). To many, the distinction between a praying Indian and the demonic Wampanoag was academic. After all, Muttawmp's chief Nipmuc ally, Matoonas, was a praying Indian. Matoonas had even served the English as a constable of the praying Indian town of Pakachoag, and many of his followers had lived there for years before the uprising. Few Englishmen remembered how, in 1671, local settlers executed his son on suspicion of murdering an Englishman.
Throughout the first days of August, threats and recriminations wrang out within both chambers of the Massachusetts General Court. In the lower and upper houses, prominent men representing powerful factions, such as the old Puritan elite and the merchants, called out for more active restrictions against the Praying Indians. The democratically elected representatives of the lower house, the "House of Deputies," were the fastest to act, and on August 4, they passed a bill banning the movement of praying Indians outside of their settlements without special permissions and restraining their movement inside of English towns to the local prisons. The upper house, the "House of Assistants," spent several days deliberating before approving it. Governor Leverett supported the legislation and successfully amended the original legislation so that local elites and militia commanders were responsible for managing the praying Indian travel permitting system.
Most colonists were happy about these changes, but there was some dissent. From his seat in the House of Assistants, Superintendant of Praying Indians, Daniel Gookin, spoke out against the enterprise. He predicted that the bill was likely to only further "inflame the frontier" and was joined by Rev. John Eliot, who wrote to tell the body it was attempting to destroy his life's work. Unimpressed, though, the General Court and the Governor forged ahead with their project. Several days after the first legislation concerning praying Indians was passed, in the aftermath of the battle of Nemasket Paths, both houses approved another law raising a bounty on the scalps of rebel Indians. Governor Leverett ensured that the colony would offer higher bounties for living captives. Yet, his intention was not to save many of them but instead to sell the bulk into slavery in the Caribbean. Rev. Eliot spoke out against the bill, warning that God would punish anyone who sold Christian slaves, but his words represented the feelings of a small minority.
Despite these actions, Massachusetts was successful in gathering enough praying Indian and Pawtucket auxiliaries to outfit all of its major militia formations with Indigenous scouts by the end of the first week of August. Among the quickest to arrive were twenty Pawtucket warriors under Abooksigun, a son-in-law of Sachem Wenepoykin. Weeks of negotiations between Governor Leverett and the gnarled Sachem resulted in a secret agreement between the two that saw the Pawtucket serve as key participants in Massachusetts' first thrust into Nipmuc country.
Rallying in Lancaster, Governor Leverett ordered the men of Middlesex County to raise another army to strike at a band of Nipmuc known as the Nashaway at their primary town, Waushacum, and then to march against their various villages scattered near Mount Wachusett. The Nashaway were known to be unhappy with the colonists; they possessed many of the issues with them that were common among their neighbors. Yet, the Nipmuc did not operate as a unified Confederacy, and the Nashaway did not participate in the attacks on Quabaog and Quinsigamond. The leader of the Nashaway, known variously to the English as Sagamore Sam and One-Eyed John and among his fellow Algonquians as Monoco, Upchattuck, and Shoshanim, was a descendant of high royalty. He was the son of the infamous Bashaba (Sagamore of Sagamores) Passaconoway, who ruled over the Penacook when they were at the height of their power, and his elder brother was Wonalancet, Sagamore of the Penacook, recently relocated to Lake Winnipesaukee.
Governor Leverett hoped his act of aggression would serve to model a new strategy he had developed to win the war. Dubbed "the Salem System," the Governor proposed having the colony pay and reward its soldiery by signing over the spoils of conquest to them. They would receive cash for all lands seized, all Indians captured or killed, and all loot taken from them. Passed piecemeal between the debates on the rights of praying Indians and scalping bounties, the system once propagated inspired hundreds of poor men to enlist. In Lancaster, a small army of 200 militiamen from Concord and Groton was rallied and prepared for action by August 11th. They were joined there by 20 Pawtucket auxiliaries and 10 Praying Indian scouts, and the entire force fell under the command of the head of the Middlesex County Regiment, the 70-year-old Major Simon Willard.
Trouble emerged between the English and their Indigenous allies early on in the campaign when one of the Pawtucket warriors fled from Lancaster on the night of the 10th to warn Sachem Monoco of what was coming. At the time, Major Willard was uncertain of what had happened, but the incident cost the Pawtucket his trust. Leaving Lancaster on the morning of the 12th, with Praying Indian scouts in the lead, Willard led his army southwest along a well-trod path to Waushacum. Built between two lakes on a bit of fertile farmland less than 5 miles away from Lancaster, Waushacum and Lancaster shared a long history. Lancaster was built on land sold to the English by Monoco, and in better times, the two communities engaged in a very active trade in furs, beads, alcohol, and guns. Years ago, the population of beaver and other game animals plummeted, though, and since then, Monoco fell afoul of local traders by incurring great debts to them.
What the Sachem lacked in European-style economics, he made up for in battlefield cunning. Forewarned by the Pawtucket scout of the impending English attack, he rallied as many warriors as he could and began evacuating Waushacum. Dispatching the children and elderly to the west and north, he had the women remain to bring in what they could of the vital corn crop. He also posted scouts to watch Lancaster and moved his army around to the north of it. When he received word that Willard had left the town, he initiated his own plan. Waiting until the militia had traveled an hour down the path to Waushacum, Monoco attacked Lancaster with nearly all his power. Sweeping into the settlement, to the surprise of the stunned villagers, the Nashaway warriors shot several cattle, burnt several fields, killed or captured several villagers, and set fire to several houses. Most importantly, though, they set fire to Lancaster's only bridge across the Nashua (the Land Between), thus isolating the settlement and Willard's army west of the river.
Seeing the smoke rising and hearing the gunfire popping off behind them, the men of Willard's army insisted they turn back. A large contingent of Lancaster's men were part of the army, and they were desperate to return to the settlement to protect their families and their property. Willard felt forced to heed their wishes, and Monoco did not move to hinder his opponent in any way; instead, he used the time as Willard settled back in Lancaster to finish picking his corn before retreating off west to better-fortified settlements near Mount Wachusett. Sachem Muttawmp's eldest daughter, Nittawosew, bore witness to these events and reported them faithfully to her father, informing him that with a single stroke, the English had driven another band of Nipmuc into open resistance. Yet, by mid-August, Muttawmp had little time to enjoy that thought, for his mind was consumed by the affairs of the other three directions: the south, east, and west.
During the attack on Lancaster, 10 settlers were killed and 13 captured, among them the wife of the village minister. Her name -- Mary Rowlandson.
As August dawned, the Narragansett Confederacy seemed to be nearing an inflection point. The Sachem's council, called for by Canonchet and Pessicus, seemed like it could propel the entire nation into the ranks of Metacom's growing coalition. For the first time in many years, the leaders of the Niantic and Shawomet would sit together with the Narragansett in council. For a moment it seemed Confederacy of Miantonomo had been revived.
Yet, when the Council convened on the isle of Nanihigonset (the mythical origin point and current capital of the Narragansett), on August 4th, any illusions of unity were quickly shattered. The Council began with the Sachems receiving foreign envoys. The first to speak was the aged and respected Roger Williams, who had travelled from Providence with a small escort of native warriors to preach for an alliance between Narragansett and Rhode Island. Speaking in his best broken Narragansett, he presented the assembled Sachems with four belts of wampum and gave gifts of shirts, needles, pots, furs, and other objects.
His speech impressed many of those assembled, including Canonchet's mother, Sunksqua Wawaloam. However, it also met with intense opposition from Sachem Pumham, leader of the Shawomet. Pumham insisted that no alliance with Rhode Island was possible while the colony occupied so much Narragansett land, including much of his own in and around the town of Warwick. His words earned him the sympathy of many of Canonchet's supporters but not Canonchet himself, who believed that peace with Rhode Island was necessary should war with the New England Confederation come. Ultimately, the council took no decision on the matter. Grand Sachem Pessicus hoped Roger Williams could resolve the Shawomet dispute (so as not to alienate Pumham), and then the issue could be revisited in time.
The second foreign dignitary to speak was Sunksqua Weetamoo of the Pocassett. Having paddled across the bay to escape her own war torn country, she came to Nanihigonset in hope of drawing the Confederacy into Metacom's alliance. She, too, made great gifts of wampum to the council and even presented Pessicus himself with a belt she'd strung depicting a tomahawk striking the cross. Her message was clear, and yet she was not so warmly received as she might have hoped. Sachem Ninigret and his sister Sunksqua Quaiapen came across as cold to Weetamoo. Ninigret in particular insisted that war against the English would mean the destruction of the Narragansett and their allies. He spoke of lost battles and past wars, and of Miantonomo and of the crimes committed by Sachem Uncas. His words swayed many minds especially Pessicus's and when Canonchet spoke to the entire assembly without foreign dignitaries present he was not able to sway his fellow Sachems towards war.
Instead, the Great Council of the Small Point is memorable only as an anti-climax. Lacking unity, the leaders of the Narragansett decided their confederacy would remain neutral. Instead of making war, the sachems returned home to focus on bringing in the harvest and absorbing the refugees coming out of the north and the east. Sachem Canonchet was unable to accept this outcome though. He left Nanihigonset, still plotting about how he would bring war upon the English. He did not have long to wait before an opportunity presented itself. On August 6th, while Canonchet was still meeting with the Council, he learned that Connecticut Colony had dispatched an army up the ancient path from New London to Quabaug and that presently they had encamped in the praying Indian towns centered on Maanexit.
Publicly conceding to the wishes of the majority of his peers, promising neutrality for the time being, Canonchet departed Nanihigonset and returned home to his village at Moosup. Upon arrival, he learned that the army of Connecticut numbered around 200 and that it included dragoons and auxiliaries from the Pequot and Mohegan. Despite these numbers and his vows, Canonchet decided to attack the English force. Rallying around 125 of his best warriors, he struck out in the pre-dawn hours of the 10th for the praying Indian town of Quinnatisett. Home to 100, mostly Nipmuc residents, the town had been slightly depopulated since Muttawmp's rebellion as many residents had either left to join him or escape the fighting. Those who remained now were relieved by the sight of the English and gladly hosted 30 Connecticut militiamen and 10 Mohegan warriors in their town.
These forces did not anticipate any kind of danger originating from the south-east and were taken flat-footed when Canonchet's men began their dawn assault. The garrison's surprise enabled the Narragansett to quickly over run much of the town, and several of the defenders were even cut down in their beds. Those who survived the initial shock rallied in the local church and managed to resist there long enough for help to arrive from Maanexit. Their wait was a long one, though. Once the attack started, Canonchet ordered his brother Massecump to take a fifth of the army and establish positions on the road between Quinnatisset and Maanexit. From there they were to ambush any reinforcements moving south to rescue Quinnatisset, but things did not go according to plan. The English reinforcements were led by Mohegan scouts who quickly spotted the trap and managed to cut off part of Moosup's party killing him in a bloody skirmish near the ambush site. Uncas's son Oneco led the Mohegan in this effort and once he had defeated Moosup he pressed on into Quinnatisset. Uneager to fight a pitched battle against the English and their allies, Canonchet immediately started to withdraw his army. Melting back into the woods around Quinnatisset he feigned a march further west before returning east to his homelands. The colonial forces decided not to pursue.
In the immediate aftermath of the raid, Canonchet tallied 18 warriors lost including his brother, while the militia of Connecticut counted 13 of their own, 10 auxiliaries, and 23 praying Indians as among the casualties. Quinatisett also lost most of its livestock and almost all of its homes during the raid. Of those praying Indians, 15 were taken captive by Canonchet. Yet, despite his war loot the destruction of Quinnatisett, Canonchet's raid was not the victory he had sought. The death of Massecump proved Canonchet's involvement and the real danger of fighting the English. His fellow Narragansett were not so much impressed by the affair as horrified that they were now likely to be dragged into this war against their will. In Pessicus's court, Weetamoo observed the Grand Sachem struggle come to terms with the actions of his nephew. The leadership of the Confederacy again appeared impotent as a new crisis now threatened to drag the Narragansett directly into the war.
Nemasket Paths was but a continuation. Victory, victory, defeat and victory. Blood spilled on the fields would not help this year's harvest. Bodies would provide greatly to the three sisters, but not in time for the winter hunger which Metacom feared for his people. Every loss was worth three victories, and Nemasket Paths only paid part of the debt owed to the English for Acushnet. Worse still, losses were not shared equally among the many tribes. The Wampanoag, while weak, were still by far larger than those allied tribes in the north who flocked to Metacom's cause. For them, every loss is worth five victories so few is their number. How many victories until these tribes were lost forever? How many until the Wampanoag are gone forever? Metacom hoped that this war was not just an acceleration of what was happening quietly in the praying villages and English plantations. A death of not one, but of all, of that intangible thing which may never come back.
"My friends, our fathers were not half so wise as we ourselves, who see with younger eyes. They sell our land to Englishmen who teach our nation nothing but to fast and pray. But remember the Great Spirit gave this land to us and our grandfathers for our support, and so we must defend it with our lives if need be."
Kancamagus stood on top of a great gray boulder, belts of wampum hanging from his chest as he spoke to the assembled crowd. Penacook from all across the Confederacy convened on Bear Island in Lake Winnipesaukee on August 8th to hear the young Sachem speak words of war. Sagamore Wonalancet had alienated many among his people, especially the young warriors, by inviting English missionaries among them and for his policy of strict neutrality in the wake of the war raging to the south. Kancamagus intended to harness this energy and use it against his uncle for the sake of all Penacook.
Several days before the meeting, Wonalancet was warned about his nephew's treachery. Yet, that warning was incomplete. Knowing only that Kancamagus intended to rally a group of warriors on Bear Island for sinister purposes yet unknown, Wonalancet decided to leave the safety of his council house at Aquadoctan to attempt to defuse the situation before it got out of hand.
Departing with only a handful of his most trusted warriors and companions on the evening of the 8th, it took Wonalancet and his party less than an hour to canoe to the island. When they arrived there they saw a crowd on the beaches and as they drew closer Wonalancet attempted to address the assembled crowd. Speaking as a man who knew firsthand the violence the English were capable of, Wonalancet warned, "What happens if you were to attack the English? You may win some victories, and you may push them off their land. But what of your mother's, siblings, and children? What happens when the English, who are so numerous, come here in revenge for your actions against them. Could you live with yourself if your family pays for your recklessness? We are a small village here, without the liberty to have our young men do as they wish in war. If you are so blinded by your anger that you would harm your Sachem, violate your laws, and bring violence upon this village, you must be prepared for the consequences that will befall your family. I call on you to come to your sense, look at yourselves."
Yet these words fell on deaf ears. Kancamagus, eager to overthrow his uncle and assert the primacy of his own faction within the Confederacy, had the old Sagamore arrested. Wonalancet went willingly enough and despite his companion's protestations urged them to disarm, as above all he valued the worth of Penacook life. Celebrating the ease with which his uncle had surrendered, Kancamagus then led 100 of his followers to Aquadoctan. Upon their arrival, the youthful Sachem had all the English present in the settlement arrested by his men. This included two missionaries and five merchants who were there to take part in the fur trade.
The next day, he built a bonfire of Algonquin bibles and had these men tortured and executed in front of the townspeople and then, standing before their bloodied corpses, he declared himself Sagamore of the Penacook and sent messengers out to all the towns across the Confederacy notifying them of the coup and summoning them to war against the English. Inspired by the successes of Metacom, he told his messengers to regale their audiences with stories of the numerous abuses and unfair dealings that the Penacook had suffered with the colonial authorities. He also used the victories of the Wampanoag and the Nipmuc to show that resistance was not only possible but necessary. Finally, he demurred from killing his uncle, perhaps fearful of the consequences that might result from his murder, and instead sent Wonalancet alone into exile in the lands of the Cowassuck.
Yet, Kancamagus's sense of unfettered victory would be short-lived. Within days, he received word from the towns of Pemigewasset and M'Squamskook that the Sachems of those towns rejected his coup and would remain loyal to Wonalancet and his policy neutrality. Meanwhile, a steady stream of loyalists began to flow out of the Confederacy to join their Sagamore in exile, enabling him to establish a small community near the border between the Cowassuck and the Penacook called Wôbanaki-wigwôm or Neutral Town.
These setbacks did little to phase Kancamagus though or to stall his plans. Instead, he sent envoys forth into the land of the Pequawket urging Sagamore Squando to join him in a strike against the English settlements in Maine. Squando had been planning an attack against his former English allies for months, given the blood debt owed to him for the murders of his wife and child. Yet, since late June, Modackawando and the Penobscots had succeeded at convincing him to defer his revenge for the time being by successfully convincing the Androscoggin to not support the Pequawket in any first strike.
However, now that Kancamagus was forthcoming in his support for Squando that calculation changed. Raising more than 150 Penacook warriors, Kancamagus left Aquadoctan on August 16th and united with 50 Pequawket warriors on the way to Cocheco. Established in 1635, by Richard Waldron as a trading post, Cocheco had long served as a hub for the frontier fur trade and the illicit sale of alcohol and firearms to the Abenaki. Over the decades, the trade there drew in numerous English settlers and by 1675 the town was home to 41 families and a sawmill, which made it one of the most "industrialized" settlements on the Maine frontier. It also served an important function for the settlers in York, protecting their western approaches against any attack from the interior.
In the days leading up to Kancamagus's attack, Richard Waldron and the active units of the York Regiment (the Maine militia) were not present in Cocheco or York, but were instead deployed further north protecting the settlements of Saco, Scarborough, and Falmouth from a potential Pequawket-Androscoggin attack. However, partisans from Wonalancet's camp did manage to warn the local English authorities of Kancamagus's coup. Therefore, when Kancamagus's war band arrived at the outskirts of Cocheco on the morning of the 19th, they found it most of its houses abandoned and promptly began burning them to the ground. The local militia company made no attempt to resist them, instead fortifying themselves within Waldron's trade compound.
Curiously, though, several settlers refused to evacuate their homes. These individuals had faith that God would protect them from the rampaging Abenaki, and so they took to praying even as Kancamagus's men surrounded their houses and lit them on fire. In the end, their faith would not prove suitable protection against the flames and two entire families to perished in this way. Kancamagus also took great satisfaction in burning down Waldron's saw mill during the raid. Yet, he did not make a move against the man's fortified home and old trade outpost, judging it as too heavily guarded. Instead, he left Cocheco a scorched ruin and said goodbye to Squando before heading south.
On August 24th, Kancamagus's men launched another raid on the towns of Salisbury and Amesbury. Assured of the neutrality of the local Indians at M'Squamskook (they'd surrendered their most of their guns the previous week) the settlers of neither settlement expected an attack. Therefore, Kancamagus caught them flat-footed and managed to devastate large swaths of both towns and carry off many prisoners before retreating north again. Meanwhile, along the coast of Maine north of York, Squando began his own campaign of destruction, sending raiders into attack the settlements of Falmouth and Scarborough.
They found both these settlements abandoned, as in the wake of the raid on Cocheco, Major Waldron decided to evacuate both settlements and concentrate his resources on defending York. Therefore, both towns were burnt to ashes and any useful goods that remained were carried off west back into the Pequawket homeland. As August came to a close, the English and the Abenaki found themselves embroiled in a war that leaders on both sides had done their best to prevent. King Philip's War had found a new frontier.
In the course of the fighting some 13 Penacook, 5 Pequawket, and 85 Englishmen were killed, captured or injured.
When word reached Hartford of the Narragansett raid on Quinnatiset and of Oneco's victory over Massecump, Governor Winthrop faced a hard decision. With Metacom's war raging to the north and with Sir Edmund Andros blockading the outlet of the Kwanitekw in the south and threatening an invasion from the west, it now seemed Connecticut was surrounded by a ring of enemies. Ever since the Pequot War, Connecticut's strength rested on its alliance system and active diplomacy with the Indigenous nations surrounding it. This policy allowed the colony to grow its power steadily as the decades passed, and it kept potential rivals, like the Narragansett and Mohegan contained, isolated, and unable to seriously threaten the status quo.
Yet, with Metacom rallying more nations to his banner by the week, the prospect of the Narragansett Confederacy entering the war on the side of the Wampanoag and the Nipmuc was viewed by many in Hartford as a disaster. Had Winthrop known that Canonchet's raid was not sanctioned by Grand Sachem Pessicus, it may have changed his calculus. However, the reports he received lacked crucial details. Captain John Gallop was unsure whether Canonchet's raid was sanctioned by the Grand Council in Nanihigonset, and the Mohegan intentionally misinformed their patrons about which Sachems were involved in the attack in order to bring about a war that they hoped would leave them as the preeminent Indigenous nation in southern New England. This left Winthrop to conclude that the best recourse against the Narragansett was a violent raid meant to decapitate and cripple them before they could organize another, more effective attack.
On the morning of August 13th, Captain John Gallop received orders from Governor Winthrop, to send Oneco and twenty Mohegan scouts south down the Old Connecticut Path from Maanexit to New Haven. Oneco and his war party followed this order obediently, and arriving at their destination, he received a great gift of wampum from Winthrop and was given a new set of instructions. Boarding the sloops David and Jonah, the Mohegans were joined by a small detachment of dismounted dragoons. Together they formed a small but potent detachment of shock troops that was well armed (and in the dragoon's case armored), experienced, and capable of launching a quick raid on Connecticut's behalf. Acting under orders from Winthrop, the sloops slipped out of New Haven on the morning of August 16th and arrived off the coast near Nanihigonset early that very evening. Transferring to several smaller boats, the assault force paddled to shore and then began their attack on the Narragansett in earnest.
In the aftermath of Canonchet's raid, Pessicus felt little but rage towards his nephew. The young Sachem's lies meant that Pessicus had not expected any attack to be made against the English, and the towns under his control were not prepared for war. The women remained hard at work bringing in the harvest from the fields while the men spent their days fishing and hunting. Many remained oblivious to the danger, although the growing number of Wampanoag refugees in the Confederacy attested to it. At Pessicus's council fire, opinion was divided over what to do next. Pessicus personally favored sending envoys to Hartford to refute Canonchet's attack and of stripping his nephew of his rank and status. However, the remnants of the war party, led by Canonchet's grieving mother Sunksqua Wawaloam, argued forcefully that the Narragansett must either rise now or bow forever. Sunksqua Weetamoo of the Pocasset supported Wawaloam in this, and together the two managed to delay Pessicus's decision by several vital days. On the evening of the 15th, Pessicus decided to send envoys to Hartford to negotiate with the colony, but by then it was too late.
Narragansett fishermen spotted the David and Jonah soon after they anchored off the shore near Nanihigonset and quickly informed Pessicus once they saw a landing party coming off the ships. Pessicus decided to try to meet the English at the beach to attempt to demonstrate his willingness to negotiate in good will, and promptly headed south with only a small retinue of warriors to protect him. Meanwhile, Wawaloam, Sachem Quanopen, and Weetamoo were left in Nanihigonset, and they put out the call to nearby Narragansett that an English landing party was near.
As Pessicus approached the beach, he and his retinue were caught in an ambush arranged by the Mohegans and their English allies. Hiding behind a large sand dune, they watched the Grand Sachem draw near them and unaware of his exact identity opened fire once he and his men came so close that there was no hope of escape. The Narragansett Grand Sachem attempted to lay down his arms and surrender, but was cut down by the sword of a young dragoon before his words could even be registered by his attackers.
The raiders then moved north and approached Nanihigonset proper. The town itself was built on a sandy isthmus jutting out into Point Judith Pond that partially flooded and became an island at high tide. Unfortunately for the Narragansett, their attackers came at low tide, and they had only a few warriors prepared to defend the town. They put up as good of a resistance as possible, spurred on by Weetamoo, Wawaloam, and Quanopen, who did all they could to reverse the tide. However, the accuracy of the Mohegan warriors and the armor of the Conneticut dragoons were decisive. The defenders were eventually forced to depart from the isthmus either, evacuating either by canoe or swimming. After that the battle turned into a massacre and within a few hours Nanihigonset, capital of the Narragansett Confederacy since time immemorial, was gone. A massive blow had been struck.
Sunksqua Wawaloam and 120 Narragansett and Wampanoag civilians were among the victims of the attack. 90 of them were killed and another 30 taken as prisoners back to New Haven. Sunksqua Wawaloam was lucky to be counted among the prisoners. Meanwhile, of the Narragansett combatants some 50 warriors were killed or seriously wounded alongside Sunksqua Weetamoo who suffered a sword blow to the ear, losing the lower portion of her left ear lobe. She was saved during the fighting by Sachem Quanopen, who managed to paddle her and some other survivors to safety on the far side of the pond. On the other side, Conneticut and Mohegan losses were minimal. Just 4 dead and 6 wounded between them. The cost they were forced to pay for throwing the center of Narragansett power into turmoil.
Despite this victory, even greater events soon overshadowed it back in Hartford. On August 21, after months of negotiations with Governor Winthrop, Sir Edmund Andros finally made his move against Connecticut. The authorities in New York had long craved dominion over all of Long Island and resented Connecticut's attempts to hold onto the eastern half of the island. On August 15th Governor Winthrop received an offer from Andros to end the blockade of the colony in exchange for New York gaining possession over the entire colony. Winthrop rebuffed this offer, and the next day Sir Edmund Andros learned of attempts by the government of Connecticut to get into contact with the governors of East and West Jersey. These efforts came to not, but they outraged Andros and this rage turned vitriolic when he learned a day later that an "Indian raid" had been launched on Long Island, involving Connecticut militiamen crossing over into the old Dutch town of Hempstead and stealing several cattle there.
(Dislcaimer: Historically Long Island was all made part of New York in 1666 after New Amsterdam fell to the English for the first time, but I failed to pick that up in my research and thus incorporated an inaccurate understanding of the history into my map. I've now decided to double down and make it a point of historical divergence, though.)
On the morning of August 21, two hundred New York militiamen (mostly Dutch farmers and firshermen) crossed the border into Conneticut's part of Long Island and occupied the settlement of Huntington. This army was supported several brigs outfitted in New York, and the locals decided it was best not to put up much of a fight when they had so little firepower comparatively. Waitstill Winthrop, the 33-year-old son of John Winthrop, was responsible for organizing the "Indian raid" on his father's behalf, and he soon took charge of rallying a defense of the far-flung province. Organizing a militia of devout Englishmen and some outfitting some privateers from his headquarters at the hamlet of Stony Brook, he fought a brief skirmish with the New Yorkers on the 27th and managed to beat them, driving them west and temporarily delaying their advance into the eastern portions of the island. Yet, a victory can often mark a strategic loss and as the air cools and the trees start to turn all shades of yellow, red, and orange it remains to be seen if a war with New York for the future of Long Island will serve Connecticut's strategic interest.
In the wake of Josiah Winslow's defeat during the battle for Nemasket, Metacom and his companions breathed a short sigh of relief. With no English army advancing against their towns, the warriors had time to rest, rearm, and recuperate for the fight ahead. Yet, Metacom was not content to remain passive. He believed that victory in the war hinged on his ability to inflict as much pain on the English as possible.
Therefore, while most Wampanoag women focused on bringing in the harvest of squash and beans (corn picking starts in September), Metacom and his counselors cast their eyes around the region in search of a soft target to strike. Looking north and east, the "rebels" saw strongly held towns surrounded by local praying Indians and Wampanoag bands such as the Mashpee that were not entirely sympathetic to their cause. However, to the west, the King of Mount Hope sensed weakness. Ever since the first weeks of the war, the towns of Swansea and Rehoboth had become depopulated as hundreds of Englishmen fled towards the relative safety of Rhode Island or towards Massachusetts and the eastern parts of Plymouth Colony. This exodus included prominent members of both communities, such as Hugh Cole, who served as the militia captain of Swansea before the start of the war (and was considered a personal friend by Metacom) and who left for Rhode Island back in June.
The only serious check on Metacom's ambitions for the region was a 200-man detachment of the Suffolk militia regiment stationed in Taunton, under the command of Captain Thomas Savage. They'd spent weeks fortifying the town into a kind of base for the English in the area therefore, Metacom wisely decided not to challenge them directly. Instead, he decided to attack Plymouth where it was weakest, in Swansea and Rehoboth so that Savage's men would march to their relief, and in so doing expose themselves to another ambush. He also hoped that by raiding Swansea and Rehoboth the Wampanoag could loot some food to help make up for what had been lost at Acushnet and if all went really well maybe he could even open up a land route to Rhode Island.
Setting out on the morning of August the 14th, Metacom rallied about two hundred veteran warriors from Nemasket and led them southwest in the direction of Mt. Hope Bay. Making good time, the Wampanoag army rendezvoused with another 100 warriors from Pocasset around midday. The Pocasset warriors were under the command of one of Weetamoo's cousins named Corbitant, and he looked with envy upon the battle trophies captured by the Pokanoket and Nemasket. Hoping to demonstrate his own dedication to the cause, Corbitant presented Metacom with a freshly strung belt of wampum and now united, the raiders started moving west towards a narrow section of the Titicut (Taunton) River about five miles south of Taunton proper.
Around 7 PM they came upon the ruins of a long abandoned Wampanoag settlement on the Titicut called Chippascut and camping there for the night, Metacom met with his top officers to go over his plan for the coming morning. He revealed that Rehoboth would be the first target of their raid, assigned his trusted advisor Annawan to lead the attack. He also dispatched a runner down to Pokannoket asking those remaining in the village to bring up any canoes available to them by mid-morning on the 15th. With this business out of the way, the army settled down to rest for the night. Yet, sleep would not come easy for them. Once the sun fell below the horizon, temperatures went down to 40 degrees Fahrenheit (4 degrees Celsius) within a few hours. Summer was giving way to fall.
The next day, the army waited for hours for the canoes to arrive. Once they did, it took until the late evening for Metacom to get all his warriors to the west side of the river. Impatient to get their attack going, the Wampanoag spent that night camped out in the woods just north of Swansea. Powwau Tuspaquin, Metacom's brother-in-law and Sachem of Nemasket, prayed that night over the raiders and asked the manitou (spirits) to protect those who would be involved in the attack. After Tuspaquin's work was done, Annawan departed the camp in the middle of the night with 100 raiders. He managed to reach Rehoboth before dawn, and had his warriors hide themselves among the barns and haystacks that dotted the town.
When the sun rose again, the raid began. It started with the first settler to leave his home that morning. Annawan had told his men that would be their signal and when they heard his screams all of them emerged from their hiding places and initiated a full blown assault on the town. In just a few hours the Wampanoag killed 10 militiamen and 20 settlers while capturing 30 more and torching some 42 homes, 21 barns, three corn mills, a garrison house, and a sawmill. By mid-day all that was left of the settlement was a single garrison house and several houses immediately adjacent to it, as well as, a few shaken survivors. Eventually though the raid was called off when Metacom recieved word from scouts posted along the road between Swansea and Rehoboth that approximately 60 militiamen were marching from Swansea to relieve the attack on the town.
These men were originally from Rehoboth, but had relocated to Swansea several weeks ago to reinforce the defenses there since the town was deemed to be at greater risk than Rehoboth. Metacom quickly rallied his army and deftly ambushed this force as it was crossing a brook near Rehoboth. Their defeat was total with 50 militaimen killed in exchange for just 15 Wampanoag warriors. However, Metacom and his warriors had little time to enjoy this victory for as soon as they scattered the men of Rehoboth they learned that 300 English militiamen were approaching the destroyed town from the north.
Taking stock of his situation, his powder, and the spiritual advise of Tuspaquin, who told Metacom he had visions of a bear standing on its hind legs which portended ill omens, the legendary Sachem decided not to attack. Instead, he withdrew leaving Savage's Massachusetts militiamen and 100 militia raised from Taunton's inhabitants to relieve Rehoboth uncontested. They camped out in the town, taking stock of what happened there and Savage decided to help the survivors evacuate north towards relative safety. Meanwhile, Metacom and his raiders moved south and bypassing Swansea they made it to Pokanoket before nightfall.
Metacom felt at ease back in the town where he was born, raised, and ruled from. Compared to before the war the settlement was little more than a ghost town now, inhabitted by those too stubborn to flee or by small groups of scouts, farmers, hunters, and fishermen who were attempting to keep the rest of the Wampanoag fed. Resting there for a day, Metacom rallied his army again on the 17th and moved north again to target Swansea.
In the wake of the raid on Rehoboth and the ambush just east of it, the people of Swansea requested reinforcements from Captain Savage but he was nervous about stretching his forces thin as he attempted to aid the survivors of Rehoboth. Therefore, when Metacom struck he only faced about 30 militiamen in the town. They were quickly overwhelmed by the Wampanoag warband and after a few hours passed most of Swansea was reduced to ruins as well. Of some 170 inhabitants pre-war 70 had already fled, and of the remaining 100, only 15 were made casualties during the raid as most had already fled to the safety of Swansea's garrison house when they heard about Rehoboth. Yet, despite those relatively light losses the majority of the town was burnt down (some 35 homes) and the survivors were soon forced to evacuate their ruined settlement just as the inhabitants of Rehoboth had.
Withdrawing back across the Titicut that night, Metacom felt his raids had been an unqualified success. Two English towns were burnt, dozens of pigs captured, small stores of food were looted, more than 40 settlers captured, and 55 militiamen killed all in exchange for just 15 Wampanoag dead. However, the Wampanoag would not be left to savor their triumphs in peace. Once Metacom's army was back on the east side of the Titicut it quickly disbanded with Corbitant and his warriors returning to Pocasset while the bulk of the army went back to Namasket.
Meanwhile, to their north governors Leverett and Winslow were busy reacting to the raid. Ever since mid-July, Governor Leverett had planned to march an army of Massachusetts men south into Plymouth to stabilize the situation in the colony and bring the war to the Wampanoag. However, Leverett's plans had faced constant setbacks. It had proven easy enough to rally 100 willing Suffolk County militiamen to serve under the Governor, but Leverett also insisted on marching to Plymouth with a large artillery battery. This caused numerous delays as those guns had to be taken off of the same Massachusetts ships which were tasked with supressing the Dutch pirate problem in the north.
Therefore, it took Leverett until the 14th to leave Boston and he arrived in Plymouth late on the night of the 15th only to learn that Metacom had raided Rehoboth. Winslow and Leverett met that night and spent hours trying to decide what they would do but their discussions ended up dragging on for several days as Leverett spent many hours chastising Winslow for elements of his performance thus far in the war.
Eventually though, the pair agreed to launch a punitive raid on Pokanoket (Mt. Hope) in a bid to strike a psychological as well as a physical blow against the Wampanoag. In order to avoid ambushes, the pair also agreed that Leverett's expedition would move over the water rather than by land. Once that decision was made a fleet was swiftly assembled. Composed mostly of ships from the Cape but also some from Boston, dozens of militiamen and sailors clamored to join the expedition.
The atmosphere in Plymouth only grew more murderous when on the 18th the Governors recieved another messanger from Taunton indicating that Swansea had burned. News of the another defeat coming in right before the expedition was set to depart seemed inauspicious to many Puritans, and in Boston Minister Increase Mather exclaimed before his congregation that God was punishing the English for their sins. However, in Plymouth the Leverett and Winslow decided to appeal for divine favor directly. They declared the 18th and 19th Days of Fasting and Humiliation in both their colonies. Like the Wampanoag attempts to appeal to their manitou this was done in order to put the soldiers and the colony at ease and assure them of the victory to come.
At dawn on the 19th, Winslow's expedition departed from Plymouth harbor. He led a fleet of six ships carrying 150 militiamen and crewed by some 90 sailors. The wind and the weather were good and the fleet anchored off the coast of Pokanoket around mid-morning on the 20th. Coming quickly ashore they made an uncontested landing and advanced swiftly up the sides of Mt. Hope. Yet, there was no resistance to this advance either and when the English entered the town they found it mostly uninhabited with the dozens who were residing there fleeing off into the woods at the first site of the English.
Dispatching a couple of Mosley's hounds after them a few stragglers were captured and brought back to the camp. They revealed that Metacom had been there just a few nights before and returned back across the river after burning Swansea. Once this business was done, Leverett looted what could be looted and set fire to the town. His actions derailed the food gathering activities that had been going on there and would result in less food in the future and he set fire to the fields of corn, beans, and squash that usually sustained the town in peace. Then he and his men returned to their ships and sailed back to Plymouth. Leverett would depart back for Boston shortly after that but he left his new force of raiders down there and placed it under the command of Captain Mosley who was still recuperating from the amputation he suffered back in July.
Leverett ordered Mosley to carry out another naval raid on Cape Cod and to bring the entire peninsula under English control, but these plans would be derailed by another act of God. On the 23rd and 24th, the eastern seashore of New England was hit by a powerful hurricane that had originated in the Carribean. This tempest wrecked two of the ships in the Plymouth armada and caused untold damage across the entire coastline of the northeast, destroying homes, drowing settlers, and wrecking ships across all of the English colonies. In Boston, Increase Mather again declared that God was punishing them for their sins by means of calamities without number. After all is it not sin that is the root of all evil?
Despite Metacom's decision to remain within the boundaries of the old Wampanoag Confederacy throughout August, the war he'd helped spark kept growing in all directions around him. The actions of the governments of the New England colonies and of well established Sachems like Kancamagus, Canonchet, and Squando ensured that by September 1, the Wabanaki, the Pennacook, and the Narragansett had all become direct parties to the conflict. Yet, across much of Wopanaak (the land where the sun is born every day) peace still reigned supreme. In Rhode Island, the Connecticut River Valley, the coastal interior of Massachusetts, and across the majority of Nipmuc and Wabanaki country, people farmed and fished in peace much as they had in August 1674. Yet, the ripples of the conflict were inescapable for the entire region as winter loomed just over the horizon.
In Rhode Island, Governor Coddington attempted to ensure the safety and continued neutrality of his colony by military means as well as diplomatic ones. Regarding the former, in early August he sent orders to the militia captains of Freedtown, Warwick, Westerly, and Wichford to begin strengthening their defenses in case of an attack by the Indians or the English. Seeing the chaos engulfing Plymouth and the Narragansett, the local militiamen took to these orders willingly, with some even ignoring the beginning of the harvest to work throughout the month on new garrison houses and simple palisades for their towns.
Locals were aided in their efforts by desperate refugees recently relocated from Plymouth, desperately hoping that they would never again fall victim to the Wampanoag or their allies. In fact, throughout the month of August, Rhode Island continued to receive an influx of refugees from her northeast, with more than 150 Plymouth settlers relocating to the colony by the end of the month. Most of these arrived in the aftermath of Metacom's raids on Swansea and Rehoboth which threw the entire border region into turmoil. Coddington continued to welcome these newcomers, with many settling in Freedtown while those with some means relocated to Aquidneck Island.
Meanwhile, on the diplomatic front, Rhode Island found itself in a precarious yet advantageous position. With wars raging between New York and Connecticut on one side and between the New England Confederation and the Indians on the other, Rhode Island tried to balance its relations with all sides. This meant that under Coddington, Rhode Island continued to participate in the prisoner trade with the Wampanoag, sending Metacom powder, shot, food, clothes, beads, and alcohol in exchange for many of the male and high status settlers captured during his raids. The trade was strategically vital for the Wampanoag, who had quickly become reliant on Rhode Island for the bulk of their gunpowder. At the same time, the trade had begun to come under fire from a growing cast of conservative Rhode Island clergymen, refugees, and General Assembly representatives who labeled the Governor a traitor and agitated an alliance with the other colonies of New England. These voices would be especially strong on the western shore of the colony, where the chaos engulfing the Narragansett Confederacy seemed to present an opportunity to seize vast tracts of land.
Yet, Coddington was not only facing resistance to his policy from within but also from without as Governor Leverett sent several threatening letters to his peer throughout the early part of the month demanding that Penelope Pelham Winslow (Mrs. Winslow) be shipped off to Boston alongside any refugee or ransomed prisoner who would like to leave Rhode Island. Not seeking a direct conflict with the behemoth of New England, Coddington quickly gave in to these demands, but besides Winslow only a few settlers would willingly return to Plymouth or Massachusetts, with the majority preferring the relative safety of Rhode Island.
Roger Williams for his part, despite his advanced age, remained a stalwart ally of the governor. In the first week of August, he went to Nanihigonset to attempt to bring about an alliance between the Narragansett and Rhode Island and to keep them out of the wider war. Despite his failures in that regard, he remained friendly to the Narragansett and upon his return home to Providence was horrified to learn about Connecticut's raid on Nanihigonsett and the murder of Pessicus. Perhaps it was these actions which drove him to double down on his pamphleteering as he published numerous screeds throughout August supporting Coddington's neutral policy and decrying those who participated willingly in unjustified wars. His tracts were meant to target merchants mostly, but they were widely circulated among Rhode Island's Quakers, Baptists, and Jews, and in some circles in Massachusetts and Connecticut which felt that Metacom's attack on Plymouth had exploded into a much wider war because of the unjust actions of their governors. Prominent Puritan missionaries like Daniel Gookin and John Eliot were especially of this opinion, and Williams' writing helped galvanize them to openly espouse their narrative about the cause of the current disasters.
Williams also worked to help the refugees from Plymouth resettle, opening up his own plantation up to those freshly off the footpath from the east and providing them with sufficient food and shelter to survive. By the end of the month, his house was inhabited by 4 different families, and it is likely that an individual from one of them carried tuberculosis with them when they arrived at Williams' farm. Regardless, at the end of the month the disease swept across Providence and Williams contracted it, leaving him bedridden within a few short days. As September dawned, his sons would rush to his side to take care of their ailing father. It appeared he was on death's doorstep.
Meanwhile, coastal Massachusetts was faced with its own refugee problems. With the Nipmuc, Pennacook, Narragansett, and Pequawket entering the fray against the New England Confederation, hundreds of settlers fled towards the relative safety of Boston and the towns nearby it. They mixed together with hundreds of refugees from Plymouth who had been dislocated earlier in the summer, and together they contributed to the rising wave of anti-Native American hate crimes across the colony. The most famous of these incidents took place on August 21st, when a drunken mob stormed the Boston prison and lynched 13 Praying Indians who had been staying there.
Governor Leverett mostly ignored the refugee problem throughout the month, but was rather consumed by a frantic energy that saw him legislating in the first weeks of August and leading troops during the second half of the month. Besides these activities, the Governor was also busy attempting to manage the colony's diplomatic situation and his own business interests. Undertaking all these efforts left the governor's attention spread very thin, and many of his goals with go unaccomplished. On the business front, he quietly attempted to develop trade contacts in both Maine and New York so that his merchant vessels could create a profitable new trade route bringing furs from Maine to New York and weapons from New York to Massachusetts and Maine. This venture did not go as planned though as Ser Edmund Andros banned the export of weapons to New England given his war with Connecticut and in Maine the entry of the Pennacook and Pequawket into the war significantly disrupted many of the trade networks his business strategy relied on.
Closer to home, Leverett would have some successes regarding the Pawtucket and their Sachem Wenepoykin. Leverett and Wenepoykin struck a deal to build a sawmill on Pawtucket territory to make up for the one that was supposed to be built by the Pawtucket with Pennacook aid. Work on the structure would begin by the end of the month. However, Wenepoykin was a slippery fish, and word reached Leverett's ears at the end of the month that the sachem had been in talks with his lead counselors about leaving northern Massachusetts and relocating to Pennacook country. According to Leverett's spies, the idea was popular among the Pawtucket, and among a small but growing cast of Praying Indians who had fled to them, yet it remained uncertain how the governor would react.
Forty miles (64 km) west in Nipmuc country, Muttawmp and his allies maintained a defensive stance throughout the month. The young Sachem expected to be attacked from the west, south, and east, however for the most part these offensives never materialized. Instead, his coalition grew to encompass most of the towns in Nipmuc country, as Sachem Monoco entered into open hostilities with the English after their raid against his hometown and Muttawmp's son and younger daughters toured around the region rallying more warriors to their father's cause as they told and retold stories of his victory at Quabaug. Muttawmp's eldest daughter Nittawosew was also active in his cause, but she was sent to the far north, where she traveled into the heart of Pennacook country. There she found a Confederacy wrought with division in the aftermath of Kancamagus's coup, but she did all she could to support and legitimize the young Sachem's actions, arriving at his camp in person sometime during the last week of August. The Nipmuc would greatly benefit from the relative peace that surrounded them, as warriors used the free time to hunt and fish as they would in normal times, while the women brought in bushels of squash and beans from their gardens. This harvest if it continued to go well through the end of September would be enough to ensure the Nipmuc would not starve before the coming of Spring.
Given this relative calm and the central location inhabited by the Nipmuc, refugees and volunteers from other Indian nations would begin streaming into Muttawmp, Matoonas, and Monoco's towns throughout the month. Some of them were Praying Indians from Massachusetts attempting to escape the new security regime. Others came from Narragansett and Wampanoag territory hoping to find somewhere safe to winter away from the choas in the south. Strangest of all towards the end of the month a small contingent of Pawtucket warriors arrived in Wachusett to volunteer alongside Monoco having traveled through Pennacook country. Their presence was not yet known to the English but it did encourage the Nipmuc to see so many allies come to join them.
Finally, in the Connecticut River Valley life would continue on through 1675 much as it had in 1674 with almost all focus centered on the start of the harvest. Sachem Sangumachu and Colonel Pynchon would be exceptions to this trend though with both focusing on entrenching their positions in anticipation of the war coming to their lands. Sachem Sangumachu for his part spent much of the month attempting to establish another settlement for his followers along the banks of the Conneticut River just west of Norwuttuck. His hope was that a settlement along the river would improve his band's food supply and the Sachem also hoped to establish an armory there to help maintain his small arsenal of flintlocks. However, this effort would face strong opposition from the settlers of Hadley who feared Sangumachu would use the settlement to disrupt traffic on the road north to Peskeompscut and beyond it Northfield. Their opposition would lead to an incident at the very end of the month in which one of the settlers of Hadley shot and killed one of Sangumachu's men as he attempted to return a cow that had wandered away from his owner's property. This incident caused many of the Pocumtuc to abandon their new settlement calling it unsafe and instead return to the fortified village at Norwottuck.
Tensions were not only rising around Hadley though. In the north it was said that the sachems of Peskeompscut, Mettawompe, and Coasset met in mid-August to discuss the war in the west and their stance on it. The decision was made to remain neutral and to continue paying tribute to the Mohawk for peace. Yet, in Springfield the meeting was seen in a different light. Paranoia about their Indian neighbors led many of the local settlers to demand that Colonel Pynchon take a harsher stance against the Pocumtuc by ending all arms sales with them and by disarming all those who lived within walking distance of English towns. Pynchon would attempt to redirect these settlers by declaring martial law across the valley and utilizing his position as commander of the regional militia to begin a fortification project encompassing all major English settlements in the area. This was a massive undertaking but with the local settlers growing increasingly paranoid about their neighbors many farmers allowed parts of their harvest to rot on the vine so as to focus on building palisades and garrison houses. Pynchon also attempted to place all river traffic along the Massachusetts segment of the Kwanitekw River under his direct control. For bigger ships this would prove quite easy as Pynchon already owned most of these but for smaller craft it would prove harder as local settlers resisted his ordnance and hid their property to prevent the lord of the valley from seizing it. As summer comes to its end, the Conneticut River Valley has become the sole place in New England where settlers and Native Americans continue to live mostly at peace with one another. How long that will last though is anyone's guess.
OOC: This is the final update of turn two! Stats and a September 1st map should come sometime within the next week.