armed," "to gather and improve for their own use all the Indian Corn of the Indian plantations belonging to our enemies the Indians that are fled." With these records my knowledge of this heroic character ends. Whether he went back to his trade as a carpenter, or peaceably tilled his acres, or remained to the end a daring scout and Indian fighter I know not. It may be assumed perhaps, that in 1718 he was dead, as his farm was then improved by his son. George William Curtis, the silver-tongued orator, traces back his origin to this stalwart Puritan; and I think it may be admitted, that, in addition to persuasive speech, of which his ancestor does not seem to have been destitute, he inherits the capacity to have views of his own and to stand by them.

With these personal sketches ends my account of the affair at Brookfield and of its actors. I do not propose to follow farther the desperate conflict. The war pursued its devious, cruel course till it closed, so far as our State was concerned, with the death, twelve months later, of Philip, who like a wounded wild beast sought his own lair to die. And when it closed, the Wampanoags, who had welcomed the Pilgrim and given him food and kindness, as a tribe had ceased to exist. It was the first and the last independent Indian war on Massachusetts soil. All later wars may properly be termed French and Indian Wars. And the savage allies of the most Christian monarchs, the Kings of France, came largely from outside the Bay State.

WHEELER'S DEFEAT, 1675: WHERE?

BY LUCIUS R. PAGE.

VERY soon after his crushing defeat by the Indians, August 2, 1675, Captain Thomas Wheeler wrote a "Narrative of the Lord's Providences in various dispensations towards Captain Hutchinson of Boston and myself, and those that went with us into the Nipmuck Country, and also to Quabaug, alias Brookfield," etc. This Narrative, having become scarce, was republished in 1827, in the New Hampshire Historical Collections, ii. 5-23. It has recently been again published in the History of North Brookfield, pp. 80-89. From this "Narrative" I quote a passage relative to the place where he was defeated:

"The said Captain Hutchinson and myself, with about twenty men or more, marched from Cambridge to Sudbury, July 28, 1675; and from thence into the Nipmuck Country; and finding that the Indians had deserted their towns, and we having gone until we came within two miles of New Norwitch on July 31, (only we saw two Indians having an horse with them, whom we would have spoke with, but they fled from us and left their horse which we took,) we then thought it not expedient to march any further that way, but set our march for Brookfield, whither we came on the Lord's day about noon. From thence the same day (being August 1,) we understanding that the Indians were about ten miles north west from us, we sent out four men' to acquaint the Indians that we were not come to harm them, but our business was only to deliver a message from our Honoured Governour and Council to them, and to receive their answer, we desiring to come to a Treaty of Peace with them, (though they had for several days fled from us,) they having before professed friendship and promised fidelity to the English. When the messengers

1 One of these men was Ephraim Curtis.

1

came to them they made an alarm and gathered together about an hundred and fifty fighting men, as near as they could judge. The young men amongst them were stout in their speeches and surly in their carriage. But at length some of the chief Sachems promised to meet us on the next morning about 8 of the clock upon a plain within three miles of Brookfield, with which answer the messengers returned to us. Whereupon, though their speeches and carriage did much discourage divers of our company, yet we conceived that we had a clear call to go to meet them at the place whither they had promised to come. Accordingly we with our men accompanied with three of the principal inhabitants of that town marched to the place appointed; but the treacherous heathen, intending mischief, (if they could have opportunity,) came not to the said place, and so failed our hopes of speaking with them there. Whereupon the said Captain Hutchinson and myself, with the rest of our company, considered what was best to be done, whether we should go any further towards them or return, divers of us apprehending much danger in case we did proceed, because the Indians kept not promise there with us. But the three men who belonged to Brookfield were so strongly persuaded of their freedom from any ill intentions. towards us, (as upon other bounds [grounds?] so especially because the greatest part of those Indians belonged to David, one of their chief Sachems, who was taken to be a great friend to the English,) that the said Captain Hutchinson who was principally intrusted with the matter of Treaty with them was thereby encouraged to proceed and march forward towards a swamp where the Indians then were. When we came near the said swamp, the way was so very bad that we could march only in a single file, there being a very rocky hill on the right hand, and a thick swamp on the left. In which there were many of those cruel blood-thirsty heathen who there waylaid us, waiting an opportunity to cut us off; there being also much brush on the side of the said hill, where they lay in ambush to surprise us. When we had marched there about sixty or seventy rods, the said perfidious Indians sent out their shot upon us as a shower of hail, they being (as was supposed) about two hundred men or more."2

1 Near the head of Wickaboag Pond.

2 Narrative pp. 6-8.

In this assault eight men were killed outright, including the three Brookfield men, and five more were wounded, one of whom was Captain Hutchinson, who died about a fortnight afterwards. Having mentioned the names of the killed and wounded, Captain Wheeler continues his Narrative thus:

"Upon this sudden and unexpected blow given us, (wherein we desire to look higher than man the instrument,) we returned to the town as fast as the badness of the way and the weakness of our wounded men would permit, we being then ten miles from it."

A difference of opinion exists concerning the place where the tragical assault was made,-whether in a defile about two miles northward from Wickaboag Pond, on the easterly side of Sucker Brook, and near the line between West Brookfield and New Braintree, or on the easterly side of the Winnimisset Meadow in that part of New Braintree which was formerly included in Hardwick.

During the last summer, by invitation of the President of this Society and accompanied by several of its members, I had an opportunity to explore both of these places. In my judgment there is little to choose between them, so far as their external appearance is concerned. Both answer reasonably well to Wheeler's description, due allowance being made for the changes wrought by drainage and cultivation in the last two hundred years. The question of location must be settled, if settled at all, by other considerations. And I bespeak your patience while I state very briefly some of the reasons why I believe that Winnimisset, rather than Sucker Brook, was the place of Wheeler's defeat.

Winnimisset had been visited by Ephraim Curtis twice in the preceding July, and his reports are preserved in the Massachusetts Archives. In his first report, dated July 16, 1675, he says, "these Indians have newly begun to settle themselves upon an island containing about

2 Narrative, p. 10.

four acres of ground, being compassed round with a broad miry swamp on the one side, and a muddy river with meadow on both sides of it on the other side, and but only one place that a horse could possibly pass, and there with a great deal of difficulty by reason of the mire and dirt."1 At his second visit, he reported, July 24, 1675, that he "found them at the same place where they were before."2 And he subsequently testified :-"The third time that I was sent out with Captain Hutchinson, and by his order went and treated with the Nipmug Indians in a swamp about eight miles from Quabouge," &c.3 This last visit was on the first day of August, when Wheeler says, "we sent out four men to acquaint the Indians that we had not come to harm them," and no intimation is given that this was not the swamp "where they were before." On the next day, Wheeler says, "when we came near the said swamp, the way was so very bad that we could march only in a single file, there being a very rocky hill on the right hand, and a thick swamp on the left"; he adds, "we had marched there sixty or seventy rods" before the assault was made. And he gives no intimation that the swamp which he was then approaching was not the same which Curtis had three times visited, and where he understood they were on Sunday, the immediately preceding day, viz., "about ten miles" from the garrison-house in Brookfield.

66

To recapitulate:-On the first day of August, when at Brookfield, on the summit of Foster Hill, Captain Wheeler understood that the Indians were about ten miles north west from us,"-and Curtis, on the same day, actually found them in a swamp about eight miles from Quaboag." As the distances were estimated, not measured, this difference is not material. On the next day, the Indians having failed to meet them, the English party marched from the plain near the head of Wickaboag Pond "towards a swamp

1 Mass. Arch., lxvii., 214–216.

2 Ibid., Ixvii., 222.

3 Ibid., lxvii., 254.