Narrative of the Pequot War
by John Mason
Source: Primary Source Documents
(Part 1)
A Brief History
OF
THE PEQUOT WAR:
Especially of the memorable Taking of their Fort at Mistick in
Connecticut in 1637.
Written by Major John Mason, a principal Actor therein, as then
chief Captain and Commander of Connecticut Forces.
With an Introduction and some Explanatory Notes by the Reverend
Mr. Thomas Prince.
PSAL. XLIV. 1-3. We have heard with our Ears, O God, our Fathers
have told us, what Work Thou didst in their Days, in the times of
old; How Thou didst drive out the Heathen with thy Hand, and
plantedst Them: how Thou did afflict the People and cast them
out. For they got not the Land in Possession by their own Sword,
neither did their own Arm save them: but thy right Hand, and
thine Arm, and the Light of thy Countenance, because Thou hadst a
Favour unto them.
PSAL. CII. 18. This shall be written for the Generation to come:
and the People which shall be Created, shall praise the Lord.
BOSTON:
Printed and Sold by S. Kneeland and T. Green in Queen Street,
1736.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * *
Introduction.
IN my Contemplations of the Divine Providence towards the People
of New England, I have often tho't what a special Favour it was,
that there came over with the first Settlers of Plimouth and
Connecticut Colonies, which in those Times were especially
exposed to the superiour Power of the Barbarians round about
them; Two brave Englishmen bred to arms in the Dutch Netherlands,
viz. Capt. Miles Standish of Plimouth, and Capt. John Mason of
Connecticut: Gentlemen of tried Valour, Military Skill and
Conduct, great Activity, and warm Zeal for that noble Cause of
Pure Scriptural Religion, and Religious Liberty, which were the
chief original Design and Interest of the Fathers of these
Plantations; and who were acted with such eminent Degrees of
Faith and Piety, as excited them to the most daring Enterprizes
in the Cause of God and of his People, and went a great way to
their wonderful Successes.
Like those inspired Heroes of whom we read the History in the
Eleventh Chapter to the Hebrews-By Faith, they not only rather
chose to suffer Affliction with the People of God than to enjoy
the Pleasures of Sin for a Season; esteeming the Reproach of
Christ greater Riches than the Treasures of Egypt: But by Faith
they even forsook the same, passed thro' the Sea, subdued
Kingdoms, wrought Righteousness, obtained
4 HISTORY OF THE PEQUOT WAR.
Promises, waxed valiant in Fight, and turned to flight the armies
of the Aliens.
The Judicious Reader that knows the New English History, cannot
think these Scripture Phrases or religious Turns unsuitable on
this Occasion: For as these Colonies were chiefly, if not
entirely Settled by a Religious People, and for those Religious
Purposes; It is as impossible to write an impartial or true
History of them, as of the ancient Israelites, or the later
Vaudois or North-Britons, without observing that Religious Spirit
and Intention which evidently ran through and animate their
Historical Transactions.
Capt. Standish was of a low Stature, but of such a daring and
active Genius, that even before the Arrival of the Massachusetts
Colony, He spread a Terror over all the Tribes of Indians round
about him, from the Massachusetts to Martha's Vineyard, and from
Cape Cod Harbour to Narragansett. Capt. Mason was Tall and
Portly, but never the less full of Martial Bravery and Vigour;
that He soon became the equal Dread of the more numerous Nations
from Narragansett to Hudson's River. They were Both the
Instrumental Saviours of this Country in the most critical
Conjunctures: And as we quietly enjoy the Fruits of their
extraordinary Diligence and Valour, both the present and future
Generations will for ever be obliged to revere their Memory.
Capt. Mason, the Writer of the following History, in which he was
a principal Actor, as Chief Commander of the Connecticut Forces,
is said to have been a Relative of Mr. John Mason the ancient
Claimer of the Province of New-Hampshire: However, the Captain
MASON'S NARRATIVE. 5
was one of the first who went up from the Masschusetts, about the
Year 1635 to lay the Foundation of Connecticut Colony: He went
from Dorchester, first settled at Windsor,1 and thence marched
forth to the Pequot War.
But it being above Threescore Years since the following Narrative
was Written, near an Hundred since the Events therein related,
and the State of the New England Colonies being long since
greatly Changed; it seems needful for the present Readers clearer
Apprehension of these Matters, to Observe-That in the Year 1633,
and 1634, several Englishmen arriving from England, at the
Massachusetts went up in the Western Country to discover
Connecticut River; the next Year began to remove thither; and by
the Beginning of 1637, Hartford, Windsor and Weathersfield were
Settled, besides a Fortification built at Saybrook on the Mouth
of the River.
At that Time there were especially three powerful and warlike
Nations of Indians in the South Western Parts of New England;
which spread all the Country from Aquethneck, since called Rhode
Island, to Quinnepiack, since called New-Haven; viz. the
Narragansetts, Pequots and Mohegans. The Narragansetts reached
from the Bay of the same Name, to Pawcatuck River, now the
Boundary between the Governments of
1 The names of those who are known to have gone from Windsor are
as follows: Capt. John Mason, Sergt. Bendict Alvord, Thomas
Barber, Thomas Buckland, George Chappel, John Dyer, James
Eggleston, Nathan Gillet, Thomas Gridley, Thomas Stiles, Sergt.
Thomas Staires, Richard Osborn, Thomas Parsons, William Thrall.
They were absent three weeks and two days. Every soldier received
1s. 6d. per day, reckoning six days in the week; sergeants, 20d.
per day; lieutenants, 20s. per week; the captain, 40s. per
week.-Stiles' History of Ancient Windsor.
6 HISTORY OF THE PEQUOT WAR.
Rhode-Island and Connecticut: And their Head Sachem was
Miantonimo. The Pequots reached from thence Westward to
Connecticut River, and over it, as far as Branford, if not
Quinnepiack; their Head Sachem being Sassacus. And the Mohegans
spread along from the Narragansetts through the Inland Country,
on the Back or Northerly Side of the Pequots, between them and
the Nipmucks; their Head Sachem being Uncas.
The most terrible of all those Nations were then the Pequots; who
with their depending Tribes soon entered on a Resolution to
Destroy the English out of the Country. In 1634, they killed
Capt. Stone and all his Company, being seven besides Himself, in
and near his Bark on Connecticut River. In 1635, they killed
Capt. Oldham in his Bark at Block-Island; and at Long-Island they
killed two more cast away there. In 1636, and the following
Winter and March, they killed six and took seven more at
Connecticut River: Those they took alive they tortured to Death
in a most barbarous Manner. And on April 23. 1637, they killed
nine more and carried two young Women Captive at Weathersfield.
They had earnestly solicited the Narragansetts to engage in their
Confederacy: very politickly representing to them, That if they
should help or suffer the English to subdue the Pequots, they
would thereby make Way for their own future Ruin; and that they
need not come to open Battle with the English; only Fire our
Houses, kill our Cattle, lye in Ambush and shoot us as we went
about our Business; so we should be quickly forced to leave this
Country, and the Indians not ex-
MASON'S NARRATIVE. 7
posed to any great Hazard. Those truly politick Arguments were
upon the Point of prevailing on the Narragansetts: And had These
with the Mohegans, to whom the Pequots were nearly related,
joined against us; they might then, in the infant State of these
Colonies, have easily accomplished their desperate Resolutions.
But the Narragansetts being more afraid of the Pequots than of
the English; were willing they Should weaken each other, not in
the least imagining the English could destroy them; at the same
time an Agency from the Massachusetts Colony to the
Narragansetts, happily Preserved their staggering Friendship.2
And as Uncas the Great Sachim of the Moheags, upon the first
coming of the English, fell into an intimate Acquaintance with
Capt. Mason, He from the Beginning entertained us in an amicable
Manner: And though both by his Father and Mother He derived from
the Royal Blood of the Pequots, and had Married the Daughter of
Tatobam their then late Sachim; yet such was his Affection for
us, as he faithfully adhered to us, ventured his Life in our
Service, assisted at the Taking their Fort, when about Seven
Hundred of them
2 The proposed Indian league was prevented by the diplomacy of
Roger Williams. For, though he had been banished by the colony of
Massachusetts, the magistrates sought his counsel, which he gave
freely, and was thus able to render the infant colonies a service
which proved to be of the greatest importance. In a letter to
John Mason in 1670, when both were old men, he writes as follows:
" When, the next year after my banishment, the Lord drew the
bow of the Pequot war against the country . . . . the Lord helped
me immediately to put my life in my hand, and scarce acquainting
my wife, to ship myself all alone in a poor canoe, and to cut
through a stormy wind with great seas, every minute in hazard of
my life, to the sachem's house. Three days and nights my business
forced me to lodge and mix with the bloody Pequot ambassadors,
whose hands and arms reeked with the blood of my countrymen,
murdered and massacred by them on Connecticut River, and from
whom I could not but nightly look for their bloody knives at my
own throat also."
8 HISTORY OF THE PEQUOT WAR.
were Destroyed, and thereupon in subduing and driving out of the
Country the remaining greater Part of that fierce and dangerous
Nation.
Soon after the War, Capt. Mason was by the Government of
Connecticut, made the major General of all their forces, and so
continued to the day of his death: The Rev. Mr. Hooker of
Hartford, being desired by the Government in their Name to
deliver the Staff into his Hand; We may imagin he did it with
that superiour Piety, Spirit and Majesty, which were peculiar to
him: Like an ancient Prophet addressing himself to the Military
Officer, delivering to him the Principal Ensign of Martial Power,
to Lead the Armies and Fight the Battles of the Lord and of his
People.
Major Mason having been trained up in the Netherland War under
Sir Thomas Fairfax;3 when the Struggle arose in England between
K. Charles I. and the Parliament about the Royal Powers and the
National Liberties; that Famous General had such an esteem for
the Major's Conduct and Bravery, that He wrote to the Major to
come over and help Him.4 But the Ma-
3 Fairfax went to the Netherlands in April of 1630, and though
but eighteen, was a volunteer in the army and was with Sir Horace
Vere at the siege of Bois-le-Duc, which surrendered in July of
that year. Young Fairfax was then ordered by his grandfather to
leave camp and travel in France; and there he remained for about
eighteen months, returning to England in February of 1632. Since
the total service of Fairfax in the Low Countries extended over
but four months, and was somewhat in the nature of a youthful
adventure, it can hardly be said that Mason was " trained up
" under him. though the story has been repeated by nearly
every biographer of Mason since Prince. He may, however, have
been a companion in arms with Fairfax, though of this there is no
direct proof.
4 This statement by Prince seems to have been also without
authority. However, Fairfax, who was no doubt the ablest general
of the Civil War and a great organizer, must have known of the
service of Captain Mason, and his " esteem " may have
led him to write Mason in Connecticut to join Cromwell's Army.
MASON'S NARRATIVE. 9
jor excusing himself, continued in this Country as long as he
lived, and had some of the greatest Honours his Colony could
yield him.
For besides his Office of Major General, the Colony in May 1660
chose him their Deputy Governour; continued him in the same Post
by annual Re-elections, by virtue of their first Constitution
to1662 inclusively. The same Year K. Charles II. comprehending
the Colonies of Connecticut and New Haven in One Government by
the name of Connecticut Colony; He in the Royal Charter, signed
April 23. appointed Major Mason their first Deputy Governour till
the second Thursday of October following: After which, the
General Court being left to chuse their Officers, they continued
to chuse him their Deputy Governour every Year to May 1670; when
his Age and Bodily Infirmities advancing, he laid down his Office
and retired from Publick Business.
After the Pequot War, he had removed from Windsor to Saybrook:
But in 1659, he removed thence to Norwich; where he Died in 1672,
or 1673, in the 73d Year of his Age: leaving three sons, viz.
Samuel, John and Daniel, to imitate their Fathers Example and
inherit his Virtues.
I have only now to observe, that in The Relation of the Troubles
which happened to New England by the Indians from 1614 to 1675,
Published by the then Mr. Increase Mather in 1677, I find a copy
of the following Narrative, but without the Prefaces, had been
communicated to him by Mr. John Allyn then the Secretary of
Connecticut Colony; which that Rev. Author took for Mr. Allyn's
and calls it his. But we must inform
10 HISTORY OF THE PEQUOT WAR
the Reader, that the Narrative was originally drawn by Major
Mason. And as his Eldest Grandson Capt. John Mason now of New
London has put it into my Hands; I have been more than usually
careful in Correcting the Press according to the Original; as the
most authentick Account of the Pequot War, and as a standing
Monument both of the extraordinary Dangers and Courage of our
pious Fathers, and of the eminent Appearance of Heaven to save
them.
' The other actions of Major Mason must be referred
' to the General History of this country, when some
' Gentleman of greater Qualifications and Leisure than
' I may claim, shall rise up among us, to undertake it
' I shall give some Hints in my Brief Chronology;
' which through numerous Hindrances, is now in such
' a Forwardness that near 200 Pages are Printed al-
' ready; and in a little Time, Life and Health allowed,
' I hope to present the Politick with the first of the two
' intended Volumes. In the mean while I cannot but
' Regret it, that such considerable and ancient Towns
' as Saybrook, Fairfield, Stamford, Canterbury, Groton
' in the County of Middlesex, Chelmsford, Billerica,
' Woburn, Dunstable and Bristol, should afford no
' more than their bare Names in the Published Rec-
' ords of this Country.
THOMAS PRINCE.
BOSTON, Dec. 23, 1735.
MASON'S NARRATIVE. 11
To The Honourable The General Court of Connecticut.
Honoured Gentlemen,
You Well know how often I have been requested by yourselves to
write something in reference to the Subject of the ensuing
Treatise (who have power to Command) and how backward I have
been, as being conscious to my own unfitness; accounting it not
so proper, I being a Chief Actor therein myself. Yet considering
that little hath been done to keep the memory of such a special
Providence alive, though I could heartily have wished that some
other who had been less interested and better qualified might
have undertaken the Task, for I am not unacquainted with my own
Weakness; yet I shall endeavour in plainness and faithfulness
impartially to declare the Matter, not taking the Crown from the
Head of one and putting it upon another. There are several who
have Wrote and also Printed at random on this Subject, greatly
missing the Mark in many Things as I conceive.5 I shall not
exempt my self from frailties, yet from material Faults I presume
you may pronounce it not Guilty, and do assure you that if I
should see or by any be convinced of an Error, I shall at once
confess and amend it.
I thought it my Duty in the Entrance to relate the first Grounds
upon which the English took up Arms against the Pequots; for the
Beginning is the Moiety of the Whole; and not to mention some
Passages at
5 Mason refers, no doubt, to the accounts by Underhill and
Vincent, which had then been printed.
12 HISTORY OF THE PEQUOT WAR.
Rovers, as others have done, and not demonstrate the Cause. Judge
of me as you please; I shall not climb after Applause, nor do I
much fear a Censure; there being many Testimonies to what I shall
say. 'Tis possible some may think no better can be expected in
these distracting Times; it being so hard to please a few,
impossible to please all: I shall therefore content myself that I
have attended my rule: You may please to improve some others who
were Actors in the Service to give in their Apprehensions, that
so the severals being compared, you may enlarge or diminish as
you shall see meet. I desire my Name may be sparingly mentioned:
My principal Aim is that God may have his due praise.
By your unworthy Servant,
JOHN MASON.
--------------------
To The American Reader.
Judicious Reader,
ALTHOUGH it be too true indeed that the Press labours under, and
the World doth too much abound with pamphleting Papers; yet know
that this Piece cannot or at least ought not to be disaccepted by
thee; For by the help of this thou mayest look backward and
interpret how God hath been working, and that very wonderfully
for thy Safety and Comfort: And it being the Lord's doing, it
should be marvellous in thine Eyes.
And when thou shalt have viewed over this Paper, thou wilt say
the Printers of this Edition have done well to prevent the
possible Imputation of Posterity; in that they have consulted the
exhibition at least to
MASON'S NARRATIVE. 13
the American World, of the remarkable Providencies of God, which
thou mayest at thy leisure read, consider and affect thy self
with, in the Sequel.
History most properly is a Declaration of Things that are done by
those that were present at the doing of them: Therefore this here
presented to thee may in that respect plead for liking and
acceptance with thee: The Historiographer being one of the
principal Actors, by whom those English Engagements were under
God carried on and so successfully effected. And for a President
for him in this his Publication of his own, in Parte Rei
Bellicae, he hath that great Man at arms the first of the noble
Caesars, being the Manager and Inditer of his martial Exploits.
He has also that necessary Ingredient in an Historian; Ut nequid
falsi dicere, et nequid veri non dicere audeat; That he will tell
the Truth and will not say a jot of Falsehood.
And Memorandum that those divine Over-rulings, their
Recollection, as they ought to be Quickeners of us up to a
Theological Reformation, and Awakeners of us from a lethargilike
Security, least the Lord should yet again make them more
afflicting Thorns in our Eyes and slashing Scourges in our Sides;
so also they may well be Pledges or Earnests to us of his future
saving Mercies; and that if we by our Declensions from him in his
ways do not provoke him, he will not forsake us, but have respect
to us in our Dwellings, and lend us the desirable Providence of
his perpetual Salvation.
N. B. This Epistle to the American Reader appears to have been
written by another Hand than Major Mason's.
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This page was last updated September 15, 2000.