Lives of Famous Indian Chiefs: From Cofachiqui, the Indian Princess, and Powhatan; down to and including Chief Joseph and Geronimo. Also an answer, from the latest research, of the query, Whence came the Indian? Together with a number of thrillingly interesting Indian stories and anecdotes from historyWood, Norman B. (Norman Barton)
History
Lives of Famous Indian Chiefs: From Cofachiqui, the Indian Princess, and Powhatan; down to and including Chief Joseph and Geronimo. Also an answer, from the latest research, of the query, Whence came the Indian? Together with a number of thrillingly interesting Indian stories and anecdotes from history
Wood, Norman B. (Norman Barton)
Indians -- Origin; Indians of North America -- Anecdotes; Indians of North America -- Biography
It seems that a captain by the name of Hunt who had been left in charge of
a vessel by Captain John Smith, while exploring the coast of New England in
1614, had exasperated the Indians beyond endurance. Captain Smith thus
records this infamous crime in his "Generale Historie of New England." "He
(Hunt) betraied foure and twentie of these poore salvages aboord his ship,
and most dishonestly and inhumanely for their kind usage of me and all our
men, carried them with him to Maligo, and there for a little private gaine
sold those silly salvages for Rials of eight; but this vilde act kept him
ever after from any more emploiement to these parts."
Samoset had heard from his red brothers all about this kidnapping, as well
as the attack on the Pilgrims in revenge for it.
The sequel of Hunt's outrageous crime is quite interesting. He sold his
victims, as we have seen, at Malaga, for eighty pounds each, but some of
them, including an Indian by the name of Squanto, were ransomed and
liberated by the monks of that island.
Squanto now went first to Cornhill, England, afterward to London. Here he
acquired some knowledge of the English language and obtained the friendship
and sympathy of Mr. John Slaney, a merchant of that city, who protected him
and determined to send the poor exile back to his native land.
About this time (1619) Sir F. Gorges was preparing to send a ship to New
England under the command of Captain Thomas Dermer, and it was arranged for
Squanto to embark on board this ship. "When I arrived," says Dermer in his
letter to Purchas, "at my savage's native country, finding all dead
(because of the pestilence), I traveled along a day's journey to a place
called Nummastaquyt, where, finding inhabitants, I dispatched a messenger a
day's journey further west, to Pacanokit, which bordereth on the sea;
whence came to see me two kings, attended with a guard of fifty armed men,
who being well satisfied with that my savage and I discoursed unto them
(being desirous of novelty) gave me content in whatsoever I demanded. Here
I redeemed a Frenchman and afterwards another at Masstachusitt, who three
years since escaped shipwreck at the northeast of Cape Cod."
One of these two "kings," as the sachems were frequently entitled by the
early writers, must have been Massasoit, the other was probably his
brother, Quadepinah.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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