Philip had now penetrated the Wilderness and effected his escape beyond the reach of his foes. He had the boundless forest around him for his refuge, with the opportunity of emerging at his leisure upon any point of attack along the New England frontier he might choose. Brookfield, an exposed settlement of twenty families, was the first to suffer. Twenty horsemen coming to its defense, were ambushed in a deep gully, and eleven killed. Emboldened by this success, three hundred Indians, yelling like fiends and brandishing their bloody weapons, rushed into the settlement. The terrified people gathered for defense in the strongest house, from the loopholes and windows of which they saw the torch applied to their homes. In an hour every cabin, with all its household furniture, most of it brought from England, was a heap of smoldering embers. The Indians now surrounded the house in which the people were gathered. Inside, feather beds were fastened to the walls for protection. Outside the Indians exerted their utmost ingenuity for two days to fire the building; They wrapped around their arrows hemp dipped in oil, and setting them on fire, shot them on the dry, inflammable roof. Several times the building was in a blaze, but by great effort the inmates extinguished it. One night a fire was built against the very door, but the colonists rushed out to a near-by well and procured water to quench it. When the ammunition of the colonists was running low, and they were exhausted by two days and as many nights of incessant conflict, and ready to despair, the Indians made a last desperate effort to fire the building. Filling a cart with hemp, flax and the resinous boughs of fir and pine, fastening to the tongue a succession of long poles, they set the whole contents on fire and pushed it against the garrison house, whose walls were as dry as tinder. But at that critical instant, when all hope was gone. Major Willard, of Boston, with forty-eight dragoons, charged through the Indians, scattering them right and left, and entered the garrison. The burning cart was rolled away from the building, and a providential shower aided in extinguishing the flames which had been kindled. The savages, after firing a few volleys into the fortress, sullenly retired. During this remarkable siege, one white man was killed and many wounded, while the Indians' loss was about eighty killed. It is said that Major Willard, who thus rescued the people of Brookfield from a cruel death, suffered military censure and disgrace for having gone there instead of remaining at Hadley, where there were no Indians. The fate of Brookfield was also meted out to Hatfield, Deerfield, Northfield and Springfield, while North Hampton, Worcester and Hadley, though lacking the name, became "battlefields."