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
The night before his death it is said that Philip, "like him of the army of
Midian," had been dreaming that he was fallen into the hands of the
English; he awoke in alarm and told it to his men and advised them to fly
for their lives, for he believed it would come to pass. Now, just as he was
telling his dream, he was startled by the first shot fired by one of the
English, who had surrounded his camp. Seizing his gun and powder horn he
fled at full speed in a direction guarded by an Englishman and the traitor,
Alderman. The Englishman took deliberate aim at him when he was only a few
yards away, but the powder was damp and the gun missed fire, as if in
fulfilment of the oracle. It was now the Indian's turn, and a sharp report
rang through the forest and _two bullets,_ for the gun was _double_
charged, passed almost directly through the heart of the heroic warrior.
For an instant the majestic frame of the chieftain quivered from the shock,
and then he fell heavily and stone dead in the mud and water of the swamp.
The traitorous Indian ran eagerly to inform Captain Church that he had shot
King Philip, and Church, by a prearranged signal, called his soldiers
together and informed them of the death of their formidable foe. The
corpse was dragged out of the swamp, as if it had been the carcass of a
wild beast, to where the ground was dry. Captain Church then said:
"Forasmuch as he has caused many an Englishman's body to lie unburied and
to rot above the ground, not one of his bones shall be buried."
Accordingly, an old Indian executioner was ordered to cut off his head and
quarter his body, which was immediately done. Philip had a mutilated hand,
caused by the bursting of a pistol; this hand was given to Alderman, who
shot him, as his share of the spoil. Captain Church informs us that
Alderman preserved it in rum and carried it around the country as a show,
"and accordingly he got many a penny by exhibiting it." The head was sent
to Plymouth, where it was set up on a gibbet and exposed for twenty years,
while the four quarters of the body were nailed to as many trees, a
terrible exhibition of the barbarism of that age.
"Such," said Edward Everett, "was the fate of Philip. He had fought a
relentless war, but he fought for his native land, for the mound that
covered the bones of his parents; he fought for his squaw and papoose;
no--I will not defraud them of the sacred names which our hearts
understand--he fought for his wife and child."
Philip, of Mount Hope, was certainly one of the most illustrious savages
upon the North American continent. The interposition of Providence alone
seems to have prevented him from exterminating the whole English race of
New England. Though his character has been described only by those who were
exasperated against him to the very highest degree, still it is evident
that he possessed many of the noblest qualities which can embellish any
character.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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