The Pilgrims did everything which could be done to avoid the Pequot war; but it was forced upon them. Sassacus was a very shrewd man, and laid very broad plans for his military operations. He could summon thousands of warriors who would fall furiously upon all the scattered settlements, lay them in ashes, and massacre the inhabitants. In the year 1634, just after a very flourishing trading post had been established on the Connecticut river at Windsor, two English traders, Captains Norton and Stone, ascended the river in a boat, laden with valuables for the Indian trade, which they intended to exchange for furs. These traders had eight white boatmen in their employ. The Indians were peaceful, and they had no apprehensions of danger. One night, as the boat was moored by the side of the stream, a band of Indians, with hideous yells, rushed from an ambush upon them, put every man to death and, having plundered the boat of all its contents, sunk it in the stream. These traders were from Massachusetts. This powerful colony demanded of Sassacus that the murderers should be surrendered to them, and that payment should be made for the plundered goods. The bloody deed had been performed at midnight in the glooms of the forest. There was no survivor to tell the story. Sassacus fabricated one, very ingeniously, to palm off upon the English. No one could deny the villany of Captain Hunt, who, some years before, had kidnapped several Indians and sold them into slavery. Sassacus declared that Captains Norton and Stone, without any provocation, had seized two Indians, bound them hand and foot in their boat, and were about to carry them off, no one knew where. The friends of these captives crept cautiously along the shore watching for an opportunity to rescue them. The white men were all thoroughly armed with swords and muskets, rendering any attempt to rescue the captives extremely perilous. The right of self-defense rendered it necessary, in the conflict which would ensue, to kill. In the darkness of the night they rushed upon the boat which was drawn up to the shore, killed the white men and released the captives. He also stated that all the Indians engaged in the affray, excepting two, had since died of the small-pox. This plausible story could not be disproved. The magistrates of Massachusetts, high-minded and honorable men, wished to treat the Indians not merely with justice, but with humanity. It could not be denied that, admitting the facts to be as stated by Sassacus, the Indians had performed a heroic act--one for which they deserved praise rather than censure. The Governor of Massachusetts therefore accepted this explanation, and resumed his friendly alliance with the treacherous Pequots.