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| Pilgrims and Wampanoags at Thanksgiving |
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| Massasoit |
Ships from England arrived
steadily, and new settlements sprang up in Massachusetts and Connecticut. Near
New London, the Pequot tribe pushed back against encroaching settlers, and the first
war between English settlers and Native Americans took place in 1637. Due to
the English army’s overwhelming arms advantage – muskets and steel armor vs.
bows and arrows – it ended quickly. Pequots who managed to escape death joined
other tribes, and captives were sold into slavery. New England’s tribes
remembered that harsh lesson, and it took nearly forty years for the next war
to erupt.
However, by 1675 New England’s
tribes were chafing under English rule. Game was disappearing, English cattle
raided their crops, the fur-bearing animals they once traded to the Englishmen
were trapped out, and the English settlers no longer wanted wampum manufactured
by New England’s tribes. Worst of all, English settlers encroached deep into
Indian land on all fronts. Wampanoag raids began in the summer of 1675, and
quickly broke into open warfare. They
were led by Massasoit’s grandson, Metacomet, known as King Philip by his
English neighbors. Though the Wampanoags were joined by Narragansetts,
Nipmucks, Sakonnets, and Pocassets, the Indians’ defeat was inevitable.
I am now at work on the
manuscript which will complete my trilogy about Herodias Long of Rhode Island,
and King Philip’s War looms large on my horizon. The Pilgrims and Puritans left
many descriptions of New England’s Indians, but I wondered if the Native
American culture was altered by the time the Pilgrims arrived in 1620. After
all, by the time the Pilgrims arrived, Europeans had been coming to America for
many years for fish, furs, and timber. The Pilgrims found an iron kettle in a
cache of corn, and the Indians possessed other English goods, so, how else had
they changed? For comparison, I sought out the first contact between Europeans
and New England’s Indians.
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| Giovanni da Verrazano |
In January 1524, Captain Giovanni
da Verrazano captained a single ship, manned by only fifty men. He hoped to
find new lands for France (the sponsor of his journey) and a short cut to China.
That hope was dashed, but Verrazano was the first European since the Vikings to
explore the American coast.
Verrazano’s ship, La Dauphine, departed the Canary Islands
on January 17, 1524. They reached Cape Fear, North Carolina about March 1, and
Pamlico Sound soon afterward. In the Cape Fear area, Verrazano wrote, We had seen many people who came to the shore of the sea and
seeing us approach fled, sometimes halting, turning back, looking with great
admiration. Reassuring them by various signs, some of them approached, showing
great delight at seeing us, marveling at our clothes, figures and whiteness,
making to us various signs where we could land more conveniently with the small
boat, offering to us of their foods.
Verrazano and his men made
contact with the tidewater Indians, though not without trepidation. One young
sailor swam near to shore with to toss bells and mirrors to the Indians, but
was then overwhelmed by the waves. The Indians ran to carry him ashore, and the
alarmed lad uttered very loud cries. The Indians replied in kind, hoping to
show him that he should not fear. Then they laid him on the ground, stripped
off his wet shirt and hose, and built a large fire nearby. Verrazano, watching
from shipboard, was not the only one who thought the sailor was about to be
roasted for food. However, the lad revived, and when he was ready to go back to
the ship’s boat, the Indians, holding him always close
with various embraces, accompanied him as far as the sea.
In the vicinity of Delaware,
Verrazano found the inhabitants more fearful. He and his men met two women with
a half-dozen children, but the rest of the villagers had fled. They gave the
women food, which the old woman ate with gusto, but a younger one threw to the
ground. Verrazano took a young boy to carry to France, and tried to take the
young woman as well, who was of much beauty and of tall
stature. She cried out so that
the sailors released her, but kept the boy.
That unfortunate Indian lad was
one of many who were kidnapped over the centuries, including
Tisquantum/Squanto, who learned English from his captors before returning to
New England in 1617. He proved to be a godsend to the Pilgrims in 1621,
introducing them to Massasoit and other tribal leaders, and teaching the
Pilgrims how to grow crops in weather harsher than they had known in England.
However, the kidnapping of Squanto and other New England Indians no doubt added
to the fear displayed by the Indians whom the Pilgrims encountered.
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| 1556 map of New York and Newport harbors |
At the Hudson River Verrazano saw
many inhabitants, clothed with the feathers of birds of
various colors, [who] came toward us joyfully, uttering very great exclamations
of admiration. Verrazano’s ship sailed along Long Island and passed
Block Island, which Verrazano described like the island
of Rhodes, full of hills, covered with trees.
Then the ship entered
Narragansett Bay. Verrazano found a beautiful port
which he named Refugio – we know it as Newport. When La Dauphine entered the port, Verrazano said about twenty barges
full of people approached the ship. They stopped about fifty paces away, then altogether uttered a loud shout, signifying that they were
glad. Having them somewhat, imitating their gestures, they came so near that we
threw them some little bells and mirrors and many trinkets, having taken which,
regarding them with laughter, they entered the ship confidently.
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| Ninigret of the Niantics |
This was the first meeting
between Europeans and the Wampanoags, the tribe which would save the Pilgrims’
lives a century later. Verrazano’s account of the Wampanoags in their pre-contact
state is worth relating here at length (slightly abridged): There
were among them two Kings, of as good stature and form as it would be possible
to tell; the first of about XXXX years, the other a young man of XXIIII years,
the clothing of whom was thus: the older had on his nude body a skin of a stag,
artificially adorned like a damask with various embroideries; the head bare,
the hair turned back with various bands, at the neck a broad chain ornamented
with many stones of diverse colors. The young man was almost in the same style.
This is
the most beautiful people and the most civilized in customs that we have found
in this navigation. They excel us in size; they are of bronze color, some
inclining more to whiteness, others to tawny color; the face sharply cut, the
hair long and black, upon which they bestow the greatest study in adorning; the
eyes black and alert, the bearing kind and gentle, imitating much the ancient [manner].
Of other parts of the body I will not speak to your Majesty, having all the
proportions which belong to every well built man. Their women are of the same
beauty and charm; very graceful; of comely mien and agreeable aspect; of habits
and behavior as much according to womanly custom as pertains to human nature;
they go nude with only one skin of the stag embroidered like the men, and some
wear on the arms very rich skins of the lynx; the head bare, with various
arrangements of braids, composed of their own hair, which hang on one side and
the other of the breast. Some use other hair-arrangements like the women of
Egypt and of Syria use, and these are they who are advanced in age and are
joined in wedlock.
They have
in the ears various pendent trinkets as the orientals are accustomed to have,
the men like the women, among which we saw many plates wrought from copper, by
whom it is prized more than gold; which, on account of its color, they do not
esteem; on the other hand rating blue and red above any other. That which they
were given by us which they most valued were little bells, blue crystals and
other trinkets to place in the ears and on the neck. They did not prize cloth
of silk and of gold nor even of other kind, nor did they care to have them;
likewise with metals like steel and iron, for many times showing them our arms
they did not conceive admiration for them nor ask for them, only examining the
workmanship. They did the same with the mirrors; suddenly looking at them, they
refused them laughing.
Physical descriptions of Wampanoags
and Narragansetts by 17th century settlers vary little from Verrazano’s
writings. However, the Indians quickly came to prize English clothing, replaced
dyed porcupine quills and wampum beads made from clam shells with glass beads,
and used buttons, bells, coins, and other English trinkets as ornaments. Mary
Rowlandson was captured by the Narragansetts during King Philip’s War, and
described her captors at a dance: He was dressed in his
Holland shirt with great laces sewed at the tail of it; he had his silver
buttons, his white stockings, his garters were hung round with shillings, and
he had girdles of wampum upon his head and shoulders. She had a kersey coat and
[was] covered with girdles of wampum from her loins upward; her arms from her
elbows to her hands were covered with bracelets; there were handfuls of
necklaces about her neck and several sorts of jewels in her ears. She had fine
red stockings and white shoes, her hair was powdered and face painted red.
Back to Verrazano: They [the Wampanoags] are very liberal, so much so that all
which they have they give away. We formed a great friendship with them, and one
day, before we had entered with the ship in the port, remaining on account of
the unfavorable weather conditions anchored a league at sea, they came in great
numbers in their little barges to the ship, having painted and decked the face
with various colors, showing to us it was evidence of good feeling, bringing to
us of their food, signaling to us where for the safety of the ship we ought
anchor in the port, continually accompanying us until we cast anchor there.
Verrazano may have admired the
hospitality, beauty, and civility of the Wampanoags, but New England’s settlers
during the 17th century were less kind. They barred Indians from
living among them, and even Roger Williams, who lived with the Narragansetts,
described one of their chiefs as a ‘wise and peaceful prince,’ and wrote a
dictionary of their language, described Indians as ‘barbarous scum and the
offscourings of mankind.’ And though the Englishmen accused the Indians of
theft, the Pilgrims raided Indian villages and cemeteries for artifacts which
took their fancy, and stole their seed corn.
We remained XV days, supplying
ourselves with many necessities; where every day the people came to see us at
the ship, bringing their women, of whom they are very careful: because entering
the ship themselves, remaining a long time, they made their women stay in the
barges, and however many entreaties we made them, offering to give them various
things, it was not possible that they would allow them to enter the ship. And
one of the two Kings coming many times with the Queen and many attendants
through their desire to see us, at first always stopped on a land distant from
us two hundred paces, sending a boat to inform us of their coming, saying they
wished to come to see the ship; doing this for a kind of safety. And when they
had the response from us, they came quickly, and having stood awhile to look,
hearing the noisy clamor of the sailor crowd, sent the Queen with her damsels
in a very light barge to stay on a little island distant from us a quarter of a
league ... And one time, our people remaining two or three days on a
little island near the ship for various necessities as is the custom of
sailors, [the king] came with seven or eight of his attendants, watching our
operations, asking many times if we wished to remain there for a long time,
offering us his every help. Then, shooting with the bow, running, he performed
with his attendants various games to give us pleasure. This description
of archery and games is very similar to the Thanksgiving the Pilgrims shared
with their Indian neighbors.
My conclusion is that the Wampanoag and Narragansett cultures were not
much altered between the arrivals of Verrazano in 1524 and of the Pilgrims in
1620. However, the Indians were quick to adapt, eagerly seeking English clothes and
ornaments. They were equally avid to possess guns, but the English settlers tried
to keep their armaments to themselves. As King Philip’s War demonstrated, those
efforts were unsuccessful.
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| Verrazano's 1524 exploration |
As for Captain da Verrazano, after his time with the Wampanoags,
Verrazano and his crew passed along lower Cape Cod, then set off across the sea
to France. In 1527 Verrazano returned to the New World, this time to Brazil, and
returned to Europe with a cargo of brazil wood. A year later, Verrazano
explored Florida, the Bahamas, and the Lesser Antilles. When he rowed ashore,
probably on Guadeloupe, he was killed and cannibalized by the island’s Carib
inhabitants.
Sources:
Verrazano’s voyage along the
Atlantic coast of North America, 1524
Giovanni da Verrazano
Of Plymouth Plantation William Bradford
Flintlock and Tomahawk, 1958 Douglas Leach
The Sovereignty and Goodness of
God, 1682 Mary Rowlandson
wikimedia.com
wikipedia.com
