Dummer's War: Difference between revisions

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Browse history interactively
← Previous editNext edit →
Content deleted Content added
VisualWikitext
No edit summary
Line 25: Line 25:
{{French colonial campaigns}}
{{French colonial campaigns}}
'''Dummer's War''' (1722–1725), (also known as '''[[John Lovewell (Junior)|Lovewell's War]]''', '''[[Sébastien Rale|Father Rale's War]]''', '''[[Gray Lock|Greylock's War]]''', '''Three Years War''' or the '''4th Indian War''') was a series of battles between [[New England]] and the [[Wabanaki Confederacy]] (specifically Mi'kmaq, Maliseet, and Abenaki), who were allied with [[New France]].<ref>The war had little organized leadership, and was mostly a series of [[skirmish]]es. Exactly which of these should be considered part of the war remains a matter of dispute.</ref> The war took place in the three northernmost British colonies - Nova Scotia, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts (which included present-day [[Maine]] and [[Vermont]]).<ref name = "NS">The Nova Scotia theatre of the Dummer War is named the "Mi'kmaq-Maliseet War" by John Grenier. ''The Far Reaches of Empire: War in Nova Scotia 1710-1760''. University of Oklahoma Press. 2008.</ref> The root cause of the conflict was tension over the ownership of these regions.
'''Dummer's War''' (1722–1725), (also known as '''[[John Lovewell (Junior)|Lovewell's War]]''', '''[[Sébastien Rale|Father Rale's War]]''', '''[[Gray Lock|Greylock's War]]''', '''Three Years War''' or the '''4th Indian War''') was a series of battles between [[New England]] and the [[Wabanaki Confederacy]] (specifically Mi'kmaq, Maliseet, and Abenaki), who were allied with [[New France]].<ref>The war had little organized leadership, and was mostly a series of [[skirmish]]es. Exactly which of these should be considered part of the war remains a matter of dispute.</ref> The war took place in the three northernmost British colonies - Nova Scotia, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts (which included present-day [[Maine]] and [[Vermont]]).<ref name = "NS">The Nova Scotia theatre of the Dummer War is named the "Mi'kmaq-Maliseet War" by John Grenier. ''The Far Reaches of Empire: War in Nova Scotia 1710-1760''. University of Oklahoma Press. 2008.</ref> The root cause of the conflict was tension over the ownership of these regions.

The war has been commemorated by [[Henry Wadsworth Longfellow]], 1807&ndash;1882, with his poem "The Battle of Lovells Pond" and by [[Nathaniel Hawthorne]] with his story, "[[Roger Malvin's Burial]]".


== Historical context ==
== Historical context ==

Revision as of 17:43, 17 October 2010

Dummer's War
Date1722–1725
Location
Northern New England and Nova Scotia
Result Skirmishing ceased by 1725.
Belligerents

Mohawk		 Wabanaki Confederacy
Abenaki
Pequawket
Mi'kmaq
Maliseet

Dummer's War (1722–1725), (also known as Lovewell's War, Father Rale's War, Greylock's War, Three Years War or the 4th Indian War) was a series of battles between New England and the Wabanaki Confederacy (specifically Mi'kmaq, Maliseet, and Abenaki), who were allied with New France.[1] The war took place in the three northernmost British colonies - Nova Scotia, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts (which included present-day Maine and Vermont).[2] The root cause of the conflict was tension over the ownership of these regions.

The war has been commemorated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, 1807–1882, with his poem "The Battle of Lovells Pond" and by Nathaniel Hawthorne with his story, "Roger Malvin's Burial".

Historical context

The war occured as a result of an expansion of New England settlements along the Kennebec River (in present-day Maine) and of the movement of more New England fishermen into Nova Scotia waters (particularly at Canso, Nova Scotia). The Treaty of Utrecht (1713), which ended Queen Anne's War, had facilitated this expansion. The treaty, however, had been signed in Europe and had not involved any member of the Wabanaki natives. None had been consulted and they protested through raids on British fishermen and settlements.[3] For the first and only time, Wabanaki would fight New Englanders and the British on their own terms and for their own reasons and not principally to defend French imperial interests.[4] In response to Wabanki hostilities toward the expansion, the Governor of Nova Scotia Richard Phillips built a fort in traditional Mi'kmaq territory at Canso, Nova Scotia (1720) and Massachusetts Governor Shute built a fort on traditional Abenaki territory at the mouth of the Kennebec River (present day Phippsburg, Maine) (1716). [5]

These fortifications escalated the conflict. A Jesuit missionary named Sébastien Rale (Rasles) was stationed at Norridgewock, while an Abenaki named Gray Lock led raids against the encroaching New England settlements. In the fall of 1721, the Abenakis burned the farms and killed livestock in the settlements around Casco Bay.[6] Govenor Shute chose to launch a punitive expedition against Father Rale at Norridgewock in March 1722. While the New England Rangers were unsuccessful in capturing Father Rale, they plundered the church and Rale's cabin.[7] In response, the Abenakis raided a British settlement at Merrymeeting Bay near the mouth of the Kennebec River.[8]

In Nova Scotia, the Mi'kmaq raided the new fort at Canso, Nova Scotia (1720). Under potential siege, in May 1722, Lieutenant Governor John Doucett took 22 Mi'kmaq hostage at Annapolis Royal to prevent the capital from being attacked.[9] In July 1722 the Abenaki and Mi'kmaq created a blockade of Annapolis Royal, with the intent of starving the capital.[10] The natives captured 18 fishing vessels and prisoners from present-day Yarmouth to Canso. They also seized prisoners and vessels from the Bay of Fundy.

As a result of the escalating conflict, Massachusetts Governor Samuel Shute officially declared war on the Abenaki on July 22, 1722.[11] Lieutenant Governor William Dummer, after whom the war is named, took the position of acting Governor the following year in 1723.

Northern New England theatre

Raid on Fort St. George, Maine

In August 1722, 500-600 natives laid siege to Fort St. George (Phippsburg, Maine, located on the Kennebec River at Sabino Head) for twelve days.[12]

Raid on Northfield and Rutland, Massachusetts

To defend against these attacks, the English built Fort Dummer (near present-day Brattleboro, Vermont) in 1724.

Battle at Norridgewock

Death of Father Sebastian Rale of the Society of Jesus, an 1856 lithograph

In July 1724, 100 Massachusetts rangers under Captains Jeremiah Moulton and Johnson Harmon marched to Norridgewock, Maine to assassinate Father Sébastien Rale and destroy the settlement. Rale was killed in the opening moments of the battle, a leading chief was killed and the rangers massacred nearly two dozen women and children.[13]. The English had casualties of two militiamen and one Mohawk.

During Dummer's War, as revenge for the raid on Norridgewock, the tribe and its auxiliaries on June 13 burned Brunswick at the mouth of the Kennebec, taking hostages to exchange for those held in Boston. Consequently, on July 25 Shute declared war on the eastern Indians. But on January 1, 1723, Shute abruptly departed for London. He had grown disgusted with the intransigent Assembly (which controlled funding) as it squabbled with the Governor's Council over which body should conduct the war. Lieutenant-governor William Dummer assumed management of the government. Further Abenaki incursions persuaded the Assembly to act in what would be called Dummer's War -- also Father Rale's War.

In August 1724, captains Johnson Harmon and Jeremiah Moulton and a force of 208 soldiers left Fort Richmond (now Richmond, Maine) in 17 whaleboats up the Kennebec.[14] At Taconic Falls (now Winslow), 40 men were left to guard the boats as the troops continued on foot. On August 23, 1724 (N. S.), the expedition came upon the village unexpectedly. Many of the Indians were routed, leaving 26 warriors dead and 14 wounded. Among the casualties was Sébastien Rale. Harmon's son-in-law, Lt. Jacques, scalped Fr. Rale. The Boston authorities gave a reward for the scalps, and Harmon was promoted.

Thereafter, the French and Indians claimed that the missionary died "a martyr" at the foot of a large cross set in the central square, drawing the soldiers' attention to himself to save his parishioners. The English militia claimed that he was "a bloody incendiary" shot in a cabin while reloading his flintlock. His body was mutilated, and his scalp redeemed in Boston with those of the other dead. A Mohawk named Christian, who accompanied the troops, slipped back after they had departed and set the village and church ablaze. The 150 Abenaki survivors returned to bury the fallen before abandoning Norridgewock for Canada. Rale was interred beneath the altar at which he had ministered his converts. In 1833, Bishop Fenwick dedicated an 11-foot-tall (3.4 m) obelisk monument, erected by subscription, over his grave at what is today St. Sebastian's Cemetery at Old Point in Madison, Maine.

Raid on Winnipiscogee Lake

On December 10, 1724, Captain John Lovewell along with a company of rangers killed two Abenakis.[15]

Lovewell and his militia company (often called "snowshoe men") of 30 men left Dunstable on their first expedition in December of 1724, trekking to the north of Lake Winnipesaukee ("Winnipiscogee Lake") into the White Mountains of New Hampshire. On December 19, 40 miles (64 km) north of Winnipesaukee, the troop came upon a wigwam, where they killed and scalped an Abenaki man and took an Abenaki boy captive in response to the abduction of two men from Dunstable and the ambush and killing of eight others by Abenaki warriors. The company was paid 200 pounds for the scalp (150 pounds plus 50 pounds over and above).

Battle at Wakefield

In February 1725, Lovewell made a second expedition to the area and killed another ten Indians near Lake Winnipesaukee.[16]

On February 20 they came across a recently inhabited wigwam and followed tracks for some five miles. On the banks of a pond at the head of the Salmon Falls River in the present town of Wakefield, New Hampshire they came upon more wigwams with smoke rising from them. Some time after 2:00 AM Lovewell gave the order to fire. A short time later ten Indians lay dead. The Indians were said to have had numerous extra blankets, snowshoes, moccasins, a few furs and new French muskets, which would seem to indicate that they were on their way to attack frontier settlements. Preventing such an attack is probably the true success of this expedition.

Early in March Lovewell's troops arrived in Boston. They paraded their Indian scalps through the streets, Lovewell himself wearing a wig made of Indian scalps. The bounty paid was 1000 pounds (100 per scalp).

Raid on Fryeburg

During his last expedition, Lovewell died in a fight against the Pequawket tribe at Fryeburg, Maine, on May 8, 1725.

The third expedition consisted of only 46 men and left from Dunstable on April 16, 1725. They built a fort at Ossipee and left 10 men, including the doctor and John Goffe, to garrison the fort while the rest left to raid the Abenaki town of Pequawket, now Fryeburg. On May 9, as the militiamen were being led in prayer by chaplain Jonathan Frye, a lone Abenaki warrior was spotted. Lovewell's men waited until the warrior was close and fired at him but missed. The Abenaki returned fire, killing Lovewell. Ensign Seth Wyman, Lovewell's second in command, killed the warrior with the next shot. Chaplain Frye then scalped the dead Indian. The militia had left their packs a ways back so as to be unencumbered by them in battle. Two returning war parties of Abenaki led by Paugus and Nat found them and waited in ambush for the returning militia. Eight men were killed in the first volley by the Indian warriors. The battle continued for more than 10 hours until Ensign Wyman killed the Indian war chief Paugus. With the death of Paugus the rest of the Indians soon vanished into the forest. Only 20 of the militiamen survived the battle; three died on the retreat home. The Abenaki losses except for Paugus are unknown. The Abenaki deserted the town of Pequawket after the battle and fled to Canada.

Nova Scotia theatre[2]

Battle at Winnepang (Jeddore Harbour)

In response to the blockade of Annapolis Royal, New England lauched a campaign to end the blockade and retrive over 86 New England prisoners taken by the natives. One of these operations resulted in the Battle at Winnepang (Jeddore Harbour), in which thirty-five natives were killed and five New Englanders.[17] Only five native bodies were recovered from the battle, and the New Englanders decapitated the corpses and set the severed heads on pikes surrounding Canso's new fort. [18]

Raid on Canso (1723)

In 1723, the village was raided again by the Mi'kmaq, who killed five fishermen. In this same year, the New Englanders built a twelve-gun blockhouse to guard the village and fishery.[19]

Raid on Annapolis Royal (1724)

The worst moment of the war for the capital came in early July 1724 when a group of sixty Mikmaq and Maliseets raided Annapolis Royal. They killed and scalped a sergeant and a private, wounded four more soldiers, and terrorized the village. They also burned houses and took prisoners.[20] The British responded by executing one of the Mi'kmaq hostages on the same spot the sergeant was killed. They also burned three Acadian houses in retaliation.[21]

As a result of the raid, three blockhouses were built to protect the town. The Acadian church was moved closer to the fort so that it could be more easily monitored.[22]

Aftermath

Peace treaties were signed in Maine in December 1725 and in June of the following year in Nova Scotia. Unlike the Maine natives, the Mi'kmaq and Maliseet of Nova Scotia refused to declare themselves British subjects.[23] The war had been as much a native victory as it was a British one. The British were forced to acknowledge that the natives had a right to possess their land.[24] The peace in Nova Scotia would last for eighteen years.[25]

References and notes

  1. ^ The war had little organized leadership, and was mostly a series of skirmishes. Exactly which of these should be considered part of the war remains a matter of dispute.
  2. ^ a b The Nova Scotia theatre of the Dummer War is named the "Mi'kmaq-Maliseet War" by John Grenier. The Far Reaches of Empire: War in Nova Scotia 1710-1760. University of Oklahoma Press. 2008.
  3. ^ William Wicken. "Mi'maq Decisions: Antoine Tecouenemac, the Conquest, and the Treaty of Utrecht". in John Reid et al (eds). The Conquest of Acadia, 1710: Imperial, Colonial and Aboriginal Constructions. University of Toronto Press. 2004. pp. 96
  4. ^ William Wicken, p. 96
  5. ^ The French claimed the same territory on the Kennebec River by building churches in the Abenaki villages of Norridgewock and Medoctec further up the Kennebec River. (See John Grenier. The Far Reaches of Empire. University of Oklahoma Press. 2008. p. 51, p. 54)
  6. ^ Faragher, p. 163
  7. ^ John Grenier, p. 55
  8. ^ Grenier, p. 55
  9. ^ Grenier, p. 56
  10. ^ Beamish Murdoch. History of Nova Scotia or Acadia, p. 399
  11. ^ A history of Nova-Scotia, or Acadie, Volume 1, by Beamish Murdoch, p. 398
  12. ^ Grenier, p. 59
  13. ^ John Grenier, p. 84
  14. ^ Johnson was known for his bloodthirsty attitude towards the Indians. In 1715, male members of the Harmon family massacred Native Americans at a pow-wow in York, Maine. The local minister, Samuel Moody, stated that God would punish the Harmons so that there would be no more males to carry on the name.
  15. ^ John Grenier, p. 65
  16. ^ John Grenier, p. 65
  17. ^ Beamish Murdoch. A history of Nova-Scotia, or Acadie, Volume 1, p. 399
  18. ^ Geoffery Plank, An Unsettled Conquest, p. 78
  19. ^ Benjamin Church, p. 289; John Grenier, p. 62
  20. ^ Faragher, John Mack, A Great and Noble Scheme New York; W. W. Norton & Company, 2005. pp. 164-165.
  21. ^ Brenda Dunn, p. 123
  22. ^ Brenda Dunn, pp. 124-125
  23. ^ John Grenier, p. 70
  24. ^ John Grenier, p. 71
  25. ^ John Faragher, p. 167

External links

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Dummer%27s_War&oldid=391268655"