Manataka American Indian Council
ABENAKI HISTORY
Part IV
History
A
major reason for the fall of the Stuarts was a growing belief that they were on
the verge of restoring the Catholic church. To this end Jesuits had been
secretly entering England on the behalf of the Vatican for years. Aware of this
intrigue, New England Puritans could hardly fail to notice members of this same
religious order were living among the Abenaki on their northern frontier. The
militant attitude of the Abenaki after they returned from Canada only seemed to
confirm their suspicion of a plot which could even involve elements in the
English government, and Andros' offer of a New York sanctuary for Algonquin
refugees from New England in 1676 had only added fuel to the fire. The Sokoki
were already French allies against the Iroquois having joined them in attacks on
the Seneca villages in 1684. With the outbreak of war between Britain and France
in 1688, the Abenaki needed little encouragement to launch themselves against
the New England frontier.
With the onset of fighting the Abenaki withdrew to sanctuaries in northern New
England and Canada. Raids struck throughout New England with a ferocity unseen
since the King Philip's War and by 1695 had forced the abandonment of most of
the New England frontier. The Penobscot destroyed York, Maine in 1691 and
massacred 77 of its inhabitants, but by 1693 they had tired of the fighting.
Together with the Kennebec, Androscoggin, and Saco, they made peace with the
English, but the Sokoki near St. Francois (Odanak) had been raided several times
by the Mohawk (English allies). They remained active in the war and participated
in the French attacks on the Mohawk villages in 1693 and the Onondaga
three-years later. The Sokoki also continued their raids into New England, one
of which even reached the vicinity of Boston during 1697. The Treaty of Ryswick
(1697) ended the war between Britain and France, but the fighting between the
Abenaki and New England persisted for two years. At a treaty signed in 1699, the
eastern Abenaki promised to remain neutral in future wars between Britain and
France.
The future was only two years away. War between Britain and France resumed with
the Queen Anne's War (1701-13). True to their obligations, most eastern Abenaki
remained neutral and withdrew to Wolinak (Becancour) near Trois-Rivieres,
Quebec. Others established villages with the Sokoki near the new Jesuit mission
at St. Francois du Lac. New England colonists were so reluctant to enter Abenaki
territory in Maine, it took them almost two years to realize the Abenaki had
left. Western New England was different. By 1700 the Sokoki had formed a lasting
alliance with the Caughnawaga (Christian Mohawk who had relocated to Canada and
become French allies) and did not remain neutral. The new alliance also served
to protect the Sokoki from the British-allied Mohawk, who, in honoring the
Iroquois "Great Law of Peace," avoided combat with their Caughnawaga
relatives who were allies of the French. The arrangement even extended to the
Albany traders of New York who continued to trade with the Sokoki throughout the
war.
New England, however, had no peace with the Abenaki. Forming joint war parties
with the Caughnawaga, the Sokoki raided the frontier from their village of
Missisquoi on the eastern shore of Lake Champlain, Cowasuck in northern Vermont,
and St. Francois in Quebec. The mixed populations of these villages made the
affiliations of the raiders impossible, and they became known in New England as
St. Francis, or simply Abenaki. The most famous raid occurred at Deerfield,
Massachusetts on the unlikely date of February 29, 1704 and resulted in 56 dead,
109 captured, and half the houses burned. Massachusetts militia attacked
Cowasuck in retaliation, but most of the Sokoki escaped and retreated north
beyond reach. The English had little success in stopping the raids. Haverhill,
Massachusetts was destroyed in 1708, and Deerfield repulsed another raid in
1709. Military expeditions against the Ossipee and into the upper Connecticut
Valley achieved little. Meanwhile, Haverhill (only 30 miles north of
Boston) was attacked in 1713.
However, in Maine, the departure of the Abenaki had opened the door for British
attacks against the French in Acadia. The initial British attack in 1701 on a
French fort on the Penobscot failed, but three years later the British succeeded
and gained control of the entire coast of Maine. Military expeditions against
the Pigwacket in 1704 and 1708 succeeded only in capturing empty villages but
demonstrated that the Abenaki had withdrawn into Canada. Two British attempts to
take Port Royal in 1707 failed, but the final effort in 1710 succeeded and
forced the French to halt raids on New England to defend Quebec against a
possible British naval attack. While the Sokoki remained near St. Francois and
Missisquoi, the eastern Abenaki began returning to Maine in 1709. The British
capture of Arcadia in 1710 more-or-less ended the war in North America. Three
years later at Treaty of Utrecht (1713), France ceded Acadia (Nova Scotia) to
Great Britain. For the first time, the entire Abenaki homeland in Maine was
clearly under British rule. Although the eastern Abenaki were very upset with
this situation, they agreed to peace with Massachusetts at Portsmouth that year.
West of White Mountains, the Sokoki lands in northern Vermont and New Hampshire,
however, remained a disputed area between the Britain and France.
The French in Acadia (renamed Nova Scotia by the British) did not accept the
Treaty of Utrecht as permanent and expected the next conflict would return
control to France. That is, if British settlement did not overrun the area in
the meantime. By 1717 new English settlements were moving rapidly up the coast
of Maine and into the Connecticut Valley of southern Vermont and New Hampshire.
Feeling they were defending the rights of their Abenaki converts (and perhaps
those of France as well), several Jesuits, most notably Father Sebastian Rasles,
strongly encouraged the Abenaki to defend both their lands and themselves.
Conferences in 1717 and 1719 between the English and Abenaki could not reach an
agreement, and after several incidents of violence, Massachusetts governor
Samuel Shuttle declared war on the Abenaki in 1722. Known as Dummer's War (Grey
Lock's War, Lovewell's Wa, or Father Rasles' War), the fighting lasted five
years until 1727. In 1724 a colonial army attacked and burned Norridgewock on
the upper Kennebec River in Maine, killing Rasles and mutilating his corpse.
Although the French were never involved directly in the war, their sympathies
were definitely with the Abenaki, and their reaction to the circumstances of
Rasles' death almost provoked an open rebellion among the French population in
Acadia.
Only 150 Kennebec refugees from Norridgewock managed to reach safety in Canada.
After the Pigwacket were defeated the following spring, resistance by the
Abenaki in Maine ended. In December they signed a peace treaty with
Massachusetts which was ratified at Falmouth the following August. The fighting
continued in the west, however, for another two years in what could be
considered a separate, but related, conflict - Grey Lock's War (1723-27).
A member of the Pocumtuc who had found refuge in New York after the King
Philip's War, Grey Lock (Wawanotewat "he who fools others") had left
Schaghticook and joined the Sokoki at Missisquoi. After war with New England
began in 1722, he became a war leader and his successful raids against
settlements in the Connecticut valley of Massachusetts earned him a large
following. Unable to capture Grey Lock or locate his secret "castle"
near Missisquoi, the English asked the Iroquois to help, but they refused to
become involved except as possible mediators.
After the war in Maine ended in 1726 with the defeat of the eastern Abenaki and
a peace treaty, Massachusetts sent gifts and an offer of peace to Grey Lock in
the fall. No answer came back except in the form of continued raids. New York,
the Iroquois, and the Penobscot made other attempts to mediate an end to the
conflict, but Grey Lock also ignored these efforts. The Penobscot, however, did
succeed in getting the Canadian Abenaki at Wolinak and St. Francois to agree to
peace with New England. Grey Lock was noticeably absent from the treaty signed
at Montreal in July of 1727, but shortly afterwards - probably honoring the
request of the Abenaki at St. Francois - he ended the war but never signed any
agreement with the English. Seventeen years of peace followed what had been 50
of continuous war between the Abenaki and New England.
The Pigwacket, Androscoggin, Norridgewock returned to Maine during 1727, and in
the years following, the Penobscot emerged as the spokesman for the eastern
Abenaki with the French and English. For the most part, these peoples would
never leave their homeland again. The Passamaquoddy and Maliseet continued to
occupy the St. Croix and St. John Rivers respectively, while in Nova Scotia
(Acadia) the French Acadians and Micmac patiently awaited their return to France
rule and maintained an uneasy truce with the British garrisons in the area. Two
permanent Abenaki communities had meanwhile emerged in Quebec: Becancour (near
Trois-Rivieres composed mostly of eastern Abenaki displaced from southern
Maine); and St. Francois (30 miles to the southwest with a mixed population of
Sokoki, Pennacook, and New England Algonquin). The Sokoki also maintained a
large, permanent village at Missisquoi on Lake Champlain and a smaller
settlement at Cowasuck in northern Vermont.
After Dummer's War, New England came to think of the Abenaki as having
permanently migrated to Canada - an error which has persisted to the present.
For this reason, virtually all groups of Sokoki and Abenaki encountered in
northern New England during this period were usually referred to as St. Francis
Indians. The poorly defined boundary between Quebec and New England (a question
not completely settled until the 1800s) contributed to the confusion, but it
also was a convenient excuse for taking what was considered the unoccupied land
in between. In truth the Sokoki and Abenaki never really left northern New
England and bands of extended families have continued to live and hunt there
ever since. After 1727 English settlements cautiously crept north along the
Connecticut River into southern Vermont and New Hampshire, but the slow advance
of these heavily fortified outposts in a time of peace is a clear indication
that the Sokoki and Abenaki were still present in northern New England in large
enough numbers to seriously dispute this encroachment.
A major smallpox epidemic forced the abandonment of Missisquoi in 1730, but it
was re-occupied the following year. In one of those questionable agreements by
natives of doubtful authority, some Sokoki and Schaghticook were induced to sell
land along the Connecticut and Deerfield Rivers in 1735. Despite this agreement,
the Sokoki continued to protest each new English settlement and made it very
clear that they considered the upper Connecticut Valley as their own. Their
numbers had been reduced by war, epidemic, and slow exodus west to the Great
Lakes (only 150 warriors), but allied with the French and Caughnawaga, they were
still formidable. The friction increased, but the Sokoki still traded with both
the English and French. The real problem, however, was to the west at the
disputed boundary between Canada and New York in the upper Hudson Valley. French
settlement on Lake Champlain had begun near Missisquoi in 1734, and a Jesuit
mission was added in 1743.
With the beginning of the King George's War (1744-48) between Britain and
France, the long period of peace ended. Both the Abenaki and Sokoki stood with
the French. The Cowasuck and Eastern Abenaki withdrew north towards Canada, but
strangely enough, a few St. Francois and Pigwacket (one of the last mentions of
the Pigwacket who disappear from record after 1750) sought refuge near Boston
with the English. The Sokoki and their Caughnawaga allies promptly cleaned out
most of the new settlements in southern Vermont and New Hampshire and harassed
the few that remained for the next four years.
Governor
Shirley of Massachusetts in 1744 declared war on Cape Sable, Nova Scotia, and
St. John Indians (actually the Maliseet and Micmac) so the Canadian Maritimes
were aflame ...at least for the English since the French Acadians were
officially neutral and openly sympathized with the Micmac. At least 35 Abenaki
and Sokoki war parties attacked the frontier during the spring of 1746. In
August Fort Massachusetts on Hoosac River was captured and almost all of the
settlements on the east side of the Hudson River in New York had to be
abandoned.
Only Mohawk sided with the British, but after their raid just south of Montreal,
the Canadian Iroquois declared war on the British colonies in 1747. The
French-British war ended with the signing of the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle in
1748, but the Penobscot, Kennebec, Maliseet and Passamaquoddy did not sign a
separate peace until 1749. It took even longer for Penobscot to get the St.
Francois to agree to call in their war parties.
Although they had been battered on the frontiers by the native allies of the French, the British had succeeded in capturing the French fortress at Louisbourg in 1745. Much to the outrage of New England the peace treaty had returned Louisbourg to France, and much to the outrage of the French Acadians, Britain had retained control of the Canadian Maritimes. If there was one thing the King George's War accomplished, it was to leave all parties dissatisfied and ready for another war to settle things.
In
1749 the French reoccupied the upper St. John's River. By blaming the British
for a smallpox epidemic that had broken out among the Micmac during the war and
supplying arms and ammunition, they were able to prolong the fighting in Nova
Scotia until 1752. By 1755 the British had decided to regain control of the
Maritimes by deporting the entire French Acadian population which had
steadfastly refused to sign an oath of loyalty to Great Britain. Things were
also very tense in western New England, and the Sokoki at St. Francois
threatened war in 1752 if there was any further English settlement up the
Connecticut River. The murder of two of Abenaki hunters by New Englanders the
following year brought retaliatory raids against the New England frontier during
the summer of 1754. Preparing for war, the French had encouraged the mission
villages along the St. Lawrence (Caughnawaga, Lake of the Two Mountains, St.
Francois, Becancour, Oswegatchie, Lorette, and St. Regis) to organize themselves
as the Seven Nations of Canada (Great Fire of Caughnawaga).
The Caughnawaga dominated this group and attended the Albany Conference with the
British colonies (August, 1754). Speaking on behalf of the Abenaki and Sokoki,
the Caughnawaga agreed to stay out of any future war between Britain and France.
Unfortunately, it was a promise that could not be kept. The opening shots of the
French and Indian War (1755-63) were actually fired in 1754 in western
Pennsylvania. Raids from Missisquoi and St. Francois hit the frontier in New
York that year, and the Penobscot attacked Maine settlements, prompting the
Massachusetts governor to offer bounties of: £50 male Penobscot prisoner, £40
male scalp, £25 woman/child prisoner, and £20 woman/child scalp. In 1755 the
British had assembled a large military expedition under General Edmund Braddock
to capture Fort Duquesne (Pittsburgh). Strangely enough, the allies that helped
the French inflict the horrendous defeat on Braddock's army near Pittsburgh
were, for the most part, not from the Ohio valley, but warriors from the Seven
Nations of Canada led by a Huron war chief from Lorette.
Abenaki and Sokoki warriors also participated in Montcalm's campaign in northern
New York, where it is rumored that the Penobscot initiated the massacre that
followed the capture of Fort William Henry in 1757. Meanwhile, an Abenaki war
party from Becancour raiding near Albany gathered up the last 60 New England
Algonquin at Schaghticook and took them back to St. Francois in Canada. Except
on the frontier in Vermont, Maine, and New Hampshire, New England suffered
relatively few Indian attacks during the war, especially after the colonial
rangers commanded by Major Robert Rogers attacked and burned St. Francois during
the fall of 1759. Rogers claimed to have killed 200 Abenaki (including the
French priest), but the French records listed only 30 dead. Charlestown was
raided in retaliation, but the St. Francois dispersed after the raid and were
effectively taken out of the war. After the capture of Quebec in 1759, the war
was over in North America, although the French did not officially leave until
1763.
Peace did not come uniformly, and Rogers Rangers were required to expel the
French from the St. John's River in 1760. Even then a British survey crew was
warned by the Maliseet to remain on the lower part of the river. Peace with the
St. John's tribes and their eastern Abenaki allies did not really happen until
after treaties were signed in 1770 and 1776, and peace with the Micmac took
another three years. Elsewhere, with the French defeated and the Abenaki
scattered into small groups, settlers flooded north between 1761 and 1774. With
their lands being overrun, the Seven Nations considered joining the Pontiac
Rebellion in 1763, but in the end urged peace. The British response to the
uprising was to issue the Proclamation of 1763 halting further settlement west
of the Appalachian crest. However, Sir William Johnson, the British Indian agent
for North America, ruled that this did not cover lands claimed by the
Caughnawaga, Sokoki, and Abenaki.
This left the Abenaki without a homeland. After years of passing back-and-forth
across the border, Quebec considered them New England Indians, and New England
felt they belonged in Canada. During the war, many Abenaki and Sokoki had been
given refuge at the St. Regis, but with the end of the fighting, the Mohawk
wanted them to leave, but they no longer had a place to go. Some stayed as
unwelcome guests, others were absorbed by St. Francois, but many were forced to
scatter in small bands across northern New England as squatters in their own
homeland. It was not surprising that, on the eve of the American Revolution in
1775, the Abenaki and many former French allies longed for the return of French
rule to North America. The American Revolution presented the Abenaki with two
poor choices between the Americans who were taking their land and the British
who were giving it away.
In the beginning, the Seven Nations and other Abenaki were asked to remain
neutral but ended up fighting on both sides. Already involved in a struggle with
the British over settlement in northern Maine and the Canadian Maritimes, and
perhaps hoping the revolution would get rid of the British and restore the
French in Canada, the Penobscot, Passamaquoddy, Maliseet and Micmac sided with
the Americans. The St. Francois were divided but some helped the Americans
besiege Boston and provided guides for Benedict Arnold's ill-fated expedition
against Quebec during the winter of 1776-77. The Penobscot also served as
scouts for Washington's army, and in 1779 participated in the unsuccessful
American attack against the British forts on the Penobscot River. Colonel John
Allen formed an Abenaki regiment at Machias which harassed British shipping
along the Maine coast during the war. Meanwhile, other Abenaki served with the
British and raided Maine's Androscoggin valley in 1781.
After the war the Penobscot and Passamaquoddy received some recognition for
their services and by 1798 Massachusetts established three small reservations
for them in northern Maine (Maine was not a state until 1820). The treaty
was a clear violation of the Non-Intercourse Act passed by Congress in 1790, and
led to a $81.5 million federal settlement in 1978 for lands taken from them
without compensation. Federal recognition followed in 1980. The Passamaquoddy
and Penobscot were granted representation in the Maine legislature in 1823, but
their representatives had no status except in matters concerning Native
Americans. Tribal members were not allowed to vote in state elections until
1924. The Canadian Abenaki at St. Francois and Bécancour were granted reserves.
These were enlarged to accommodate an enlarged population in 1805, although the
land was reclaimed in 1839 for "non-use." During the War of 1812, the
"last time the Abenaki went to war," Bécancour provided two companies
to the British army. The St. Francois and Bécancour have endured to the
present, although groups have left over the years. Many went west and worked
with the Hudson Bay Company during the 1800s.
Small groups of Abenaki have been moving west to the Great Lakes and Ohio Valley
since they accompanied La Salle's expedition in 1680. The French encouraged one
group to move to Ohio in 1721, but upon learning the Abenaki had proposed an
alliance with the Fox (who were at war with the French at the time), the
invitation was withdrawn. Several small groups still managed to settle along the
Ohio River by the 1750. In 1787 some of the Abenaki with the Iroquois at St.
Regis left. Crossing the Mississippi, they settled on the White River in Spanish
Arkansas. After the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, they apparently merged with the
Delaware and Shawnee who lived nearby and later moved with them, first to Kansas
and then Oklahoma. Vermont became a state in 1791, but neither it nor the United
States has ever recognized the land claims or tribal status of the Abenaki
living there. The Sokoki presented claims for parts of their homeland in 1798,
1800, 1812, 1826, 1853, and 1874, but all were rejected by the State of Vermont.
First Nations referred to in this Abenaki History:
Huron
Mahican
Narragansett
Nipmuc
Susquehannock
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