The Indian Remnant in New England.
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THE INDIAN REMNANT IN NEW ENGLAND. I. BY GEORGE J. VARNEY. THE fact that efforts have been made during the years since 1882 to the present date to obtain payment from Rhode Island, and, more recently, from Connecti cut tfnd New York also, for "Shorelands" within those States, by Indians whose an cestors were once the sole possessors of large portions of the territory embraced by those commonwealths, demonstrates that the "Indian Question is not yet settled in the earliest permanently colonized parts of the United States, excepting Virginia. The Indians concerned in this movement are the Xarragansetts in Rhode Island, the Mohegans in Connecticut, and the Montauks (of eastern Long Island) in New York,—three tribes only. At the time of the founding of the Puritan commonwealth there were resi dent in New England territory not less than thirteen tribes, with numerous sub-divisions because of location. A question that must sometimes have arisen in recent years in the minds of per sons of ethnic predilection is, What has become of the descendants of the people whose numerous villages were, a few gener ations ago, scattered along all the rivers from seaboard to source? The answer is not read ily to be found, but will be attempted in this paper. The Massachusetts tribe (which occupied the middle portion of the eastern section of the Bay State), after its early and severe discipline by Miles Standish and his men, soon put themselves in a friendly attitude toward the English. Before the Pilgrims had been in Plymouth one year, Chickataubut, the principal sachem of this tribe, with eight other sachems, by written instrument, acknowledged themselves the subjects of King James. Ten years later, on the twentysecond of March, 1631, the chief sachem
visited Governor Winthrop at Boston, pre senting to him a hogshead of corn. At this time the sachem wore English garments, and sat at the governor's table, where he con ducted himself creditably. On June 14, of the same year, Chickataubut was ordered by the court to pay a small skin of beaver, in satisfaction for the killing of a settler's pig by a member of his tribe; which mandate he promptly obeyed. Later in the same year a citizen and his servants stole some of the sachem's corn. Being de tected, the court, on September 27, ordered that the citizen should restore two-fold, and lose his title of gentleman, and pay five pounds sterling. His accomplices were "whipped to the same amount." In the fol lowing year two of his men were convicted of assault upon some persons of Dorchester in their homes. The culprits were put in the "bilboes," and the sachem was required to beat them,—which he did. This was in accord with the Indian custom of the time in the region. The Massachusetts, having been greatly reduced before the English came, by disease, and soon after by a war with the Tarratines, and, subsequently, with the Pequots, contin ued to dwindle; and the remnant, no doubt, was absorbed by the Xarragansetts and other tribes about them; for before King Philip's war, they had ceased to be heard of. The extinction of several other tribes has resulted from the destructions they suffered' in consequence of their attacks upon the English settlers, and their subsequent emi gration from their old haunts, and the result ing union with kindred tribes. Of these were the Canibas, of the Kennebec river region; the Anasagunticooks, of the Androscoggin valley; and the Norridgewocks, on Sandy River, in Maine; all of whom, after
