This volume presents a valuable collection of annotated primary documents published during King Philip’s War (1675–76), a conflict that pitted English colonists against many native peoples of southern New England, to reveal the real-life experiences of early Americans.
Louise Breen’s detailed introduction to Daniel Gookin and the War, combined with interpretations of the accompanying ancillary documents, offers a set of inaccessible or unpublished archival documents that illustrate the distrust and mistreatment heaped upon praying (Christian) Indians. The book begins with an informative annotation of Historical Account of the Doings and Sufferings of the Christian Indians in New England, in the Years 1675, 1675, and 1677, written by Gookin, a magistrate and military leader who defended Massachusetts’ praying Indians, to expose atrocities committed against natives and the experiences of specific individuals and towns during the war. Developments in societal, and particularly religious, inclusivity in Puritan New England during this period of colonial conflict are thoroughly explored through Breen’s analysis.
The book offers students primary sources that are pertinent to survey history courses on Early Americans and Colonial History, as well as providing instructors with documents that serve as concrete examples to illustrate broad societal changes that occurred during the seventeenth century.
Author(s): Louise A. Breen
Publisher: Routledge
Year: 2019
Cover
Half Title
Title Page
Copyright Page
Table of Contents
PART I: General Introduction
Daniel Gookin and His Advocacy of Praying Indians
During King Philip’s War
PART II: Central Primary Source Document
Daniel Gookin, An Historical Account of the Doings and
Sufferings of the Christian Indians in New England in the
Years 1675, 1676, 1677
PART III: Ancillary Primary Source Documents
A. Superintendent of the Praying Indians
The Irish Connection: Vincent Gookin Condemns Plan to
“Transplant” Irish to Connaught, 1655
Daniel Gookin Questions Praying Indian Sarah Ahaton on
Her Adultery
Gookin Expresses Outrage over a Rumor That He Was Inciting
Indians to Violence: Correspondence between Daniel Gookin and Thomas
Prence/Prince, 1671
B. War and Internal Conflict
The Reverend John Eliot Petitions against the Selling of Indian
Captives as Slaves
The View from Providence: Excerpts from the Letter of Mary
Pray to Captain James Oliver, October 20, 1675
Job Kattenanit Humbly Petitions for Permission to Rescue
His Children
The Spy Mission: James Quannapohit’s “Relation”
Death Threat against Daniel Gookin and Thomas Danforth
Richard Scott Assails Gookin’s Character at the Blue Anchor
Tavern
William Harris, Refugee in Newport, Writes to English Secretary of
State Sir Joseph Williamson
C. Scant Mercy
William Wannuckhow and Sons Petition for Their Lives
John Lake Requests a Stay of Sagamore Sam’s Execution in Exchange
for Help Finding His Brother
Daniel Gookin Certifies the Courage of Two Praying Indian Men
Wishing to Free Their Captured Niece from Prison, August 1676
William Ahaton Pleads for the Freedom of a Five-Year Old Relative, July,
1676
Daniel Gookin Certifies That Mary Nemasit, Wife of a Praying Indian
Soldier, Was Sold by Mistake
Gookin Helps a Natick Woman Get Compensation for a
Confiscated Gun
Wait Winthrop and Wamesit Land, 1679–80
Index
