At a special meeting in 1702, it was voted to levy a
rate or tax of £31 12?. OOrf., to defray the town's in-
debtedness for the previous year. In this amount
were included £6 for the schoolmaster, £2 10s. for
the selectmen's salary, and six shillings for "time
and money spent to obtain a schoolmaster." Ten
pounds was voted Mr. Rolfe for wood, and "four pub-
lic contributions," which had first been given him
the previous year, and were annually continued till
his death. Such contributions, of one sort or another,
were taken every Sunday towards the close of service,
their object being previously eyplained by one of the
deacons. The people proceeded to the " deacon's
seat," and deposited their offerings in due order, —
first the magistrates and dignitaries, then the elders,
and lastly the common people. After the benediction
all the people remained standing, whilst the minister
marched down the aisle, followed by his family, and
gravely bowing on either side.

In 1698 a clerk of the markets was first chosen —



HAVERHILL.



1955



Ensign Thomas Eatton, who continued as such till
170G.

At the annual meeting in 1703 Captain Richard
Saltonstall petitioned the town for liberty to run a
fence " from the pound cross over the spot where the
old meeting-house formerly stood to his fence," and
to " feed on the burying-place," viz., to pasture animals
upon it, or else that the town .should fence in the
burying-place by itself, which the townsmen voted
to do, when the old meeting-house had now been re-
moved.

May 4, 1702, England declared against France and
Spain, the war known in Europe as the " War of the
Spanish Succession,'' but in America as Queen
Anne's War. It was not long before the French and
the English colonies in America were involved in it;
notwithstanding the previous peace, it appears that
in March and April, 1700, Capt. Samuel Ayer had
twenty soldiers under his command, who were in
constant service here. March 16th twenty men were
sent from Ipswich to Haverhill. Early in 1702, the
House of Representatives ordered snow shoes to be
provided for the militia in the frontier towns, that
they might be prepared to resist and pursue Indian
depredators in the winter.

At the approach of war an additional garrison was
ordered in the house of James Sanders, who lived at
or near the foot of "Sanders'" Hill, in the north-
easterly part of the town. James is thought to have
been a son of John, who came from the parish of
Dainton, Wiltshire, England.

Mirick says that early in the spring of 1701, the
Indians attacked the garrison house of Jonathan
Emerson, at the northwest corner of the present Win-
ter and Harrison Streets. He may have antedated
the time of the attack; but indeed, some straggling
party may have anticipated the war, and made an as-
sault without direction from their French masters.
The garrison repulsed the attack without loss, whilst
it is said that two Indians were killed, whom the red-
men carried away and threw into the " deep hole,"
near the brick-yards. In the winter of 1704, Febru-
ary 8th about three or four o'clock in the afternoon,
a party of six Indians surprised the northern garrison
at Joseph Bradley's, rushing in at the open gates.
Jonathan Johnson, a sentinel, shot and wounded the
foremo?t, and Mrs. Bradley, who had a kettle of boil-
ing soap on the fire, threw a ladleful of it over the
unhappy savage, whom the "subsequent proceedings"
interested no more. The savages at once killed John-
son, and took prisoners Mrs. Bradley and four others.
Three whites escaped unhurt, and the Indians proba-
bly fearing to be surprised in their turn, commenced
a precipitate retreat. The weather was bitter and the
snow deep, whilst the unhappy captives were over-
weighted with a heavy burden. Mrs. Bradley lived
for many days on bits of skin, bark, ground-nuts,
â– wild onions and lily-roots. In such a miserable
plight she gave birth to a child, deep in the forests.



When the child cried the Indians thrust hot embers
in its mouth. In mockery of the rite of baptism,
they gashed its forehead with their knives; and, dur-
ing her temporary absence they piked it upon a pole.
At last the party arrived in Canada, where the In-
dians sold Mrs. Bradley to a Canadian for eighty
livres.

She was treated kindly by the family of which she
thus became an inmate, and in March, 1705, her
husband went to Canada, and redeemed her. Tra-
dition among descendants relates that he travelled
on foot, accompanied only by a dog that drew a little
sled, whereon was a bag of snuff, a present from the
Governor of Massachusetts (at this time Joseph
Dudley) to the Governor of Canada. The reunited
couple voyaged from Montreal to Boston, and re-
turned to Haverhill in safety.

The old writers said this was Mrs. Bradley's second
captivity ; and tradition added that when the Indians
rushed into the garrison, one of them cried out,esult-
ingly, " Now Hannah, we got you." There was a
good deal of confusion about the second captivity,
but there seems to have been no doubt that in the
summer of 1706, the year after the return of Bradley
and his wife, their garrison was again attacked in
the night time. It is said they, their children and a
hired man, were the only persons within it. But
the moon shone brightly and they could see the red
men silently and watchfully stealing near. They
all armed themselves, and Mrs. Bradley, in her des-
peration, declared to her husband, that she had
rather be killed than taken prisoner again. The
savages, rushing against the door, tried to break it in
and partially succeeded, when Mrs. Bradley shot and
killed the foremost, who was struggling to crowd him-
self in at the opening. Baffled in this first attempt,
the Indians, as often occurred when their first leap
failed, retreated like the wild beasts of the forest,
whose habits in their warfare they often seemed to
have copied.

This was not Mrs. Bradley's first captivity, as ap-
pears from the State Archives. In 1738, Hannah
Bradley, of Haverhill, petitioned the General Court
for a grant of land, in consideration of her former
sufferings among the Indians and her " present low
circumstances." That body granted her two hun-
dred and fifty acres of land which was laid out to
her in two lots, May 29, 1738, in Methuen, by Richard
Hazen, a noted Haverhill surveyor.

Shortly after, Joseph Neff, a son of Mary, peti-
tioned for a similar grant, in recognition of his
mother's service in helping Hannah Duston to kill
" divers Indians." He says his mother was " kept a
prisoner for a considerable time," and " in their re-
turn home (they) past thro the utmost hazard of
their lives and suffered distressing want being almost
starved before they could return to their dwelling."
Neff was granted two hundred acres of land. In aid
of his petition, Mrs. Bradley made the following



1956



HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.



deposition which establishes the fact that she had
been taken prisoner March 15, 1697, with Mrs.
Duston, and traveled with her at least as far as
Pennacook :



[ of the Widow Uuimiih Bradley, of Haverhill, of full
ago, who testifieth and saith that about forty years past the said Ilaunah
together with the widow Mary Neff were taken prisoners by the Indians
and carried together into captivity and above penny Cook the deponent
wa-s, by the Indians, forced to travel further than the rest of the Cap-
tives, and the next night but one, there came to us one Squaw, wliosaid
that Hannah Duston and the aforesaid Mary Ncff assisted in killing the
Indians of her M'igwam, except herself and a boy, henielf escaping very
narrowly, shewing, to myself and others, seven wounds as she
said with a Hatchet on her head, which wounds were given hor when
the rest were killed, and fuither saith not. her

Hannah X Bradlky."

August 4, 1704, Joseph Page and Bartholomew
Heath were killed at Haverhill by the Indians, and
a lad with them had a narrow escape.

The distress occasioned by Indian alarms was such
that the town directed the selectmen to petition the
assembly for abatement of that year's taxes. The
next year a constant watch was kept day and night.
In June Governor Dudley directed Colonel Salton-
stall to " detach twenty able soldiers of the Newbury
militia, and have them rendezvous at Haverhill on
July fifth." These orders were given, and July 17th
Saltonstall writes Lieutenant-Colonel Thomas Noyes,
of Newbury, a severe letter, complaining of the phys-
ique of the " able soldiers," sent as " a considerable
number of them appeared to be but boys or children,
and not fit for service, blind, in part, and deaf and
cross-handed." August 4th he writes again to Noyes
in the same strain.

"Some idea," Chase truly says, " of the dangers
and alarms of those years, and the great exertions
made for the security of the frontier towns, may be
had from the large number of soldiers ferried across
the Merrimac at a single place, Griffin's Ferry, oppo-
site tlie present village."

In 1707 Griiiin would appear to have ferried over,
at different times, two hundred and eighty-four men
and nearly as many horses ; in 1708 one hundred and
eighty men and thirty-one horses.

June 24, 1707, Joseph and Ebenezer Page, sons of
Joseph, were killed in Haverhill. In August anoth-
er attack was made, in which Nathan Simonds, of
this town, and Jonathan Marsh, of Salem, were
wounded.

Early in the spring of 1708 intelligence was sent to
Governor Dudley at Boston that a French and In-
dian force, consisting of eight hundred men, was
about marching for some one of our frontier settle-
ments. Upon the receipt of this news, he " ordered
guards in the most exposed places of both his prov-
inces." P'our hundred Massachusetts militia were
posted in New Hampshire. A patrol was kept up
from King-ton to Dover, and scouts were continu-
ally upon the move. To Haverhill were sent about
forty men, commanded bv three Salem officers-



Major, afterward Colonel, Turner (a principal mer-
chant of that place, and for many years a member of
the council). Captain Price and Captain Gardner.
Soon after their arrival they were posted in the
frontier houses and the garrisons. The following is
the French account of the Canadian expedition. It
is copied from Father Charlevoix's " History of New
France." " This expedition had been decided upon
in a great council held at Montreal with the chiefs
of all the Christian Indians settled in the colony,
and other Abenaquis were to join with a hundred
picked Canadians, besides a great number of volun-
teers, chiefly officers in our troops, making in all four
hundred men. Messieurs de St. Ours des Chaillons
and Hertel de Rouville were to command the French,
and the Sieur Boucher de la Perriere was to lead the
Indians. As it was important to keep the project
secret till the moment when the warriors should start
and to march rapidly, it was arranged that the two
first named commandants should proceed by the
St. Francis River with the Algonquins, the Abena-
quis of Bekancourt, and the Hurons of Lorette, and
that La Perriere with the Iroquois should go by Lake
Champlain : that all should meet at LakeNikisipigue
(Winnipisiogee), where the Indians bordering on
Acadia were to be at the appointed time. Various
incidents well-nigh defeated the expedition, and de-
layed the march of the warriors. At last, on the 26th
of July, they started ; but Des Chaillons and Rou-
ville, on reaching the St. Francis, learned that the
Hurons had turned back, because one of their men
had been accidentally killed, apparently while hunt-
ing, the rest believing, from this, th? t the expedition
would be disastrous. The Iroquois, whom La Per-
riere was conducting by way of Lake Champlain,
soon followed this example, under the pretext that
some of them were sick, and that the malady might
easily spread through the whole force.

" De Vaudreuil (Governor of Canada), to whom the
commandants wrote, communicating this desertion
and asking his orders, replied that even if the Algon-
quins and the Abenaquis of Bekancourt should also
abandon them, they should nevertheless keep on and
make a dash at some isolated place, rather than return
without doing something. De.s Chaillons imparted
this letter to the Indians, who swore that they would
follow wherever he might lead them. They accord-
ingly set out to the number of two hundred, and after
marching one hundred and fifty leagues by imprac-
ticable roads, reached Lake Nikisipigue, but found no
Abenaquis there from the Acadian border, those
Indians having been obliged to turn their arms
elsewhere.

" They then resolved to march against a village
called Hewreuil (Haverhill), composed of twenty-five
or thirty well-built houses, with a fort, in which the
Governor resided. This fort had a garrison of thirty
soldiers and there were at least ten in each house.
These troops had but just arrived in the place, having



HAVERHILL.



1957



been sent by the Governor of New England, who, on
hearing of the march of tlie French, had sent similar
detachments to all the towns of that district.

" Our braves were not dismayed on learning that the
enemy were so well prepared to receive them, and no
longer trusting to a surprise resolved to make it up
in valor. They rested quietly all that night and the
next day, one hour alter sunrise, drew up in bat-
tle array. Rouville made a short address to the
French to exhort all who had any quarrels with each
other to be reconciled sincerely and embrace, as they
all did. They then prayed and marched against the
fort. Here they met with a vigorous resistance, but
at last entered sword in hand and set it on fire. AH the
houses were also well defended and met the same fate.
About a hundred of the English were killed in these
attacks ; many others, too slow in leaving the fort and
houses, were burned in them, and the number of
prisoners was large. There was no booty, as no
thought was given to it till everything was consumed
by the flames. Moreover, the sound of drum and
trumpet was hestrd in all the neighboring villages,
and there was not a moment to be lo?t iu securing
their retreat.

" It was conducted with great order, no one having
more provisions than were needed for the homeward
march. This precaution was even more necessary
than they imagined. Our men had scarcely gone half
a league, when, on entering a wood, they fell into an
ambuscade formed by seventy men, who, before un-
covering themselves, fired every man his shot. Our
braves stood this volley without flinching, and fortu-
nately it did no great damage. Meanwhile all behind
was full of horse and foot, in close pursuit, and there
was no course but to trample down those who had
just fired on them.

"They took this course without hesitation ; each one
threw down his stock of provisions and almost all his
baggage and without losing time with fire-arms at
once rushed to close quarters. The English, taken
aback by this sudden attack from men whom they
supposed they had thrown into confusion, were
routed themselves and could not rally; so that, except
ten or twelve who escaped by flight, all were killed
or taken.

" Nescambionit (an Indian warrior whom the Eng-
lish writers call Assacambuit), who had returned troiL
France the year before, always fought near the com-
mandants, performing wonders with a sabre presented
to him by the King. He received a musket-ball in
the foot. In the two actions we had eighteen men
wounded, three Indians and five Frenchmen killed —
among the last, two young officers of great promise,
Hertel de Chambly (Rouville's brother) and Ver-
cheres. During the last combat, several of the pris-
oners taken at the attack on Hewreuil (Haverhill)
escaped.

"All the rest praised highly the kind treatment
shown them by their captors during the retreat,



which was effected without accident, after the en-
counter just mentioned, and various incidents, related
of some of the oiBcers and volunteers, were more
honorable to them than the signal proofs they had
given of their bravery. I was one of the first to learn
them, because I was at Montreal, at the very port,
when the party landed there about the middle of
September. Great praise was given especially to the
Sieur Dupuys, son of the Lieutenant Partlculier, of
Quebec, who had carried his humanity so far as to
carry the daughter of the King's Lieutenant at Hew-
reuil a good part of the way, the girl being almost
unable to walk.

" The inaction of the English youth, much more
numerous than the French, surprised men in Canada
and one of the prisoners was asked the reason. His
answer revealed the true cause of the remissness of
the Iroquois led by I^a Perriere on his last expedition.
This man said that it was not the fault of the young
men of his nation that they had not raised war-par-
ties against the French thi< year; that more than
five hundred of the most alert had asked and obtained
leave of the Governor-General of New England, but
that as they were on the point of marching, they re-
ceived counter-orders in consequence of a letter from
the Governor of Albany to his general.

" In this letter, he added, the Governor stated that
he had just gained control of the Christian Iroquois,
who had assured him that no Indian would ever
again take the war path against the English ; that it
was thus useless to go to any expense to attack the
French, who, reduced to their own forces, were in no
position to undertake anything, so that they might
. rest assured that the English colonies would hence-
forth enjoy perfect tranquillity, which was all they
desired.

" This same prisoner al-so said that it was believed at
Hewreuil (Haverhill) and all the cantons, that
the party that laid waste that village was merely
a detachment from a force of sixteen hundred men,
of which the main body was not far off'; that the
same thing was said at Boston and that throughout
New England they were constantly under arras,
which exhausted the people greatly. It was ascer-
tained from another prisoner that the Governor of
Albany had recently made considerable presents to
the Chrislian Iroquois."

It would appear that the French Governor-General
of Canada, the Marquis de Vaudreuil, whilst sending
his detachments of French and Indians against the
English settlements in New England, had pursued a
conciliatory policy towards Peter Schuyler, whom
Charlevoix calls the Governor of Albany. He was
accordingly much disgusted to find that Schuyler had
been intriguing with the Catholic Indians and had
warned Governor Dudley of the expedition which
resulted in the attack on Haverhill. Charlevoix con-
tinues : " On his side, the Governor-General com-
plained warmly to the Governor of Albany that



1958



HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.



while he left his district and all New York undis-
turbed, out of consideration for the Dutch and for
him personally, and this with a view of keeping the
Iroquois to a neutrality no less advantageous to the
English colonies than to New York, he (Schuyler)
not only kept constantly stimulating the cantons to
take up arms, but was building a fort in the Mohawk
canton, and laboring to debauch from him the
Indians domiciliated in the centre of the French
colony,"

October 8, 1708, about three weeks after the return
of the Haverhill expedition to Canada, Schuyler re-
plied to Vaudreuil : " As for the belt which 1 sent
with a view to prevent the Indians from taking part
in this war, carried on against the government of Bos-
ton, I must avow the fact, but I was impelled to it by
Christian charity. I could not help believing it my
duty to God and my neighbor to prevent, if possible,
these barbarous and pagan cruelties, which have been
but too often perpetrated on the unhappy people of
that province." " Petre Schuiler," comments Father
Charlevoix, " was a very worthy man, and here ex-
pressed only his real sentiments ; but he was sufficiently
aware of all that had occurred during the last fifty
years in that part of America to know that it was
the English who drove us to the stern necessity of
letting our Indians act as New England did theirs.
He could not be in ignorance of the horrors to which
the Iroquois had gone at their instigation during the
last war ; that even at Boston the French and Aben-
aquis held as prisoners were treated with an inhu-
manity little inferior to the cruelties of which he
complained so bitterly. ... It was also easy
to prove that neither the French nor their Indians
had ever resorted to the cruelties he reproached them
with, except in retaliation ; and that before determin-
ing to resort to this means to stop the barbarities
used by the Iroquois to our officers, our missionaries
and our settlers, and the ill treatment to which the
Bostoners subjected our allies and our own people,
the most illustrious in New France had long been
allowed to shed unavailiug tears." . . .

" It was not only in Canada that the English
sought to turn against us the Indians, whose esteem
and affection we were always more successful than
themselves in securing."

In this manner, the accomplished Jesuit presents
the French side of the issue of responsibility for
Indian atrocities. And having now read the enemy's
account of the descent upon Haverhill, let us turn to
that transmitted to us by the English writers and
local tradition. Discrepancies will of course be ob-
served. Charlevoix received his narrative from the
returning Frenchmen, who doubtless magnified their
own exjiloits. Besides, the English accounts are con-
fused and difficult to reconcile. People who lived in
the time of our Civil War, and are familliar with its
liter.ature, will not be surprised that we have not a
clear narrative of this affair, which happened in the



gray of the morning in an obscure frontier hamlet,
one hundred and eighty years ago.

Thus, Charlevoix says the attack was made " one
hour after sunrise." The local accounts say that on
Sunday morning, August 29, 1708, at break of day,
the French and Indians passed the frontier garrisons
undiscovered and were first seen near the pound by
John Keezar, who was returning from Amesbury.
John Keezar was a wandering cobbler, the son of
John Keezar who was killed in the Indian attack of
March 15, 1697. The original pound, as we know,
stood near the meeting-house. In 1773 the town
voted "to build a stone pound in the corner of the
parsonage pasture, near Captain Fames." This pound
stood on the west side of Main Street, about midway
between White and Fourth. Probably the pound of
1708 may have stood lower down, but near the present
line of Main Street. Keezar ran into the village and
alarmed the sleeping and unguarded inhabitants by
firing his gun near the meeting-house. Another ac-
count assigns the honor of discovery to one Hutchins
who was out stealing milk. Still another to a young
man, who went up on the common to catch his horse,
for an early start (on the Sabbath !) for a distant town,
but who unluckily went to hide his sweetheart before
he told the people. An old tradition says that the
assailants came down along the present line of Con-
cord Street, east of Eound Pond. Upon that route
they would have shunned the garrison houses, and
would be quite likely to come within the observa-
tion of John Keezar, returning from Amesbury. At
any rate, they speedly whirled into the village, utter-
ing wild yells, with shrill whistling, and dressed in
hideous war-paint. It is well known that the French-
men, who so easily assimilated themselves to the
Indian habits and thus acquired the extr.iordinary
control over them to which Charlevoix alludes,
frequently adopted the Indian war-dress. Nothing
could be conceived more horrible and distracting. No
wonder the savages seemed like red demons to our
ancfstors. The first victim was Mrs. Smith, shot
whilst flying from her house to a garrison. The
enemy broke up into small parties, to do their bloody
work more quickly and effectually. There was no
fort and they attacked none.

The first assault was made at the house of the
pastor, Rolfe, which stood at the corner of the present
Main and Summer Streets, where the venerable Dr.
MosesNichols lives(1888). The house was garrisoned
by three soldiers, who behaved like poltroons, and who
even, it is said, begged their foes for mercy, which
they did not deserve and did not get.

Mr. Rolfe, an athletic man, in the prime of life,
awakened by the savage yells, jumped out of bed and
placed his back against the entrance door, which the
enemy were trying to break in. Calling in vain on