The Abenaki Indians Their Treaties of 1713 & 1717, and a Vocabulary — Reading Companion

Quebec was found not adapted to their needs and condition, probably from its close contiguity to that city, two convenient tracts of land were granted for their use; the first bears date Aug. 23, 1700, the second, May 10, 1701. These were on the St. Francis river, which has given a name to the tribe. In 1704 another settlement of refugees from New England received a grant of land at a place called Beçancour, near Three Rivers, and during this year the Governor addressed a letter to the ministry in France, giving his reasons for inducing the Abenakis to settle in his colony, and from this period it was a constant policy to encourage their immigration there, for more than half a century.

Here was the place where parties were to be fitted out to carry war, destruction, and misery to the frontiers of New England.

In 1704 these Indians piloted a body of French to the vicinity of their former homes, on the Connecticut, and entirely destroyed Deerfield. The writer not long since conversed with an ancient member of this tribe, who claimed to be the great grandson of Esther Williams, daughter of Rev. John Williams, who was, with his family, captured at that time. In 1707 this tribe, piloted by the Pennacooks down the Merrimac, destroyed Haverhill, murdering and capturing most of its inhabitants. It would fill a volume to relate the bloody tragedies acted and instigated by this tribe; it seems almost incredible that any people could exist for a generation amidst such repeated incursions of a relentless enemy.

In November, 1724, Vaudreuil, Governor General of Canada, addressed an urgent letter to the Minister of War in France, giving an account of the attack on Norridgewock, and the death of Father Rasle, with a full account of the losses and sufferings of that tribe, and asking for a grant of ammunition, guns, and blankets to supply their losses, and enable them to make war on the English settlements. He also gives a particular account of the condition of the Abenakis, and says, "of all the Indians in New France, they are in a position to render the most service; this nation consists of five villages, which number, altogether, about five hundred warriors. Two of these villages are situated on the St. Lawrence, near Three Rivers--one below that town called Beçancour, the other ten leagues above, called St. Francis, the three others are in the direction of Acadie, called Narantsouak, on the River Kanibekky, Panagamsdé, on the Pentagouet (Penobscot), and Medocteck, on the River St. John. These three villages have different routes, each by its own river, whereby they can reach Quebeck in a few days."[3]

[3] See N. Y. Colonial Documents, edited by E. B. O'Calligan, LL. D.

In April, 1725, a delegation of three gentlemen visited Montreal with a letter from the Governor of Massachusetts, in reply to one addressed to him some months previously by M. Vaudreuil, relative to the attack at Norridgewock, and the death of Father Rasle. They demanded that the prisoners held by the Abenakis should be given up, and a perpetual peace established.

The Indians, who were entirely under the influence of the French, were extremely haughty in their language and deportment; they demanded that the English should restore their lands, rebuild their church, which they had destroyed at Norridgewock, and when asked what land they referred to, said "that their land commenced at the River Gounitogon, otherwise called the long river,[4] which lies to the west beyond Boston, that this river was formerly the boundary which separated the lands of the Iroquois from those of the Abenakis, that according to this boundary, Boston and the greater part of the English settlements east of it are in Abenakis' lands; that they would be justified in telling them to quit there, but that they had considered that their settlements were established and that they were still inclined to tolerate them; but they demanded as an express condition of peace that the English should abandon the country from one league beyond Saco River to Port Royal, which was the line separating the lands of the Abenakis from those of the Micmaks."[5]

[4] Undoubtedly the Connecticut.

[5] N. Y. Colonial Documents, vol. ix.

The Abenakis denied that they had ever sold any land to the English, and when the latter claimed that much of it was theirs by a possession of more than eighty years, and that this possession gave them a title, the Indians replied, "We were in possession before you, for we have held it from time immemorial." The English delegates conceded that they did not claim beyond the west bank of the Narantsouak (Kennebec), and that the fort at St. George was built not by them, but by the government of Port Royal.