FOOTNOTES:
[40] An English translation of this "Relation" is given in the "Early Chapters of Mohawk History," by Dr. Hawley.
[41] See [Appendix, Note B].
CHAPTER X.
THE MOHEGANS ATTACK THE NEW CASTLE.—BATTLE OF KINAQUARIONES.—THE FEAST OF THE DEAD.
IN the year 1669, in one of the long bark-houses at Caughnawaga on a summer morning before the dawn, Tekakwitha is turning uneasily in her sleep. Suddenly her aunt springs up beside her and speaks in a startled voice. In an instant all in the lodge are on the alert. Sharp, wild cries are heard; bullets pierce the stout palisade, and come whizzing through the bark sides of the new house. The warriors, roused from sleep, seize their nearest weapons, be they guns, war-clubs, tomahawks, or arrows. A hurried word to the women, a loud whoop, a few bounding steps, and they are on the platform of the palisade hurling defiance at an assaulting army of Mohegans. Before them are hundreds of the foe in war-paint and feathers, led by a stout man of middle age,—the wise and gallant Chickatabutt, the great sachem of the Massachusetts. His bearing makes him conspicuous among a score of famous sagamores who are leading the assault. In the motley ranks that follow are Hudson River Indians, mingled with the red-skin neighbors of the Puritans, grim old warriors of the Massachusetts tribe. There are also Narragansett braves and other New England Indians,—all united in a desperate attempt to crush the Mohawks, and thus break in through the eastern door of the Long House of the Five Nations. The assailants seek, now by open attack and now by strategy, to dislodge the defenders of Caughnawaga from their lofty scaffolds, and to fire the palisade. Four Mohawks drop from their places dead, and two are wounded; but the Mohegans make no perceptible headway against the defensive works of the Castle. The struggle continues with unabated fury. Among those who fall on the side of the enemy are pupils of the English missionary Eliot, who know something of the Bible which he has translated for them. Five of these converts to Puritanism are engaged in this expedition, of whom but one escapes with his life. They too, like the ever increasing neophytes of Pierron, are called "praying Indians." Their chief Chickatabutt—or Josiah, as he is often called—was himself a "praying Indian" once. That was when he lived with his pious uncle Kuchamakin, one of Eliot's favorite pupils. "He kept the Sabbath several years," says Gookin; "but after turned apostate, and for several years last past separated from the praying Indians, and was but a back friend to religion." Indeed the English, who had a good opinion of him in his early days, now thought him "a very vitious person," though all acknowledged he was as brave as brave could be.
The Puritans had tried in vain to dissuade their Indian neighbors from accompanying this chief on his adventurous march to the Mohawk Valley. In spite of every drawback, however, Chickatabutt, whose name means "A-house-afire," had succeeded in bringing his army all the way from the vicinity of Boston to the castle of Caughnawaga. After they were joined by their allies, they numbered six or seven hundred men.[42] True, they had spent much of their ammunition on the march,—"shooting away their powder in the air, ... boasting, vapouring, and prating of their valour," at the Indian villages where they had stopped for foraging purposes. It was their consequent lack of ammunition which determined them to carry the Mohawk Castle, if possible, by assault. But the brave Caniengas, or "People of the Flint," though taken by surprise in their sleep, were quick to grapple with the daring Mohegans, and fought like panthers. They were not to be easily overcome, by any roving Indian foe, in defence of their women and their homes. The squaws of Caughnawaga, with the well-known courage of their race, realized their perilous situation at the first alarm, and were "arming themselves with knives and defensive weapons in case a breach should be made." The youths of the village were, many of them, fighting their first important battle on this occasion. The sight of the Mohawk women and young girls, arming themselves as best they could to resist the Mohegan attack, was in itself an irresistible appeal to their tribesmen to exert themselves to the utmost in defending them against the well-known horrors of captivity, which would undoubtedly come upon them if the castle fell into the hands of the enemy. Many a young brave was nerved to desperate feats of valor on that morning and during the days that followed. Beginning with the sudden attack at dawn, the struggle continued for a long time with uncertain issue. News was carried to Tionnontogen that the whole country was lost; that Caughnawaga was besieged by an army of Mohegans; that all the youth had already fallen, and perhaps Gandagaro, the adjacent fort, was in extremity. These reports, though exaggerated, caused the Mohawk warriors of the other castles to gather as fast as possible at Caughnawaga. Even had they been all there at the very first, they would still have been fewer in numbers than the enemy; but before the sun was high, enough of them had assembled to warrant a sally on the foe. Father Pierron was now at the castle, and a witness of the stirring events taking place there. Tekakwitha, too, was taking her part among the young girls, whose fate now hung in the balance. The missionary thus describes what followed:—
"By eight o'clock in the morning our warriors without confusion promptly arrayed themselves with all they have of greatest value, as is their custom in such encounters, and with no other leader than their own courage went out in full force against the enemy. I was with the first to go to see if, amid the carnage about the palisades of the village, where so many unbelieving souls would perish, I might not be able to save some one. On our arrival, we heard only cries of lamentation over the death of the bravest of the village. The enemy had retired after two hours of most obstinate fighting on both sides. There was but a single warrior of the Loups [Mohegans] left on the ground; and I saw that a Barbarian, after cutting off his hands and feet, had flayed him, and was stripping the flesh from the bones for a hateful repast."