This event filled the hearts of his people with sullen and vindictive malice, for they believed Alexander to have been poisoned by the English. Wetamoo immediately became the unrelenting foe of the English. She was by birth a princess in another tribe, one of the numerous "squaw sachems" of New England, and able to lead three hundred warriors into the field. All the energies of her soul were aroused to avenge her husband's death.
Alexander was succeeded by his brother Philip, who also became the head of the Pokanoket confederacy, and in a few years, by his superior diplomacy, he held sway over nearly all the tribes of New England. Philip, of Mount Hope, was a man of superior endowments and one of the few Indians acknowledged by all historians to have been truly great. He clearly understood the power of the English and the peril he encountered in measuring arms with them. And yet he also saw that unless the encroachments of the English could be arrested his own race was doomed to destruction. He deliberately made up his mind to avenge his brother's untimely death; to drive the English from the country or perish in the attempt. Had he belonged to the proud Caucasian race, and especially the Anglo-Saxon division of it, he would have been called a patriot; but, belonging to a so-called inferior race, we find that Hubbard and other earlier historians, whenever they had occasion to mention his name, pay him the passing compliment of "caitiff," "hellhound," "fiend," "arch-rebel" and various similar designations of respect and affection. Verily it makes a great difference as to whether it was my bull gored your ox, or vice versa. Philip and his Wampanoags are unlucky enough, like the lion in the fable, to have no painter.
At one time Philip is thought to have been quite interested in the Christian religion, "but," as Abbott says, "apparently foreseeing that with the introduction of Christianity all the peculiarities in manners and customs of Indian life must pass away, he adopted the views of his father, Massasoit, and became bitterly opposed to any change of religion among his people." Mr. Goodkin, speaking of the Wampanoags, says: "There are some that have hopes of the greatest and chiefest sachem, named Philip. Some of his chief men, as I hear, stand well inclined to hear the gospel, and himself is a person of good understanding and knowledge in the best things. I have heard him speak very good words, arguing that his conscience is convicted. But yet, though his will is bound to embrace Jesus Christ, his sensual and carnal lusts are strong bands to hold him fast under Satan's dominion."
Before the war Rev. John Elliot, the great apostle to the Indians, made the most persistent efforts to induce Philip to embrace Christianity. The courtly savage had always received his arguments and persuasions politely, but without other effect. One day he took hold of a button on Elliot's regulation black threadbare coat and said, "I care no more for your religion than I do for that old button. Let me hear no more about it."
The character of Philip is further illustrated by an incident which happened in 1665. At that time he heard that a Christian-Indian named Assasamooyh, whom the colonists called John Gibbs, had spoken disrespectfully of his father, Massasoit. It was not a mere personal insult but a violation of reverence due from a subject to his king, and the offender forfeited his life, according to their code, at the hand of the nearest relative, who thus became the "avenger of blood."
Hearing that Assasamooyh was on the island of Nantucket, Philip took a canoe and went in pursuit. The offender was sitting at the table of one of the colonists when a messenger rushed in breathlessly and informed him that the dreaded avenger was near the door. Assasamooyh had but just time to rush from the house when the enraged chieftain was upon him. From house to house the Indian fled like a frightened deer, closely pursued by Philip with brandished tomahawk, who considered himself but the honored executor of justice. Assasamooyh, however, at length leaped a bank and plunging into a forest eluded his foe. With difficulty the colonists then succeeded in purchasing the life of his intended victim by a very heavy ransom.
The muttering warclouds grew darker and more threatening on the horizon, and while, for a time, there was no open rupture, yet many things, real and imaginary, indicated an impending crisis.
It is not recorded that the old men dreamed dreams, but young and old appear to have "seen visions." In that superstitious witch-burning age it is not surprising that many of the colonists at this time began to give way to superstitious fears. Among other things it was asserted that a sign of impending evil in the form of an Indian bow was clearly defined against the heavens, and during the eclipse of the moon the figure of an Indian scalp was clearly seen imprinted on its disk. The northern heavens glowed with auroral lights of unusual brilliancy; troops of phantom horsemen were heard to dash through the air; the sighing of the night-wind was like the sound of whistling bullets; and the howling of wolves was fiercer and more constant than usual. These things, the superstitious declared, were warnings that the colonists were about to be severely punished for their sins, among which they named profane swearing, the neglect of bringing up their children in more rigid observances, the licensing of ale houses, and the wearing of long hair by the men and of gay apparel by the women. The more extreme even declared that they were about to be "judged" for not exterminating the Quakers.
Historians have given Philip credit for a grand scheme, conceived with deep foresight and carried on with the most crafty and persevering dissimulation—a scheme to lull the suspicions of the whites by a constant show of friendship, till a general combination of all the Indian tribes could be formed to extirpate them at a single blow. The English meantime felt as if standing over a powder magazine which might explode at any time. They were fully persuaded that a plot was making for their destruction. They felt that something must be done to meet the coming storm or dissipate it before it should burst on their heads.