One morning late in September Tommy Ten-Canoes turned his solitary canoe towards Cole’s River, near which lived his boy friend, James Brown. He paddled slowly, and late in the dreamy afternoon reached the shore opposite the Brown farm. He landed and tied his one canoe to Jemmie Brown’s boat, in which the two had spent many happy hours before the war.

The canoe was found there the next day; but Tommy Ten-Canoes? He was never seen again; he probably sought a grave in the waters of the bay.

But he had fulfilled his promise. He had been true in his heart as “the north wind to the river, the west wind to the sea, and the south wind to the flowers.”

IV
JONATHAN’S ESCAPE
A Young Hero of Hadley who Fought at Turner’s Falls in 1676

Though the Indians of New England were for many years vastly superior in numbers to the white men, they were never wholly united, and their cowardice and lack of discipline were weaknesses for which their treachery and deceit could not compensate. The long conflict between the races culminated in 1675 in King Philip’s War, when the wily Wampanoag sachem succeeded in forming a confederation, embracing nearly all the New England tribes, for a final desperate struggle.

It seemed for a time as though the combination might succeed. At the end of the summer the scattered settlements, and especially those along the Connecticut River, which formed the outposts of the colonies, were panic-stricken. Everywhere the savage allies had been victorious. A dozen towns had been attacked and burned, bands of soldiers had been cut off, and isolated murders without number had been committed. Prowling bands of Indians lurked about the stockaded towns, driving off cattle and rendering impossible the cultivation of the fields, so that the settlers were called upon to face starvation as well as the scalping-knife and tomahawk.

There was no meeting the Indians face to face, except by surprise. They fought from ambush, or by sudden assault on unprotected points, and would be gone before troops could be brought to the scene. The white men were unable to follow them without Indian allies, and they were slow to adapt themselves to the Indian mode of fighting. Flushed by their success, the confederates became overconfident, and grew to despise their clumsy opponents. In the spring of 1676 more than five thousand of them were encamped on the Connecticut River, twenty miles north of Hadley. Here they planted their corn and squashes, and amused themselves with councils, ceremonies, and feasts, boasting of what they had done and what they would do. They judged the white men by themselves, and did not suspect the iron courage and stubborn determination that were urging the people in the towns below them “to be out against the enemy.” On the night of May 18th they indulged in a great feast, and after it was over, slept soundly in their bark lodges, all but the wary Philip, who, scenting danger, had withdrawn across the river.

On that same evening about two hundred and fifty men and boys gathered in Hadley street. Of this number fifty-six were soldiers from the garrisons of Hadley, Northampton, Springfield, Hatfield, and Westfield. The rest were volunteers, among whom was Jonathan Wells, of Hadley, sixteen years old, whose adventures and miraculous escape have been preserved.

The party was under the command of Captain William Turner, and the expedition which it was about to undertake was inspired by a daring amounting to rashness. The plan was to attack the Indian camp, which contained four times their number of well-armed braves. Defeat meant death, or captivity and torture worse than death. The march began after nightfall so as not to attract the attention of the Indian scouts, and the little band made its way safely through swamps and forests, past the Indian outposts, and at daybreak arrived in the neighborhood of the camp. Here the horses were left under a small guard among the trees, while the men crept forward to the lodges of the enemy.