One of the least-known seminal events of American history is King Philip's War, 1675-1676, a hundred years
before the American Revolution. Metacom was the real name of the Native American warrior, son of Massasoit,
the famous Indian guest at the Pilgrims' first Thanksgiving. Metacom, or Philip, managed to put together an
alliance of tribes in the area which is now New England, for the purpose of driving out the colonists.
Rowlandson farmland
They almost succeeded. This war remains the most deadly, per capita, on both sides, in the history of our
country. Victory was undecided until the very end, after Metacom was killed. His head was placed on a stake
and displayed in Plymouth for over twenty years. Many of the captured Indians were sold into slavery and shipped
off to the West Indies. They never again had the strength and unity to challenge the encroaching Europeans
successfully. It took years for the colonists to reestablish the towns and farms that had been destroyed.
Their English governors across the sea -- instead of berating themselves for not supporting the fledgling
colonies -- put the blame on the colonists, and proceeded to apply a heavier hand of government in the person
of the hated Edmund Andros.
The colonists felt they had survived the worst the land and its aboriginal inhabitants could throw at them,
without either representation or support from the remote English monarchy. They politely obstructed Andros'
measures, reestablished their own colonial governments by petition to the crown, and were from that moment on
effectively independent. They trained their own ministers, elected their own local and colonial representatives,
coordinated with their fellow colonies, and managed their own affairs successfully. The English leadership
apparently never even thought of the possibility that a people unrepresented in their own Parliament, but fully
governing themselves in a remote location, might someday lose their desire to remain subservient to English
Two current-day schools
government.
Elsa and her college roommate Nancy, together for a Girls' Day Out on a beautiful autumn morning, set out to see
some of the ways in which these events have been remembered. Specifically, we were interested in Mary Rowlandson,
the wife of John Rowlandson, one of the first licensed preachers in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. When the Indians
attacked Lancaster, Mary and her youngest child were taken prisoner during King Philip's War. Her child soon died, and Mary stayed with the
Indians for about three months, from February till May as they moved through the snowy woods from one hidden camp
to another. She was finally ransomed by Elsa's 8th great grandfather, John Hoare. After her return, Mary Rowlandson
published the diary of her ordeal, which became a best-seller.
The Rowlandson family lived near what is now Lancaster, a tiny, picturesque village about an hour west of Boston.
Our first trace of them is the Mary Rowlandson Elementary School, a modern school named in honor of Mary. However,
at the town center, we found that the 19th and 20th century residents had memorialized later Famous Sons: the
Redemption rock
beautiful church building was designed by the famous architect Charles Bulfinch (he also designed the State House
in Boston); another plaque commemorates a Post-Revolution visit by General Lafayette. But most of the attention is
centered on Luther Burbank, who was born in Lancaster in 1849.
We found the fields where the Rowlandson family had lived before the attack, but our chief target was farther on,
in the next town, Princeton, Massachusetts. Redemption Rock, an immense boulder in the forest near our road was the
site of the negotiations for her release. It has been preserved thanks to a family donation of land to a conservation
trust, so we were able to photograph the rock and imagine the events of more than 300 years past, and then we enjoyed the forest itself.
Massachusetts is filled with these places and these stories, and the very effort of finding them is fun -- the
narrow roads twist off in all directions, through small villages and towns where houses from hundreds of
Old Mill Restaurantyears ago
are still occupied and maintained, past farmstands and old mills next to rivers which, since this week's rains,
are torrential -- and beautiful to see. Leaving Nancy's home in Lexington, we passed the town common,
where groups
of tourists admired the Minute Man statue, and drove through the beautifully preserved Minute Man National Historic Park --
the participants in the Revolution were the grandchildren and greatgrandchildren of the survivors of King Philip's War.
We completed our day with a delicious lunch at The Old Mill in Westminster, another small tree-filled town, where
dozens of ducks swam in the millpond observed by busloads of Fall Foliage tourists. We felt quite settled into
multiple layers of history.