The Boy Captives | Page 3

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Prepared by: Anthony J. Adam email [email protected]

The Boy Captives An Incident of the Indian War of 1695
by John Greenleaf Whittier

THE township of Haverhill, even as late as the close of the seventeenth
century, was a frontier settlement, occupying an advanced position in
the great wilderness, which, unbroken by the clearing of a white man,
extended from the Merrimac River to the French villages on the St.
Francois. A tract of twelve miles on the river and three or four
northwardly was occupied by scattered settlers, while in the centre of
the town a compact village had grown up. In the immediate vicinity
there were but few Indians, and these generally peaceful and
inoffensive. On the breaking out of the Narragansett War,(1) the
inhabitants had erected fortifications, and taken other measures for

defence; but, with the possible exception of one man who was found
slain in the woods in 1676, none of the inhabitants were molested; and
it was not until about the year 1689 that the safety of the settlement was
seriously threatened. Three persons were killed in that year. In 1690 six
garrisons were established in different parts of the town, with a small
company of soldiers attached to each. Two of these houses are still
standing. They were built of brick, two stories high, with a single
outside door, so small and narrow that but one person could enter at a
time; the windows few, and only about two and a half feet long by
eighteen inches wide, with thick diamond glass secured with lead, and
crossed inside with bars of iron. The basement had but two rooms, and
the chamber was entered by a ladder instead of stairs; so that the
inmates, if driven thither, could cut off communication with the rooms
below. Many private houses were strengthened and fortified. We
remember one familiar to our boyhood,--a venerable old building of
wood, with brick between the weather-boards and ceiling, with a
massive balustrade over the door, constructed of oak timber and plank,
with holes through the latter for firing upon assailants. The door opened
upon a stone- paved hall, or entry, leading into the huge single room of
the basement, which was lighted by two small windows, the ceiling
black with the smoke of a century and a half; a huge fireplace,
calculated for eight-feet wood, occupying one entire side; while,
overhead, suspended from the timbers, or on shelves fastened to them,
were household stores, farming utensils, fishing-rods, guns, bunches of
herbs gathered perhaps a century ago, strings of dried apples and
pumpkins, links of mottled sausages, spare-ribs, and flitches of bacon;
the fire-light of an evening dimly revealing the checked woollen
coverlet of the bed in one far-off corner, while in another--
"The pewter plates on the dresser Caught and reflected the flame as
shields of armies the sunshine."(2)
(1) The "Narragansett War" was a name applied to that part of King
Philip's War which resulted from the defection of the powerful tribe of
Narragansetts, formerly allies of the English, to the standard of the
Indian chief. (2) Longfellow's *Evangeline,* lines 205, 206.

Tradition has preserved many incidents of life in the garrisons. In times
of unusual peril the settlers generally resorted at night to the fortified
houses, taking thither their flocks and herds and such household
valuables as were most likely to strike the fancy or minister to the
comfort or vanity of the heathen marauders. False alarms were frequent.
The smoke of a distant fire, the bark of a dog in the deep woods, a
stump or bush, taking in the uncertain light of stars and moon the
appearance of a man, were sufficient to spread alarm through the entire
settlement and to cause the armed men of the garrison to pass whole
nights in sleepless watching. It is said that at Haselton's garrison-house
the sentinel on duty saw, as he thought, an