“The Indians survived our open intention of wiping them out, and since the tide turned, they have even weathered our good intentions toward them, which can be much more deadly.”

So said acclaimed American author John Steinbeck. It sums up an outlook shared by a fair number of historians and scholars regarding relations between colonists and natives dating back to the early 17th century.

Brutal wars during that tumultuous time period over territory, trade, precious resources like wampum (native beaded crafts made from shellfish), conflicts over open lands as opposed to tight-clustered settlements, Native Spiritualism versus English Puritanism — and much more — all contributed to radically contrasting lifestyles (skin pigmentation not the least of these contrasts) and helped shape an outcome that persisted through the years, some of it evident even today.

“During the Industrial Revolution movement,” reflects Norwich Town Historian Dale Plummer, “it became a trend to memorialize indigenous peoples — after nearly obliterating them and destroying their habitat — by naming buildings and sites after them, though never having afforded them any cultural intimacy.”

Among those referenced by Plummer is the onetime Great Sachem of the Narragansett tribe, Miantonomo, whose monument lies in a remote woodland location of Sachem’s Park in Norwich … rarely visited and all but forgotten by the public.

As recorded in the annals of Norwich history, Miantonomo and his Narragansetts became prominent rivals to the local Mohegan tribe led by Uncas, who was responsible for the capture and eventual execution of the Narragansett leader (with the consent of English authorities).

Who exactly was this enigmatic 17th century native leader, Miantonomo, who hailed from the neighboring Rhode Island territories? For that matter, who were the Narragansetts?

Going back

Their culture has been traced back to prehistoric times here in New England. Among the first Europeans known to have visited the Narragansett territories — according to Professor William S. Simmons, University of California — was the Italian navigator Giovanni da Verrazano who, in 1524, described the tribe in the following way: “These people are the most beautiful and have the most civil customs that we have found on this voyage. They are taller than we are … the face is clear-cut … the eyes are black and alert, and their manner is sweet and gentle.”

A culture of complexity and multi-faceted in its craftsmanship, comprehensive social values, and sophisticated tribal structure, the Narragansett clans, and others akin to them, did not suspect or imagine in any way the distant storm brewing overseas in the form of an impending cultural invasion. By the early 1600s the first vestiges of foreign incursion had begun, while harboring the deadly pestilence of smallpox and other diseases yet to be recognized by a native people with no immunity built up — advantages held by the European invaders due to past exposure (obviously no remedies or prevention measures like vaccines existing at the time) — with deaths of tribal clans viewed by colonial leaders and settlers rather arrogantly: “If God were not pleased with our inheriting these parts, why did He drive out the natives before us … and why doth He make room for us by diminishing them as we increase?”

Primary documents, books by noted scholars, and Native oral tradition have all expressed in detail this mass decimation of the early Eastern tribes. Cultures like the Narragansetts, and sachems like Miantonomo, would soon find themselves caught in an inevitable balancing act between pre-existing tribal rivalries … and a growing influx of colonial settlements seeking to expand and gain an economic stranglehold via the fur and wampum trade.

That trade was viewed initially as beneficial to the more dominant tribes like the Pequots of the Connecticut Valley and the Narragansetts of neighboring Rhode Island. Both native cultures had exchanged willingly with the early Dutch traders and the English who followed. The trade for metal and iron goods for wampum and furs provided by inland tribes like the Mohegans drove the economic prowess of all factions … until territorial imperative and political influence lit the sizzling powder keg that would erupt in all-out warfare.

“The hinterlands (deeper woodlands beyond the coasts) provided the furs that initially drove much of the early trade,” said Plummer. “It would eventually also drive the West Indies trade that sent Pequot captives there for captive African slaves shipped north.”

Pequot War

And that slave trade was fostered by the Pequot War of 1637 where preexisting rivalries among tribes were ultimately exploited by the colonists. With survival of their native culture becoming the primary objective for the New England tribes, decisions had to be made: Sassacus of the Pequots chose to resist the rapidly expanding, overwhelming might of the colonial military and its fearsome weaponry; Uncas of the Mohegans chose alliance with the English as a means of survival and autonomy from the powerful Pequots; while Miantonomo and his Narragansetts found themselves ultimately caught in a quandary over their heated rivalry with the Pequots, his opposing philosophies with Uncas, and an increasing mistrust of the colonial interlopers.

(The Narragansetts’ renowned relations with Roger Williams is another saga unto itself.)

In May of 1637, Great Sachem Miantonomo was persuaded by Captain John Mason and Uncas into allowing 200 of his own warriors to accompany a combined military force of English and Mohegans that would pass through Narragansett territory en route to a nightly ambush against a sleeping, fortified Pequot village (Fort Missituck) in what is now Mystic, Connecticut.

The result of that attack appalled the Narragansetts.

“It is too furious … it kills too many!” was among the cries expressed by the Narragansetts whose primary function was to surround the tall wooden palisade and assist in the slaying of Pequots fleeing the fort … fleeing not only the marauding English and their Mohegan allies, but also the raging fire set by Mason and his men, burning the walled native settlement to the ground and leaving nothing more than the charred remains of its inhabitants. According to documented colonial accounts – in particular, firsthand recordings written by Mason’s second-in-command, Captain John Underhill, there were anywhere between 400 and 700 inhabitants and “… not above five of them escaped out of our hands.”

It was a common tactic utilized by the English in warfare, also applied in victories over European foes — the surrounding of an enemy village or encampment and burning properties and people into ashes. It had never been witnessed by the natives of a world unfamiliar with such strategies … and was never forgotten either. It marked the beginning of the end for them.

“The Pequots were parceled out to the Mohegans and the Narragansetts following the English conquest of the ill-fated Connecticut tribe and the others that fell not long after,” Plummer explained. “A number of Pequots were shipped down to the West Indies and into slavery, becoming ‘strangers in a strange land,’ as were the Africans shipped north in exchange. And with the Pequots now stripped even of their name, their leadership gone entirely, the message from their English overlords was clear: ‘You’re not even a tribe anymore.’”

Intense conflicts

Meanwhile, conflicts developed and intensified between Miantonomo and Uncas over the stewardship granted each of them over the surviving Pequots. More so, Miantonomo’s status with the English was of a lesser degree than that enjoyed by Uncas, who viewed close relations with the English as the only true means of avoiding the fate of the deposed, decimated Pequots. That and territorial disputes between the two tribes resulted in harsh military battles that included an eventual Narragansett siege of the Mohegan’s Fort Shantok near the Norwich region.

In part, this was also due to Miantonomo’s growing disenchantment with colonial rule and his designs for organizing a revolt against the English. But the Mohegans did not share in that plan, viewing it as a futile scheme that could only lead to the doom suffered by the Pequots.

Miantonomo’s recorded oratory reflects the essence of his angst:

“For so are we all Indians as the English are all one people, and say ‘brother’ to one another; so must we be one as they are; otherwise we shall all be gone shortly, for you know our fathers had plenty of deer and skins, our plains were full of deer, as also our woods, and of turkeys and our coves full of fish and fowl. But these English having gotten our land, they with scythes cut down the grass, and with axes fell the trees; their cows and horses eat the grass, and their hogs spoil our clam banks, and we shall all be starved.”

Strong as Miantonomo’s impassioned plea came across, the Mohegans and other tribes did not respond in kind. Nor were the English comfortable with the Narragansett sachem’s call for a united front among the remaining native tribes. It ultimately helped lead to the worst disaster suffered by Miantonomo and his Narragansetts.

Capture and execution

By 1643 the enmity between the two tribes erupted in warfare, due to disputes over territory and allies, cultural differences and relations with the English, and the ever-expanding, dominant might of colonialism. Miantonomo led an invasion force of roughly 1,000 Narragansetts against the Mohegans in the ill-fated East Great Plains of Norwich Assault. Accounts of that brutal battle vary in the telling, but undisputed is the fact that Miantonomo was captured and executed by Uncas and the Mohegans, per consent of the English — with legends abounding in the wake of that event that have been viewed by some as more fable than fact. The one undisputed truth, of course, is the death of the famed Narraganasett sachem.

Two years later, in 1645, the Narragansetts again invaded Mohegan territory, this time with the siege of Fort Shantok in what is now Montville, on a punitive mission against Uncas for the execution of Miantonomo. The Narragansetts had the Mohegans effectively bottled up inside the walled fortification. Norwich historian Dale Plummer explains the outcome:

“The English from Fort Saybrook — under the command of Thomas Leffingwell — then arrived at Fort Shantok and slipped food in to the besieged Mohegans, making clear their support of Uncas and his tribe. Given such a drastic change in odds, the Narragansetts withdrew from the battle, their punitive mission a failure.”

Norwich memorial

With so many of Miantonomo’s struggles and definable exploits set against the backdrop of historic Norwich, it was only fitting that he eventually be memorialized there, roughly at the site of his execution. Narragansett tribal members had previously visited the site over the years, piling stones into a cairn to honor him. But the stones were ultimately removed, as the tale goes, by a farmer unaware of their significance. When the official memorial to Miantonomo was later erected in 1841, it was in the form of two thick stone slabs stacked together with an inscription noting the sachem’s significance in history.

The question to be posed is the extent of how Miantonomo should be remembered:

“Memorials are put up, names of buildings, ships, various sites, and so on are often the means of recognizing Native Americans; but it is done without cultural intimacy,” said Plummer. “Think of it as a form of ‘cultural blindness,’ where Indian memorials were created during the Industrial Revolution years, but minus Native input. For too long their existence and the essence of their culture was buried. Commemorating a people — but ignoring the survivors.”

So how might we recognize and remember Great Sachem Miantonomo of the Narragansetts today? Certainly, he was a man who revered the beauty and complexity of his Native culture with its artistic craftsmanship, devoted spiritualism, and an impressive social structure where women served not only as respected healers but could also rise to the rank of Sachem. A proud leader of a proud people, his dread of cultural annihilation was well founded and his resistance to it cost him his life. It might be prudent to remember and honor him by visiting that remote stretch of woods in Sachem’s Park, Norwich (off Boswell Avenue on Elijah Street), where the double layered stone slabs rest high on a lonely knoll, a marker indicating the site where a devoted leader who loved his tribe met his end. Let’s not forget him.

New London’s Nicholas Checker is an author and playwright.