Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1896-08-14
FORT GUNNER.
Rev. DIR. Geo. Leon Walkers
Historical Address.

Delivered In Brattleboro August IL.
1890, at the Annual Field Day Meet
ing of the Pocumtuck valley Mem
orIaI Association Near the Site Of the
Old Fort.
II is difficult, not indeed to say almost
impossible, for us TO realize the condition
Of things which compelled some brave
and hardy men in the midwinter of
1724-a hundred and seventy-two years
ago-to build near the spot where we now
stand frontier fortress in the perilous
wilderness. Surrounded today as we are
by fertile fields, and smiling landscapes,
and happy homes, nigh unto which now
for near century and half no hostile
footstep has approached, it is hard to
bring wildly up to mind the anxieties, the
alarms and the heroic enterprises in which
the planting of Fort Dummer had its ORR
gin. Yet we shall miss the main signih-
canoe of this event unless we do in some
degree kindle our Imagination to a con-
ception of the actual circumstances of the
occurrence. The laying together Of some
rough-hewn logs of forest, and the lift
ing up the structure of a rude-built block
house fort, whose last timber has long
since rotted away, was in itself no very
great or memorable achievement. 1t was
the necessity which impelled TO the enter
prise, the danger which attended it, the
purpose which it fulfilled, and the pathetic
or tragic incidents which attach themselves
to the structure thus planted in this pri-
meval wilderness, which give to Fort Dunn
mer its worthy place in New England re-
membrance, and make it worth while for
us to bring its story TO our recollection and
celebration today.
What, then, told as briefly as possible,
and without any possibility on this occa-
sion of the minuter shades of historical
detail, were the occurrences which led up
to the heroic planting and the heroic de-
fences Of this frontier fortress on the banks
of the Connecticut?
The first two great Indian wars of New
England-the Pequot war of 1857 and
King Philips war Of 1G74-7S-may be said
to have been of purely internal origin and
provocation. They grew out Of the nat
ural jealousy of the Indians of southern
and eastern New England. at the growth
and extension of white settlements. Our
English ancestors who came to this land
had the characteristic AnglO-SaXon craving
for land. They were never satisfied with
what they had. They were always push
ing out for more. Like the modern New
England farmer who always wanted Just
so much land as adjoins his, they only
wanted what was outside of theirs.
The perceived danger of this territorial
acquisitveness provoked that earliest strug-
gle in which tue Pequots, attempting to
defend what they deem ed their native
rights, were defeated, and their tribe dis
persed, bearing their tale of jealousy and
wrong to other tribes, to be a seed grain of
trouble wherever they went. With far
wider-minded perception of the danger to
his race, and with far ADLER powers TO or
ganze defence against the impending per-
il, King Philip, the heroic chief of the
Wampanoogs, attempted in 1914 TO organize
a general uprising of the Indian tribes of
New England against the pale face agrees
sors. 1t was time. These white men had
increased in the A years since the plant
ipg OF Boston to 10000, and their settle
. JAents reached all round the sea- board from
Falmouth to New York, and inland to
Lancaster, Northampton, Hadley, Deer
field, and even to Mortified, only II miles
below where we now stand. The Connecti-
cut river from Mortified to the Sound was
starred along its course with villages of
the invading race. Against the whole race
Philip, with mastery but Intellectual STRAIT
of New England, undertook an exterminat-
ing war. l am not going to enter into any
of the details of that desperate struggle.
1t suffices for my purpose TO say that it
brought home TO almost every frontier set
Element of New England a vivid sense of
the horrors of Indian warfare. Above
600 of the flower of New England's man
hood were killed in Two years of that
struggle. Twelve or - villages were de-
stroyed, land upwards of 900 buildings, chief
ly dwelling-houses, were burned. Every
eleventh family in New England was burn
ed out, and every eleventh family had lost
member. Brookfield, Hadley, Hatfield in
the comparatively near vicinity of this re-
gion, were attacked, suffering loss of
lives, while at Deerfield only about 20
miles from here, the massacre at Bloody
Brook of TO of the flower of the county of
Essex; and nearer still, at Mortified, the
slaughter of 20 mounted men under Capt.
Beers command-the bodies of several of
them mutilated and their heads set up on
poles-gave to the people of all this from
tier region realizing sense of the horrors
that lay in Indian revenge. Some years of
comparative quietude followed Philips
overthrow.
But now Indian warfare entered on a
new pndSe' NO longer Iue result OF Jeal-
ousy and territorial struggle on New Eng
land soil alone, it became rather the result
of the far greater conflict, on continental
stage, of opposing nationalties, civiliza-
tions and religions of European powers.
France, as long ago as ZOOS, had by the
foundation of Quebec made the first per-
manent colonial settlement in Canada.
When Champlain died in 1886 the COM
merce and sovereignty of France had
reached as far west as Wisconsin along the
great waterways of st. Lawrence and the
lakes. La Sale by 1850 added the Mis-
sissippi valley TO the French domain, and by
1899 her domain reached to the Mexican
gulf. English territory was surrounded by
French military and trading posts and the
struggle was for the possession of the
continent. Henceforth, till the conquest
of Canada in 1850, Indian warfare in New
England was but part of European pol
itcs and rellgion-the prize to be lost or
won the sovereignty of America.
The year 1859, which saw the accession
of the Protestant William and Mary of
England, marked the outbreak of the first
of these inter-colonial Indian wars, as the
result of the declaration of warfare be-
tween Great Britain and France. Once
more scene of blood and slaughter open
ed along the New England frontier settle
ments Dover, n. H., Schenectady, n. Y,
Salmon Falls aud CascO in Maine were
pillaged and large numbers of inhabitants
barbarously murdered by French and Indi-
ans, and Others carried off into a captivity
in Canada almost worse even than death.