The independent-reporter. [volume] (Skowhegan, Me.) 1909-1955, 1912-11-21
THE RED SKINS IN
MAINE
Historian Claims They
Are Numerous
At The Close of the French and In.
dian War There Were About One
Thousand.


last French and Indian War ended,
1870 years ago. There were about 1000
them there are nearly that now. But
if one were to go back another $50
years he would find nearly 40 times
that number, for Williamson, Names
greatest historian gives the Indian
population in 1912 or so as $4,000
And was it the rifle OF the early set
tier that cut them down from $4,000
to 900?
II was not; although nowhere in
this country In the colonial days, did
the smoke of peace curl less frequent
ly than in the present State of Maine.
For this district was the dark and
bloody ground" of New England. The
thin settlements from Dover to the
Penobscot for almost 100 years lived
in terror of the torch and tomahawk.
to say nothing of incursions from
Canada by the French. 1t was an
almost continuous conflict. Between
1876 and 1860, Maine was a battle
ground in six Indian wars, each OF
lasting from three to ten years. II
was no place for those who were look
ing for quiet life on the farm.
Now in Massachusetts there was
never a fourth as many Indians as In
Maine; and save during King Phil
lips 12-month war they never made
serious trouble within the populous
Bay colony.
But the Indians in Maine more than
once destroyed nearly every settle
ment clear to the New Hampshire line
and at one time the entire population
some 5000 people fled in terror to
Massachusetts Bay. Then would come
a treaty Of peace; and the land-hungry
pioneer would return, rebuild his
house and barn. and start life over
again.
Going back to the days before the
white man came to Maine, in gen
eral way the Indian tribes had the
same names as the large rivers. Well
up these rivers were their villages,
where they mainly lived save when
they went to the head waters to hunt
moose, deer or beaver, or to the sea-
shore for a summer vacation and a
change of diet to fish and clans
Those west of the Penobscot were of
the Abnoki group, and those along that
river and to the east of it into New
Brunswick called themselves Eteche'
Minis. All were of the Algonquin ma
ton.
Now the peculiar thing about this
vast body of 38 900 Indians is that they
were not in any degree killed off by
the white man. Probably there were
more settlers killed by the Indians
than there were Indians killed by the
settlers. There Indians died of the
plague and in intertribal wars.
or the 5000 of these centuries, hun
dreds were slain in fierce war be-
tween the Penobscot and Sheepscot
tribes; then thousands persisted in the
pestilence of 1919, and thousands more
later on at the hands of the Mohawks,
who laid waste their towns clear to
the st. John River. When King Phil
lips war began in 1875 not more than
IL, 900 Maine Indians were left alive,
but this was twice the white popula-
ton and sufficient to wipe out the set
Elements almost to the New Hampshire
boundary.
Then, after dozen years of peace,
came the period from 1890 to 1924,
outbreak after outbreak in which the
Maine people We're most terribly
scourged by the savages. The paths of
the settlers were banished. they were
shot down in the fields, they woke in
their buildings in flames, and the
hatchets of the sayages breaking down
the doors of their dwellings,; none
could tell where or when the prowling
foe would strike. Consequently many
families spent weeks together in the
garrison, daring to cultivate only the
nearest fields But in the brief inter
val of peace the farms soon teemed
with plenty, while the ringing saws
beside the dashing cataracts turned
the dense woods into marketable lum-
Der.
Slowly the settlers learned that the
best way to cope with the savages
was to attack them in their own viii
lagos. Expeditions of 100 or 200 men
made their way up the rivers to the
head water and burned hornets
nests" And when a heavy force from
Massachusetts Bay aided by band of
Mohawk Indians brought from New
York wiped out Norridgewock, the
great village OF the kennebec Indians,
the whole tribe largely emigrated from
Maine to the st. Francis river in Que
bee among their friends, the French.
Lovewell's fight in 1926 at Pequak-
ct, their village. broke the power of
the Saco Valley Indians, and by 1859
not one of the Sokokis was left In the
region and most of the Androscoggins