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| Total population | |
|---|---|
| extinct as a tribe | |
| Regions with significant populations | |
| northeasternMassachusetts, southernNew Hampshire[1] | |
| Languages | |
| Eastern Algonquian | |
| Religion | |
| Indigenous religion | |
| Related ethnic groups | |
| Naumkeag people,Pennacook[1] |
ThePawtucket tribe were a confederation ofEastern Algonquian-speakingNative Americans in present-day northeasternMassachusetts and southeasternNew Hampshire. They are mostly known in the historical record for their dealings with the early English colonists in the 17th century. Confusion exists about the properendonym for this group who are variously referred to in European documents as Pawtucket, Pentucket,Naumkeag,Wamesit, or Mystic Indians, or by the name of their currentsachem or sagamore.
Pawtucket, meaning "at the falls,"[3] was a location in theMerrimack Valley of northeastern Massachusetts and southeastern New Hampshire, at thePawtucket Falls in what is nowLowell, Massachusetts.[1] In the early 1600s, the Pawtucketsachem held authority over thePennacook (present-dayConcord, New Hampshire),Agawam (present-dayCape Ann, Massachusetts),Naumkeag (present-daySalem, Massachusetts), Pascataway, and Accomintas peoples according to late contemporary source Daniel Gookin, but this authority waned after an epidemic in 1612-1613.[4]
At the time of contact with Europeans,Nanepashemet was asachem of the group,[5] controlling lands from the present-dayCharles River north to thePiscataqua River and west to the present-dayConcord River. He was killed in 1617 in present dayMedford, Massachusetts, in conflict with theTarrantines, an Eastern Algonquian exonym forMiꞌkmaq, where his burial place was found byEdward Winslow in a scouting party from Plymouth.[6] After his death, leadership of the group passed to his wife, known only to history as theSquaw Sachem of Mystic, who administered the region jointly with their three sonsWonohaquaham or "Sagamore John,"Montowampate or "Sagamore James," andWenepoykin or "Sagamore George."[2]
Passaconaway was also recorded as being a Pawtucket chief sachem, who also held authority with theWamesit, Pascataqua, andPennacook peoples.[1]
In December 1633, asmallpox epidemic killed both Wonohaquaham and Montowampate along with a large portion of the tribe,[7] leaving Wenepoykin and the Squaw Sachem as the leaders of a much smaller group. When the Squaw Sachem died in roughly 1650, Wenepoykin became sole sachem of territory extending from present-dayWinthrop toMalden,North Reading,Lynn, or evenSalem. However, his attempts to assert his claim to these lands through the settlers' legal system were largely ineffective. During the next two decades, the size of the group further declined as the BritishLong Parliament and theMassachusetts General Court worked to relocate Native Americans intopraying towns such asNatick, drawing some converts from within Wenepoykin's family.
In 1675, Wenepoykin and some of the remaining Pawtucket joinedMetacomet inKing Philip's War, which was a stark turning point in the history of Native Americans in New England, and for the Pawtucket/Naumkeag in particular. Wenepoykin was taken captive the next year in 1676 and sold into slavery inBarbados. During this same time, over 1,000 nonbelligerent Praying Indians, some of them originally Pawtucket, were interned onDeer Island, but only 167 survived to return to praying towns.
After eight years of slavery in Barbados, Wenepoykin returned to Massachusetts through the intercession ofJohn Eliot, where he joined some remaining family members in Natick but died later the same year, leaving his lands to a maternal kinsman,Quonopohit, alias James Rumney Marsh,[8] though by this time most of the hereditary territory of the sachem was occupied by English settlers. Quonopohit and other kinsmen successfully pushed for payment for Pawtucket/Naumkeag lands in what is now northeastern Massachusetts in the 1670s and 1680s.[8]
At this point, the history of the Pawtucket blends with the history of other native groups who joined together in the remaining praying towns ofWamesit andNatick, as well as others who may have gone north to join the nascentWabanaki Confederacy, which had been more successful in the northern theater of King Philip's War, also known as theFirst Abenaki War, in pushing back European settlement along what is now the coast ofMaine.