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February 29th 1704, Deerfield Massachusetts, two hours before
dawn. The Reverend John Williams, his wife Eunice, their eight children
and two household servants are about to prominently enter the pages of
American history. Deerfield, a small hamlet of forty-one houses was once
Abenakis tribal farm land. Now a band of two-hundred Abenakis,
missionary Mohawks and fifty French Canadians lie shivering in the snow
waiting to attack the village. It’s obvious why the Indians are there, however
the French Canadians want to capture an important prisoner that they can
trade for a French sea captain sitting in a Boston jail - the French want John
Williams. The winter of 1704 has been harsh, and the snow drifts reach to
the top of the town’s defensive palisade. The marauders scale the wall, leap
into the town square, and issue blood-curdling war whoops. They move
quickly, chop down doors and indiscriminately murder the town’s
inhabitants. At the Williams house:
“... in the first fury of their attack they dragged to the door and
murdered two of the children and a negro woman called Parthena, who
was probably their nurse.... They kept Williams shivering in his shirt
for an hour while a frightful uproar of yells, shrieks, and gunshots
sounded from without. At length they permitted him, his wife, and five
remaining children to dress themselves. Meanwhile the Indians and
their allies burst into most of the houses, killed such of the men as
resisted, butchered some of the women and children, and seized and
bound the rest.”
Francis Parkman –Deerfield
The three-hundred mile march northward to Canada over mid-winter ice
and snow begins almost immediately for the one hundred ten or so captives.
Women and children are routinely tomahawked when they lag behind the
group. Williams’ wife is murdered the next day. Seven year old Eunice
Williams, her murdered mother’s namesake, is separated from her father.
When the seven year old lags behind, instead of being dispatched by a
quick tomahawk blow, an Indian flips her onto his back and she rides him
like a pony. Days latter, her new Indian friend finds room for her on a sled,
and while John Williams groans like a beast of burden under the weight of
the heavy pack he is made to carry, little Eunice rides all the way to Canada
like a Russian Czarevna, an imaginary play horse pulling her sled through
the snow. At their arrival in Canada, John Williams is permanently
separated from his daughter Eunice. She goes to live with a Mohawk family
until all the ransoms are paid and the French sea captain is released from
jail. It is time for the captives to return to Deerfield. Eunice refuses to go with
them. Nothing anyone can say or do will change her mind. Confronted by
her father. Eunice stands firm. She will not go back to Deerfield. John
Williams returns home without Eunice. The machinery of government now
turns on her behalf. The governors of New York and Massachusetts treat
with the governor of Canada - send Eunice home. No, she is free to
choose, and she chooses to stay in Canada. This is the Cold War three
centuries too early, Eunice wants to defect. She is not alone, other young
captives choose to stay in Canada with the Indians. At a time when
Massachusetts women are being burned at the stake for heresy to keep
them obedient, Indian women have equal footing with men. In Indian
society, the women vote in elections - not men; women own all the property
- not men. In Indian society women have as much freedom of choice as do
men. Eunice is not going back to Massachusetts. She wants to stay an
Indian. Life comes without a rule book, the rules are man-made. Every
young generation must make sense of what is handed to them. The young
generations of every age are driven to reshape the world in their own image.
John Williams prays for his daughter, his congregation prays for his
daughter, all the English colonies pray for Eunice; they ask the maker of all
things for a small miracle. Of course, their prayers are answered - they
received a big miracle; only nobody knows that in 1704. George
Washington and his generation are not born for three more decades. They
will have the same New World streak of stubbornness as Eunice, and say
“NO” to all the machinery of government. When their father across the sea
wants them to return to their English roots, they choose to stay part Indian -
freedom suits them. The young generation melts life down to essentials and
pours the mix into a mold of their own making. Three centuries after Eunice
became an Indian, there is no longer such a thing as a “full blooded
Indian.” They have all melted into the mold that is America.
For recalcitrant 7 year olds everywhere.
joseph tiraco, Leap Day Eve 2004
Email: t@tiraco.com
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