Mayflower

King Charles, and it was his pleasure and our duty and engagement for one Englishman to stand to the death by each other in all parts of the world.”
    By immediately assuming the conflict was a racial rather than a political struggle, the English were, in effect, creating a self-fulfilling prophecy. As the magnitude of the English response increased, Indians across New England discovered that instead of considering them valued allies, the English had suddenly begun to regard them all as potential foes. Perhaps Philip was right: their only option was war.
    But there were other factors besides racial fear and national loyalty influencing the Massachusetts-Bay officials’ decision to send the militia to Rhode Island. Both Massachusetts and Connecticut had designs on obtaining large tracts of land in the western portion of Rhode Island. The Massachusetts-Bay leaders decided that they must seize the opportunity to make their military presence known in Rhode Island. And so, under the pretext of securing a treaty with the Narragansetts, the Massachusetts forces left Mount Hope for the western shore of the bay, where they did their best to intimidate both the Indians and the English, whose lands the Puritans coveted. The end result of this misbegotten strategy was to turn what had most probably been a neutral tribe into an increasingly hostile one.
    For his part, Church had not given up on his original hope of winning both Weetamoo and Awashonks over to the English side. He was convinced that if he’d been able to speak to the sachems before the outbreak of hostilities, they would have spurned Philip. Even if it was too late to keep the Pocassets and Sakonnets out of the war, there was nothing to be accomplished by remaining at Mount Hope. The Plymouth authorities, however, seemed intent on keeping him on the west side of Mount Hope Bay. His elderly father-in-law, Constant Southworth, requested that Church assume his duties as commissary general of the Plymouth militia. Instead of doing something that might bring an end to the war—whether it was through diplomacy or fighting Philip—he was now forced to attend to the mundane tasks of feeding an army of several hundred men.
    There was one officer, however, who agreed with Church that it was time to move into Pocasset. Matthew Fuller was the army’s surgeon general. Although he was, in his own words, too “ancient and heavy” to be chasing Indians, he asked Church if he’d go with him to Pocasset. Church responded that “he had rather do anything in the world than stay there to build the fort.” So on the night of Thursday, July 8, after taking the ferry that ran from the southern tip of Mount Hope to Aquidneck Island, Fuller, Church, and just thirty-six men were transported by boat to the shores of Pocasset.
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    After a night spent sleeping in the countryside, they were off in search of Indians. While Fuller went north with half the men, Church took the other half south toward his home in Sakonnet. With luck, he might make contact with Awashonks. Several hours later, his men began to complain that they had not yet found any of the Indians he had promised them. As they made their way along the shore of the Sakonnet River, Church assured them “that if it was their desire to see Indians, he believed he should now soon show them what they should say was enough.”
    Fifty-five years earlier, Miles Standish had led a similar patrol along the south shore of Cape Cod. The Pilgrims’ search for Indians had been part of a voyage of discovery to a new and unknown land. Church was conducting his search just a few miles from his own farm—a land made just as new and strange by the transformative power of war.
    They could see signs of recent Indian activity all around them—a network of sinuous trails that crisscrossed the woods and fields. They came upon a wigwam loaded with cooking utensils and clothing. A few of the men asked if they could take some of the goods with them, but Church forbade it, “telling them they might expect soon to have their hands full” with Indians instead of plunder.
    On Punkatees Neck, between a ridge of dense forest and the stony shore of the Sakonnet River, they found a newly cultivated field of peas. They also saw two Indians walking through the field toward them. When the Indians turned and started to run, Church called out that he only wanted to talk and would not hurt them. But