Mayflower

English were not the only ones whose world was changing. The Indians of Philip’s generation had grown up amid the boom times of the fur trade and had come to regard expensive Western goods as an essential part of their lives. But now, with the virtual extinction of the beaver, the devaluation of wampum, and the loss of so much land, this new generation of Native Americans was beginning to confront a future of radically diminished opportunities.
    The pressure was particularly intense in Plymouth. Unlike Massachusetts-Bay and Connecticut, which had large hinterlands, the Indians and English in Plymouth had almost nowhere left to go. Pushed south to the neck of Mount Hope, Philip and his people were hemmed in from almost every side. Looking out from the summit of Mount Hope, Philip could see chimney smoke from the houses of the English to the north in Wannamoisett; to the south, just a half mile from the tip of Mount Hope was Rhode Island (known today as Aquidneck Island), home to the thriving English settlements of Portsmouth and Newport. Off in the distance to the west were the Narragansetts; closer to home was Hog Island, which, thanks to his brother Alexander, had become a part of Portsmouth, Rhode Island, back in 1654. Philip’s only relief came when he looked east across Mount Hope Bay to Pocasset in modern Tiverton, Rhode Island, the homeland of Weetamoo, Alexander’s widow and the “Squaw Sachem” of Pocasset.
    Adding to the Pokanokets’ growing sense of claustrophobia were the Englishmen’s livestock. Domesticated creatures such as cattle, horses, sheep, goats, and pigs were constantly straying off English farms and feasting on the Indians’ corn. Despite attempts to address the Indians’ complaints (a fence was built across the northern edge of Mount Hope), livestock remained a major irritant in English-Native relations.
    But if Philip had inherited a diminished and pressure-filled world, he proved remarkably resourceful in making the most of what was available to him. Yes, the Englishmen’s livestock were a nuisance. Well, then Philip would get cattle of his own. In 1665 he acquired a horse; in 1669, his large herd of hogs got him in trouble with the proprietors of Portsmouth, Rhode Island. Philip had the audacity to ferry his pigs out to Hog Island. His brother had sold the island fifteen years ago, but to Philip’s mind it was just the place for his swine to forage.
    As Philip knew, losing land had the most direct impact on the well-being of his people. If the Pokanokets were to survive as an independent entity, they must hold on to what land his father and brother had not yet sold. Soon after becoming sachem, he and Governor Prence agreed to a seven-year embargo on the sale of Indian land. It was an extraordinary agreement that marked a bold and high-minded departure from the practices of the past, and Philip instructed John Sassamon to write the governor a letter. “Last summer [Philip] made that promise with you,” Sassamon wrote, “that he would not sell no land in seven years time…. [H]e would have no English trouble him before that time.”
    But Philip’s idealistic resolve soon wavered. The following year, in April 1664, Philip agreed to sell a piece of land bordering the towns of Bridgewater, Taunton, and Rehoboth for a record £66 (roughly $12,000 today)—almost twice the amount his father had received for the Pokanoket homeland of Sowams. If the embargo had proven fleeting, Philip had at least succeeded in getting the English to pay a decent price for his land. Philip was doing just what his father had done forty years before—adapting to the inevitable forces of change.
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    Paul Revere’s engraving of King Philip
    Because Philip was the supreme sachem of the Pokanokets, his power over his people was, according to Roger Williams, that of “an absolute monarchy.” In reality, however, there were practical limits to his authority. If he should do something to lose the trust and respect of his people, the sachem might find himself without anyone to lead. “[V]ery frequently their men will leave them upon distaste or harsh dealing,” wrote Daniel Gookin, Massachusetts-Bay’s superintendent of the Praying Indians, “and go and live under other sachems that can protect them; so that their princes endeavor to carry it obligingly and lovingly unto their people, lest they should desert them, and