Rebecca Woolcot

The tragic story of Rebecca Granger is found in every history of Mass. Her husband born at Newbury, where undoubtedly he knew Rebecca. His father, John had formerly lived in Ipswich, and when some of the inhabitants of that place founded the town of Brookfield, midway between Sprinfgield and Worcester, in Mass., Joseph and his brothers removed hither, being later followed by their father. Joseph seems to have renewed at Suffield his acquaintance with his old friends the Grangers, and later married Rebecca. One child was born to them at Suffield and 2 at Springfield. Joseph had taken up a little farm of forty-five acres in what is now known as North Brookfield, in 1687, and hither the little family removed after the birth of their last child. In the years 1691 and 1692 the English colonies sent a military expedition by sea which sailed up the St. Lawrence to within sight of Quebec, and then sailed home again. In revenge, Count Frontenac, in the summer of 1693, dispatched a party of about forty Canadian Indians to attack the Mass. settlements, and especially Nashaway, now Lancaster. But, being strangers to the country, their progress was slow, and after two months in the wilderness determined to attack the first town foundy by them. It proved to be Brookfield. On the morning of July 27, 1693, Joseph Woolcot was at work on his farm some distance from the house, when Rebecca, "being fearful," as the old record says, took her children and went out to meet him. She had seen an Indian lurking in the woods near by. At once they returned to the house, where the husband discovered that his gun and other things were missing, and looking out the window he saw an Indian coming toward the dwelling. Rebecca, by direction of her husband, took her 2 little girls and crept into the bush, where she hid. Joseph took the little boy under his arm, and calling his do, which was large and strong, started out to meet the Indian. The dog proved Joseph's savior. He attacked the Indian, who emptied his gun into the brute, killing him. With a broadaxe Joseph then pursued the savage, who, loading as he ran, soon caused Joseph to flee in turn. With his little boy he made his way through the woods to the fort, several miles away, where he gave the alarm. Poor Rebecca hiding in the woods could not control herself, even in the time of utmost peril, and, crying out, "discovered herself" to the savages, who immediately dispatched her and her children. But revenge came quickly. A messenger had notified the famous Major Pynchon, the commander at Springfiled, who at once dispatched, Captian Cotton and a force of mounted men to the rescue. At Brookfield he found that the Indians had started north, and at once followed with a force of forty-two men, pushing on nigtht and day through the rought wilderness until the horses gave out. Then dismounting and divesting themselves of all superflous clothing, the captain pressed on with twenty-three men. The sun being a quarter of an hour high the next morning they came up with the enemy at breakfast, and quietly pushing their guns through the bush, killed six at the first fire. Others crawled off into the woods to die, and it is said fourteen were killed in all. The balance left without even taking their guns. A more gallant pursuit in either savage or other warfare was never made. Rebecca was the first victim in Mass. of that terrible war with the French and Indians, and by a strange coincidence her brother Ro bert, who was killed near the same spot in 1709, was the last.