Raid on Haverhill (1697)

From Wikipedia

The Raid on Haverhill was a military engagement that took place on March 15, 1697 during King William's War. French, Algonquin, and Abenaki warriors descended on Haverhill, then a small frontier community in the Province of Massachusetts Bay. In the surprise attack, the Abenaki killed 27 colonists and took 13 captive. The natives burned six homes. The raid became famous in the nineteenth century because of Hannah Dustin's captivity narrative as a result of the raid.

From The History of Haverhill, Massachusetts: From Its First Settlement, in 1640 ... By George Wingate Chase. Page 198:

After the attack on Duston's house, the Indians dispersed themselves in small parties, and attacked the houses in the vicinity. Nine houses were plundered and reduced to ashes on that eventful day, and in every case their owners were slain while defending them. Twenty-seven persons were slaughtered, (fifteen of them children) and thirteen captured, f ... It was a terrible blow for the town. Some of its most useful citizens, and promising youth, were among the slain; and well knowing that they were daily and hourly liable to similar attacks, it needs no stretch of imagination to declare that fear seized the hearts of the inhabitants.

The following is a list of the killed: —

1. John Keezar, his father (error) and son,
2. George;
3. John Kimball and his mother,
4. Hannah;
5. Sarah Eastman
6. Thomas Eaton ;
7. Thomas Emerson, his wife,
8. Elizabeth, and two children,
9. Timothy and
10. Sarah;
11. Daniel Bradley, his wife,
12. Hannah, and two children,
13. Mary and
14. Hannah;
15. Martha Dow, daughter of Stephen Dow;
16. Joseph,
17. Martha, and
18. Sarah Bradley, children of Joseph Bradley;
19. Thomas and
20. Mehitable Kingsbury;
21. Deborah (Corliss) Eastman Kingsbury (?)
22. Thomas Wood and his daughter,
23. Susannah;
24. John Woodman and his daughter,
25. Susannah;
26. Zcohariah White; and
27. Martha, the infant daughter of Mr. Duston.

captured

1. Hannah Dustin "Indian Fighter"
2. Mary Neff
3. Daniel Bradley, aged seven;
4. Abigail Kimball, aged eight; and
5. Philip Cod, aged six ;—all taken March 15, 1697

resources

• This Day in US Military History
• Each Month in Abenaki History
• Haverhill, Mass. First Congregational Church - Relations and Personal Records
• Hannah Dustin: The Judgement of History
• "Hannah Duston, the Heroine of Haverhill" "What are the details of the Abenaki Indian curse on the decendants of the Duston generations?"