The Damm Garrison House in Dover, New Hampshire
is located inside this pavilion at the Woodman Institute
 |
| This map is located inside the Damm Garrison at the Woodman Institute in Dover, New Hampshire It explains the events of Cochecho Massacre, and maps out the locations of the garrisons |
The first recorded captives carried to Quebec, Canada to be
sold to settlers and native Indians occurred at the Raid on Dover, also known
as the Cochecho Massacre, in Dover, New Hampshire on 27 June 1689. This makes this raid very interesting to genealogists,
since some of the women and children who were taken north converted to
the Catholic religion. These same English people later married French spouses and left descendants in
Canada. Some of the captives were
redeemed and came home, and some of the redeemed refused to return because they
preferred life in Canada!
At the beginning of King William’s War (1688- 1697) there
were many raids on New England settlements by the French, and the English raided
French villages in Penobscot Bay and Chedabouctou (Guysborough, Nova Scotia). In June 1689 several hundred Abenaki and
Pennacook Indians raided Dover and killed more than 20 and took 29
captives. This was one quarter of the
Dover population. The raid was quite a blow to the English settlements in New Hampshire.
The Dover Raid was revenge on Major Richard Waldron who had tricked and captured many Abenaki and
Wampanoag in 1676 during King Phillip’s War.
These Indians he captured were taken to Boston where some were executed
and some were sold into slavery in the Caribbean. Twelve years later the Abenaki retaliated with the help of the French in Canada.
Waldron's garrison was attacked with a vengeance. The Major was singled out for a particularly horrendous
torture and execution. His nose and ears
were removed and stuffed in his throat.
Each Indian slashed his chest, and he was forced to fall on his own
sword. Waldron had been well known as a
cheat at trade with the Indians and he had been a particularly cruel leader to
the English settlers (especially to Quakers).
You can read more about Waldron at this blog post:
There were five garrison houses in town at Dover, and others
in outlying areas. Five Indian women
came into town and asked to shelter at the garrisons, one at each. In the middle of the night, each woman opened
the gates of the garrison to the attackers. The rest was history…
According to the book New England Captives Carried to Canada,
pages 142 - these are some of the identified captives, all traced to French
records in Quebec:
John Church (sometimes misspelled Chase)
John Evans
Sarah Gerrish, 7 year
old granddaughter of Major Waldron,
Mrs. Elizabeth Hanson, wife of Tobias
----- Heard “a young woman of Cochecho”
Esther Lee, daughter of Richard Waldron, along with her
child
Grizel Otis, wife of Richard, daughter of James Warren
Margaret Otis, rebaptized Christine in Quebec
Rose Otis
John Otis
Stephen (rebaptized Joseph Marie)
Nathaniel (rebaptized Paul), son of Stephen Otis and Mary
Pitman
Joseph Buss
William Buss
Here is a list of some members of my family tree who were victims
of the Cochecho Massacre:
I'm forced to admit that I'm closely related to Major Richard Waldron (1615 – 1689). He was married to my 9th
great aunt, Ann Scammon. I descend from
Ann’s sister, Elizabeth (about 1625 – abut 1680) who married Thomas
Atkins. Major Waldron, as I described above, was
killed, along with most of his family, and his garrison was burned to the
ground, along with his grist mills and trading post.
I'm proud to tell you about Elizabeth Hull Heard (about 1628 – 1706), my 8th
great grandmother. According to stories
in Cotton Mather’s Magnalia Christi Americana and Belknap’s History of New Hampshire
and other books, she was a witness to Waldron’s deceit in 1676, and sheltered a
young native Abenaki boy from death. On the night of the Cochecho Massacre she was hiding
In the woods when an Indian pointed his weapon at her, but suddenly spared her
life and ran away. The Heard garrison
house was one of the few homes that were successfully defended that night by
William Wentworth because Elizabeth's husband had died a few months before the attack. It is suggested that the Indian who spared her life was the
young Abenaki boy in 1675. Elizabeth's children survived, too, including her daughter Mary (1650 - 1706), my 7th great grandmother, and her husband John Ham and children.
[You can see that I am related to both the villain and the
heroine of this massacre]
For more information:
New England Captives Carried to Canada Between 1677 and 1760 During the
French and Indian Wars, by Emma Lewis Coleman, published in 1925, reprinted
by the New England Historic Genealogical Society, 2012.
From the Dover, New Hampshire Public Library website
An online
article from Portsmouth, New Hampshire historian J. Dennis Robinson
Magnalia Christi Americana, or "The Ecclesiastical History
of New-England, from its First Planting in the year 1620 Unto the Year of Our
Lord, 1698", Cotton Mather, in seven books (reprint), New Haven, CT,1820
The Hull Family in America, Compiled by Col. Weggant, Hull
Family Association
"A Genealogical Memoir of the Family of Richard
Otis" -- 1851 -- by Horatio N. Otis. NEHGR
for July 1848 & April 1850 has the Genealogy of the Otis Family Descending
from John Otis, who immigrated to New England & settled in Hingham, Mass.
about 1635.
Click here for blog post about the DAMM family garrison,
which survived the Cochecho massacre in 1689.
The DAMM garrison was built in 1675, and is the oldest surviving
garrison house still standing in New Hampshire.
UPDATE - 3 June 2015
Roger W. Lawrence has written a new book "English Captives and Prisoners Remaining in New France" (for those with ancestors who were carried to Canada from New England in the colonial period). You can pre-order this book from the American Canadian Genealogical Society at this link www.acgs.org
-----------------------------------
To cite/link to this blog post: Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Cochecho Massacre, 27 June 1689, Dover, New Hampshire", Nutfield Genealogy, posted May 18, 2015, (http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2015/05/cochecho-massacre-27-june-1689-dover.html: accessed [access date]).
this sounds like a great place to visit. I am descended from Elizabeth Hull Heard who was a survivor. Going to be in New Hampshire this summer, what would you consider the best museum/sights to visit to get a feel for those who lived in NH and Massachusetts in the 1600s and early 1700s?
ReplyDeleteYou should definitely visit the Woodman Institute in Dover, where the Damm Garrison is located. You might also want to visit Strawbery Banke Museum in Portsmouth, which is a living history museum that represents all the time periods from the 1600s to WWII. The Ipswich, Massachusetts Historical Society has two houses that represent first period architecture, and of course Plimoth Plantation is another living history museum set in 1627. So we are cousins through Elizabeth Hull Heard! Wonderful! Have a terrific summer in New Hampshire.
DeleteAs to my other comment, maybe you could write a blog about it. :)
ReplyDeleteI was thinking the same thing about a blog post! And I thought of another great museum, The Fort at No. 4, which is on the Connecticut River in Charlestown, New Hampshire. If you visit on one of the great re-enactment weekends (see my calendar blog post or the Fort at No. 4 website) you can witness some French and Indian war action, with Natives coming down the river in canoes, French Troops, British Troops and New Hampshire militias all gathering for skirmishes in the fields. The Fort has several garrison houses and is surrounded by a wooden stockade.
DeleteHello, I am a descendant of Anne Heard and Sarah Hanson and I also have Tuthill's and Hulls in my tree. I've traced the trees of these girls back into Medieval England. Surprisingly, both have deep ties to well documented nobility.
ReplyDeleteJohn and Anne (Leza) Thomas and their 8 year old son Claude were also caught in the raid. Claude and his mother were taken captive. Claude was ransomed by the King and was adopted by an Abenaki squaw. The squaw had the surname Bigaouette which Claude eventually took as an adopted name Claude Thomas Dit Bigaouette.
ReplyDeleteI believe the surname spelling "Bigaouette was NOT the name of the Abenaki woman who cared for and adopted Claude Thomas. I have found only one record of how her name was spelled and there was no "ou" double vowel in French back then so an elongated figure 8 was used instead to signify the "ou" double vowel sound. Thus her name was written as "Big8et." I have done extensive research into the original surnames of New France families and the Fur Trade in New France and the surname "Bigaouette" does not ever show up, even when using slightly different spellings. No where is there a record of it prior to 1699 when, after a decade, Claude Thomas is ransomed, immediately converts to Catholicism and takes on his adoptive mother's "name" as his new French surname addition to Thomas "dit Bigaouette." I am currently reaching out to several Abenaki language experts to try and solve this riddle. My best guess is that the Abenaki name of the woman who adopted Claude was interpreted by French speaker's ears as "Bigaouette." Or, they simply made it up based on what their French ears were hearing when she spoke her name to them. I'll return if I find any new info.
DeleteI believe the surname spelling "Bigaouette was NOT the name of the Abenaki woman who cared for and adopted Claude Thomas. I have found only one record of how her name was spelled and there was no "ou" double vowel in French back then so an elongated figure 8 was used instead to signify the "ou" double vowel sound. Thus her name was written as "Big8et." I have done extensive research into the original surnames of New France families and the Fur Trade in New France and the surname "Bigaouette" does not ever show up, even when using slightly different spellings. No where is there a record of it prior to 1699 when, after a decade, Claude Thomas is ransomed, immediately converts to Catholicism and takes on his adoptive mother's "name" as his new French surname addition to Thomas "dit Bigaouette." I am currently reaching out to several Abenaki language experts to try and solve this riddle. My best guess is that the Abenaki name of the woman who adopted Claude was interpreted by French speaker's ears as "Bigaouette." Or, they simply made it up based on what their French ears were hearing when she spoke her name to them. I'll return if I find any new info.
DeleteI'm a direct descendant of the Thomas/ Thomas-Bigaouette line. The name change occurred when a Bigaouette immigrated to the US. Anyway, I've researched this a fair amount. I've found very little information regarding the Abenaki woman. What I did find is that the region her village was/is in would be the Lorette region (I'm unsure of that accuracy). I've been searching for the letters proving Claude was ransomed. They are the letters to The Sieur of Calliere and Sieur of Champaigny, Steward of Montreal. The letter should be dated around The Great Peace of Montreal. I also believe Claude became Catholic to marry Marie-Anne.
DeleteI am a direct descendant of Claude Thomas, who along with his mother Anne Lega/Lara were living in Cocheco at the time of the massacre. Claude was taken captive by the Abenkai Indians and for a decade was raised by an Abenaki woman named "Bigaouette". I assume she was mixed blood and part French because that sure sounds like a French origin surname to me. When Claude was ransomed after ten years he agreed to convert to Catholicism, remained in Quebec and married a french Canadian woman named Marie-Anne Villeneuve in 1706. Claude Thomas also took the name Bigaouette and became Claude Thomas dit Bigouette. My mother Henriette Fortier nee Bigaouette is a direct descendant of Claude Thomas dit Bigaouette. My Fortier line goes all the way back to Antonine Fortier and his father Noel Fortier/Forestier who migrated from Normandy France around 1665 to Quebec, New France and settled on ILe d' Orléans with many of the oldest original French families in that area. I have a question about this alleged Abenaki woman named Bigaouette who adopted Claude Thomas and cared for him while he was "captive" for nearly a decade. Bigaouette sure seems like a French surname to me. Is it possible that that the Abenaki woman named "Bigaoutte" was actually a mixed blood of French and Abenaki decsent? Is there anything else know about her. I have looked for the french name Bigaouette in original Metis family name sources and it never comes up. Any light you can shed on this would be helpful. BTW, just an example of how history can come full circle....my father Walter Fortier's father Lucien Edward Fortier (from Montreal/Quebec) married my Ojibway grandmother in 1932 after he moved to Ontario near Marathon. I'm a band member at our reserve, Pic River Ojibway First Nation.
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ReplyDeleteLoved touring the preserved garrison while researching for my novel, Raid on Cochecho! I'm descended from at least 5 families impacted by that event in 1689.
ReplyDeleteI had the pleasure of touring the well--preserved garrison house while researching for my novel, Raid on Cocheco. I'm a descendant of at least 5 families impacted by that tragic event in 1689--Otis, Heard, Hanson and Hamm to name a few.
ReplyDeleteMy name is Alan Otis just discovering this family history direct descendant of Richard Otis the otit Garrison Dover New Hampshire massacred in 1689 and then marched 400 miles to Quebec my family was in Quebec for over 200 years where my great-grandfather Charles Otis came back to the United States in New England valley falls Rhode Island and wake me up at
DeleteI have Waldron in my lineage as a ggfather but I also have the hero of Dover - Elder William Wentworth as as gg father - Proud of Elder Wentworth. Waldron not worth mentioning.
ReplyDeleteThank you so much for this information. Based on research, I think I am a direct descendant of the John Evans listed as a captive, taken back to Canada. It's my understanding that he died in captivity. He would have been about 49 years old at the time. Looking to find additional information about him if possible. I will also check out the other resources you mention.
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