1637
Troubles between the Indians and the whites arose so early as 1636. John Oldham was murdered on Block Island by a party of Pequot Indians. Vane of Massachusetts sent Endicott to inflict punishment. The Pequots in turn attacked the fort at Saybrook, and in 1637 threatened Wethersfield. They were planning a union with the Narragansets for the destruction of the English, when Roger Williams informed the Massachusetts colony of their designs and, at the urgent request of the governor and council, hastened to the chief of the Narragansets and dissuaded him from entering into the alliance. The moment was critical. Captain Mason with about ninety English and seventy Mohegans, under their sachem, Uncas (a sub chief, who with his district, Mohegan, had rebelled against the Pequot sachem, Sassacus), was sent from Hartford down the Connecticut River. Entering the Sound, he sailed past the mouth of the Thames and anchored in Narragansett Bay, at the foot of Tower Hill, near Point Judith. He kne...