Customer Reviews

Captive Histories: English, French, And Native Narratives of the 1704 Deerfield Raid (Native Americans of the Northeast)

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The story of Deerfield continues with this outstanding copulatiion of original letters written by the captives.Many of these letters have yet to be published until now.This author team brings the reader closer to the 1704 raid than ever before,as we become caught up in the emotions of the captive person. As with their first book "Captors and Captives" they intertwine all three cultures so we see how complex those times were.I hope this collaboration continues with more research on the subject,for it brings us closer to our New England past.

In 1704, a French and Indian coalition raided the frontier village of Deerfield, Massachusetts, destroying property, killing 50 of the inhabitants, and kidnapping 112. Forced to march in the dead of winter to Canada, many of the captives died along the way. Many survived, however, and later printed narratives of their ordeals. The most famous victims of this raid were members of the Williams family, and much has been written about them in subsequent centuries. In Captive Histories, Sweeney and Haefeli have gathered primary documents pertaining to the Williams survivors and those less famous. The difference in this book is the inclusion of multiple perspectives, including the Abenaki and Mohawk stories that have been passed from generation to generation via oral tradition. Letters, military reports, oral narratives,and memoires are collated and evaluated in such a way as to compare and contrast the English, French, and Native American points of view, and assess belief systems, traditions, the the reliability of the evidence. Captive Histories does not read like a historical novel; it is an important and valuable piece of research and socio/political/cultural commentary on one of colonial New England's most notorious events.