Old Saybrook Middlesex Connecticut United States

...Kievitshoek (now Old Saybrook, Connecticut) at the mouth of the Verse River (Connecticut River) and ...

The English, the main rival of the Dutch in North America, had established several settlements on the eastern coast of New England, including Plymouth Colony in 1620, New Hampshire Colony in 1623, and Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1630.

King James I of England had granted the Earl of Warwick, president of the Council for New England, the right to settle the area west of Narragansett Bay to the Pacific Ocean.

Warwick had conveyed the grant in 1631 to fifteen Puritan lords in England as a potential refuge in North America.

The patentees, who included William Fiennes, 1st Viscount Saye and Sele, as well as Lord Brooke, and Colonel George Fenwick, had in 1635 commissioned John Winthrop, Jr., son of the governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, as "Governor of River Colony".

Winthrop, on arriving in Boston in October 1635, had learned that the Dutch were planning to occupy the mouth of the Connecticut River at a place called Pasbeshauke, meaning "place at the mouth of the river" in the Algonquian language.

To counter the Dutch, Winthrop had sent a small bark (canoe) to the mouth of the Connecticut with twenty carpenters and other workmen under the leadership of Lieutenant Edward Gibbons and Sergeant Simon Willard.

The expedition had landed near the mouth of the river, on the west bank in present-day Old Saybrook, on November 24, 1635 and located the Dutch coat of arms nailed on a tree.

Tearing down the coat of arms and replacing it with a shield painted with a grinning face, they established a battery of cannon and built a small fort.

When the Dutch ship returned several days later, they sighted the cannon and the English ships and withdrew.

Winthrop had renamed the point "Point Sayebrooke" in honor of Fiennes (Viscount Saye) and Lord Brooke.

The English at Saybrook are not happy about the raid, but agree that some of them will accompany Endecott as guides.

Endecott sails along the coast to a Pequot village, where he repeats the previous year's demand of payment for the death of Stone and more for Oldham.

After some discussion, Endecott concludes that the Pequot are stalling and attacks.

The Pequot ruse works: most escape into the woods.

Endecott has his forces burn down the village and crops before sailing home.

The English of the Connecticut colonies have to deal with the anger of the Pequot in the aftermath of the raid.

The Pequot attempt to enjoin their allies, some thirty-six tributary villages, to their cause but are only partly effective.

The Western Niantic join them but the Eastern Niantic remain neutral.

The traditional enemies of the Pequot, the Mohegan and the Narragansett, openly side with the English.

The Narragansett had warred with and lost territory to the Pequot in 1622.

Now their friend Roger Williams urges them to side with the English against them.

Fort Saybrook has been effectively besieged through the fall and winter; persons venturing outside have been killed.

The Pequot step up their raids on Connecticut towns as spring arrives in 1637.

Captain Mason is joined at Fort Saybrook by John Underhill and another twenty men.

Underhill and Mason proceed to ...

The Pequot are broken by the destruction of their people and the village of Mystic.

The English victory has also deprived them of their allies.

Forced to abandon their villages, the Pequot flee—mostly in small bands—to seek refuge with other southern Algonquian peoples.

Those who survived the massacre are enslaved, with some forced to become household servants of the Puritan English.

More are sent to the West Indies.

Many are hunted down by Mohegan and Narragansett warriors, enemies of the Pequot who have allied themselves with the English colonies.

The largest group, led by Sassacus, are denied aid by the Metoac (Montauk, or Montaukett) from present-day Long Island.

Sassacus leads roughly four hundred warriors west along the coast toward the Dutch at New Amsterdam and their Native allies.

When they cross the Connecticut River, the Pequot kill three men whom they encounter near Fort Saybrook.

The Collegiate School of Connecticut (later renamed Yale University) is chartered in Old Saybrook, Connecticut.