Throughout Mary Rowlandson Story, The Sovereignty and Goodness of god, Rowlandson shares her experience of being captured by Native Americans. Of course it is an unpleasant experience for Rowlandson. Although this Narrative is told from a puritans point of view, one must also consider seeing the opposing view, and that is the Native Americans point of view. Yes, the Native Americans did assassin many white settlers and kept some hostage, but they were not just doing this because native americans were pure evil. They did it because they wanted revenge for what the white Settlers had done to them.
Before the Native Americans started attacking white settlers, we have to understand that the white settlers did way more to disturb the Native American which includes overtaking land, murdering, and taking advantage of native americans. Native Americans and the white settlers had a relationship. They often traded goods with one another to make their life’s more convenient. According to Foner the native americans were introduced to many English goods such as clothing, weapons (guns), farming tools, and other goods to make a Native American life more convenient (Foner, 55).
However, all that the hite settlers wanted was to gain a good relationship with the Native Americans so that it would be easier for the white settlers to take the Native’s land for agriculture. Not only did the white settlers introduced many great tools to the Native American’s, the white settlers also introduced diseases to the Natives. Which many Natives died from because they were not immune to the diseases like the Englishmen were. Soon there were more Englishmen than Native’s due to so many settlers immigrating.
As the Englishmen population grew more conflicts began between the natives and Englishmen. Mostly because the Englishmen wanted to take over most of the land for Agriculture reasons. Also the Englishmen over hunted the land leaving the Native’s with little to no food, and sometimes indians were treated poorly by the Englishmen. This led to conflicts between the two and eventually led the indians to revolt. On the year 1675, in the British settlement of Lancaster Native Americans attacked the British Settlement by killing innocent people and taking some hostage.
This was a terrible thing for the Native Americans to do but we should remember that this narrative is towards the white settlers point of view so it does ot state much about what the white settlers did to make the native americans to fight back. For example in one of the primary sources there is a source that talks about how an indian child would basically be used as an indentured service when they had no parents. According to the text the indian children were basically slaves until they reached twenty where they gained their freedom (A Memorandum of Indian Children Put Forth into service to the English 141).
Yes there could have been a chance where the children benefitted from being an indentured servant because they probably got a place to live nd somewhere to eat. However, the white settlers were the reason why the children’s parents died. As the primary source states most of the children’s parents died in the war or to an English Justice (A Memorandum of Indian Children Put Forth into Service to the English 142). Even if the Native American children got a place to sleep and food to eat, they still got treated poorly similar to what an African American slave experienced.
Rowlandson had many factors that basically kept her alive when she was captured. She was a house wife, brave, religious, and married to an important man that eventually helped her nd her child be free from the native americans. When Rowlandson was captured she was basically taken on a journey going through different places until the indians had taken her to King Phillip (tribe leader). King Phillip was then going to decide what he was going to do with her and the other people that were captured by the indians.
Basically all the indians wanted was to exchange Rowlandson for some goods that will benefit the Native Americans. Of course this is not right to be exchanging a person for thing. it is similar to selling a human. Like when the white settlers would sell african americans for ard labor. However, we could say its fair that the Native Americans captured people to get what they wanted. First of all the Natives were also abused and treated poorly. Second the white settlers took over a lot of the Native Americans land for Agriculture, and they also hunted most of the game that the Native Americans hunted to eat everyday.
We can understand why they revolted because they obviously didn’t want their land taken away. Native american families barely eating and a lot of them starving. Obviously everyone would be unhappy if some aliens come and took over the land and left the natives in a bad osition. Rowlandson and the Native Americans didn’t get along very well especially since Rowlandson’s and her children had been hurt by the indians and even one of her child’s died due to the child living in bad conditions while they were captured by the Native Americans.
I guess this just shows us that the Native Americans were upset for everything the white settlers did to them and their land. When they captured Rowlandson and the rest of the people the indians knew they were not going to kill them they just wanted to give the white settlers a little scare. They even wrote settlers to the white settlers letting them know that if provoked they will respond back. Some of the Native Americans learned to read and write in english to communicate with the white settlers.
According to one of the primary sources two indians wrote a letter to Rowlandson husband in english. The letter talked about how the husbands family is doing good but one that died (Sam ET AI, letter to John Leverett 133). Before the Native Americans sent that leader the white settlers sent a letter to them that they are willing to negotiate as long as they et their people free (Letter to “Indian sagamore”). Basically this letter is showing us that the indians are trying to intimidate the english settlers so that the Native americans can have what they want by using white settlers as captives.
When the the Native Americans raiding Lancaster they left the place destroyed. Many people were injured and some dead. House were burnt and the torn down. As for the Native Americans raiding Lancaster, Rowlandson’s home. The text says that no one really paid any attention to Lancaster after it was raided by the native americans. Instead colony decided to finding the enemy. he town eventually was abandoned (Town of Lancaster, petition to the governor and council of Massachusetts 128).
After all the Native Americans and the white settlers came to to a conclusion so that they can get what each side wanted. Overall this the White settlers got what they wanted and that was the people the Native Americans Captured from them. This narrative is in a White settler point of view favoring the white settlers and making the Native Americans look evil. It is basically what America always does they make themselves look good when in fact we as a country are not any different than any ther country there is.
For example we always talk about Germany and how Hitler is so evil for sending innocent people to concentration camps with terrible conditions and many of these people were often killed. When in fact america has done similar things such as having slaves and making them work in terrible conditions and some were shot just because along with how the Native American were poorly treated in their homeland. What l’m trying to say is here is that every country has had their goods and bad and people about their country before they criticize another country.
