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MARY ROWLANDSON. (c. 1636-1711). Circa 1630: Puritan colonists on their way to church equipped with a musket. MARY ROWLANDSON. Probably born in England Her father a wealthy landowner in the Massachusetts Bay Colony in Lancaster Married a minister.
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MARY ROWLANDSON (c. 1636-1711)
Circa 1630: Puritan colonists on their way to church equipped with a musket
MARY ROWLANDSON • Probably born in England • Her father a wealthy landowner in the Massachusetts Bay Colony in Lancaster • Married a minister
A NARRATIVE OF THE CAPTIVITY AND RESTORATION OF MRS. MARY ROWLANDSON • Became one of the most popular prose works of the seventeenth century • GENRE: CAPTIVITY NARRATIVE
KING PHILIP’S WAR(1675-76) • WAMPANOAG federation, led by METACOM(King Philip), against the settlers • From 1640 to 1675 new waves of land-hungry settlers pushed into Indian territory, particularly in Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island. Tribes had to fight to protect their homelands; otherwise they would become “white men’s vassals,” subject to alien religion and law, humiliating limitations on personal freedom, usurpation of favorite hunting grounds
METACOM: “I am determined not to live until I have no country.”
The Result • 600 colonists dead • 3000 Native Americanskilled • 1200 houses burned • More than half of the 90 settlements in the region had been attacked, whole Native American villages massacred and entire tribes decimated
END OF THE WAR - August 1676, King Philip was slain, and his wife and children were sold into slavery
After the GREAT SWAMP MASSACRE, the NARRANGASETT tribe enters the war on he side of Philip • attacks the town of Lancaster in February of 1676 • Mary Rowlandson taken captive • May 2, ransomed for 20 pounds
THE ATTACK • “The Indians came in great numbers” • “Some in our house were fighting for their lives, others wallowing in their blood ... and the bloody heathen ready to knock us on the head…. ‘Lord, what shall we do?’”
God’s Providential Plan • “The Lord hereby would make us the more to acknowledge His hand, and to see that our help is always in Him.” • Her time of trial
Biblical Typology • Out of 37 people in the house she was the only survivor • “who might say as he, ‘And I only am escaped alone to tell the News’” [Job 1. 15]
“Oh the roaring, and singing and dancing, and yelling of those black creatures in the night, which made the place a lively resemblance of hell.” • Separated from her husband • A wounded baby
PILGRIMAGE • Wounded and exhausted, expects to die • “But the Lord renewed my strength still, and carried me along, that I might see more of his power;”
The Third Remove Feb 12-27
Sabbath in Wenimesset • “The next day was the sabbath. I then remembered how careless I had been of God’s holy time; and how evilly I had walked in God’s sight … how righteous it was with God to cut off the thread of my life and cast me out of His presence for ever.”
HARD TIMES • Her baby dies • Her daughter Mary, ten years old • Her son also there • Barely preserves her sanity
Receives the Bible • Reads chapters on obedience and repentance
Time to Go • “At first they were all against it, except my husband would come for me, but after they assented to it, and seemed much to rejoice in it; some asked me to send them some bread, other some tobacco, others shaking me by the hand, offering me a hood and a scarf to ride in;”
HOW DOES SHE DESCRIBE HER CAPTORS? • “those merciless heathen” • “murderous wretches” • “those barbarous creatures” • “roaring lions” • “savage bears”
