Evan Haefeli

I think this must qualify as a definitive study of the events and context of the February 29 1704 (Julian calendar) raid on Deerfield, although I must confess it is the only complete book I've read on the subject so far. The authors view the event and its times (1670s to the 1760s) from every cultural and political angle, trace the origins and fates of captors and captives, the shifting alliances of European and Indian nations, and provide a marvelous window on an historical period that had been fairly obscure to me. My own personal interest of course stems from the escape of my 6th great grandmother, Thankful Nims, age 19, from the French led raiding party. While children had their heads bashed open and men and women were taken into captivity and houses burned, she and her husband Benjamin Munn hid in a primitive cellar house that was so covered with snow that it escaped notice. Thankful and Benjamin would remove south to Springfield where my 5th great grandmother, their child Sarah Munn would be born some twenty years later, understandably less close to the frontier. The subsequent generation would settle further north in Marlboro (Marlborough) Vermont. On the whole, this branch of our ancestors was by all appearances poor New England farmers all, living in large families on or near the frontier, and typically moving in search of new land with each generation. I found Haefeli and Sweeney's history fascinating and mind expanding, and intuitively plausible as a description of the cultural and political context of my ancestors' lives. I hope, some day, as my children or grandchildren peruse this list of my long ago readings, they will take the time to discover a little bit about Thankful Nims Munn and her family and circumstances as described here. (She does not actually appear in this book, but her parents and many of her siblings are mentioned.) The stories here of the cultural relationships between the many Indian nations and the French and the English provide a sense of the fluidity and connectedness of the cultures. Among the many revelations, this book provides a sense of just how few in number were the early settlers of New England and, even more so, how few were those of New France. A raiding party of some 200 was a huge undertaking, and the Deerfield raid was a singularly successful action on the part of New France, one that was really never equaled. While it became, particularly as a result of the contemporaneous book published about it (The Redeemed Captive Returning to Zion by John Williams, 1665-1729) a rallying point for New England colonialists, the military action itself seems to have marked a high water point for New France as a Continental power, with subsequent raids experiencing less success as the French project in America dwindled and then collapsed over the ensuing decades. The final chapter on historiography and the effort to define the meaning of the "Deerfield Massacre" is particularly interesting - I like to go meta. This book has gripped me for many evenings.
November 1, 2009… (mer)