Shawmut
1613-1617
The
following year, Witawamet becomes a prisoner of the Abnaki. His captors carry
him north, planning to torture Heart-Spear’s son before putting him to death.
Witawamet escapes but becomes lost in the Lakes of the Clouds, the White
Mountains.
He crawls into a cave, where Oshuam, half-dog, half-wolf challenges
him. The pair make a truce and stay together, surviving the winter on roots and
tubers and what small creatures Witawamet is able to snare. When spring comes,
Witawamet starts for Shawmut. Old Dog takes the same path.
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| Wolfdog Photo: Brittanica Advocacy for Animals |
Their
journey ends in April 1617, Witawamet’s spirit soaring when he sees the three
hills of his home. He finds a canoe on the banks of the Charles, beckons Old
Dog climb in, and paddles toward the landing place.
He sees not a single plume
of smoke from his people’s fires. Did the Abnaki raids begin early this year?
Did something else delay his people’s trek from their winter camp?
Witawamet
and Old Dog discover the truth. At the muddy cove and on the level ground
above, wherever they look, they see the dead. Not the bloody work of Abnaki but
the plague brought by men from Europe.
Witawamet
finds Pemoleni’s body in his mother’s wigwam, but there’s no sign of the
others. He climbs frantically up the mountain and searches to the horizon, observing
not a single canoe, not a soul on the islands. He starts down and is one
hundred yards from the spring on the western slope, when he hears excited
barking.
Old
Dog has found the only survivors of the Great Sickness. They are Chitanawoo,
sachem of the Shawmut, and the child, Jacques Petit.
Imagining Boston - 7
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