Northeast Coast campaign (1723)

Between April 19, 1723 and January 28, 1724, Wabanaki forces struck along the northeastern coastline in an episode now remembered as part of Dummer's War. Their assault came as a direct answer to events of the year before, when New England forces had struck at Norridgewock and Penobscot, both Wabanaki Confederacy strongholds. In turn, the confederacy set its sights on English holdings south of the Kennebec River, the line marking Acadia's border, ranging across the shore between Berwick and Mount Desert Island in what is now Maine.

Casco, known also under the names Falmouth and Portland, stood as the most important of these settlements. So devastating was the offensive across the Maine frontier that by the spring of 1724, Dummer found it necessary to order a full withdrawal of settlers into the safety of the blockhouses.

Historical context

The conflict grew out of two parallel pressures: settlers from New England pushing further along the Kennebec River into what is now Maine, and fishermen from the same region venturing increasingly into Nova Scotia's coastal waters. New France held that the true boundary separating Acadia from New England lay along the Kennebec in southern Maine. This northward push had been made possible by the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht, the agreement that closed out Queen Anne's War and handed peninsular Nova Scotia over to Great Britain. Yet that treaty had been negotiated entirely in Europe, with no Wabanaki representative present or consulted in any way regarding the settlements now spreading into their lands. Their response came in the form of raids against British fishing operations and outposts. Massachusetts Governor Samuel Shute, facing this Wabanaki resistance, ordered a series of forts constructed on land the Abenaki considered their own near where the Kennebec meets the sea: Fort George, raised at Brunswick in 1715; St. George's Fort, established at Thomaston in 1720; and Fort Richmond, built in 1721 at the town of Richmond. France pressed its own claim to the region as well, erecting a church within the Abenaki settlement of Norridgewock (now Madison, Maine) along the Kennebec, sustaining a religious mission among the Penobscot people on the river bearing their name, and constructing another church in the Maliseet community of Medoctec on the Saint John River. Together, these forts and Catholic missions pushed tensions in the region toward open war.

The campaign

Over the course of 1723, Father Rale worked alongside the Wabanaki Confederacy of Acadia to launch fourteen separate raids against New England settlements across what is now Maine. The violence began in April when raiders struck Falmouth, known today as Portland, killing a man named Chubb after mistaking him for Captain Harmen. Just days later, on April 19, attackers descended on Scarborough, striking the garrison house belonging to Roger Deering. Captain Hammond died there along with seven others, while the assailants carried off three adults and three of Deering's own children as captives.

The following month brought further bloodshed: two settlers lost their lives during a raid on Berwick, another died at Wells, and two more were killed while traveling toward York.

By summer, the Norridgewocks had joined forces once more with roughly 250 Indian allies from St. Francis to strike Arrowsic. Spurred on by Father Rale, the combined force torched thirty-seven homes and slaughtered three hundred head of cattle. Of the forty residents, all managed to escape to the garrison save for one child. That August and September saw additional violence visited upon Saco, Maine, and Dover, New Hampshire. During this period, Captain Heath led thirteen men, two of them Mohawks, into what became known as the Battle of Richmond, where they encountered thirty natives. The engagement left two of the attackers dead and the remainder scattered, though the colonists suffered one killed and two wounded in return.

October brought tragedy to Mount Desert, where Captain Cogswell and his crew were ambushed and captured the moment they set foot on shore. Around this same time, two more colonists, Smith and Bailey, met their deaths near Cape Porpoise, one falling on Vaughan's Island and the other along the shoreline not far from where the old meeting-house once stood.

The year's violence culminated on December 25, when sixty natives began a month-long siege of St. George's Fort. Captain Kennedy, in command of the defense, managed to hold his position until Colonel Westbrook arrived with reinforcements and finally drove the attackers away. Before the siege ended, though, the natives claimed one more victim: Reverend Willard.

Aftermath

As the cold months set in, Massachusetts sent an additional 300 soldiers to guard the Maine frontier, and its government placed a price on Father Rale's head. Native forces had pressed their advantage so effectively along that frontier that by spring 1724 Dummer had no choice but to order the withdrawal of settlers into the blockhouses. The Confederacy, for its part, held off until the arrival of spring before launching a fresh assault on the Northeast Coast that same year.