The Raid on Salmon Falls occurred on March 27, 1690, during King William's War, a conflict between English colonial forces and French-allied Native American groups. The raid targeted the English settlement of Salmon Falls, located in present-day Berwick, Maine, reflecting the broader military tensions of the period in northern New England.
The raid was led by Joseph-François Hertel de la Fresnière and his son Jean-Baptiste Hertel de Rouville, working in coordination with Norridgewock Abenaki chief Wahowa. The attackers initially planned to target the home of Edward Tyng at Fort Loyal, but altered their strategy and attacked Salmon Falls instead. The village was systematically plundered and burnt. During the assault, thirty-four men were killed, and fifty-four people—predominantly women and children—were taken captive and transported to Canada. A militia force mustered from Portsmouth pursued the raiders but was repelled in a skirmish later that day. Following the attack on Salmon Falls, Hertel continued his campaign of raids into present-day Portland, Maine.
The raid demonstrated the vulnerability of English settlements in Maine and the coordinated capability of French and Native American forces to strike multiple targets across the region. The successful capture and destruction of the settlement, combined with the significant number of captives taken, represented a significant blow to English colonial presence in the area during King William's War.
European colonization of North America accelerated after 1600, with England, France, Spain, and the Netherlands establishing competing settlements along the Atlantic coast, the St. Lawrence River, the Gulf of Mexico, and the Mississippi Valley. The first permanent English settlement at Jamestown, Virginia (1607) struggled with starvation and conflict; the Plymouth colony (1620) and the Massachusetts Bay Colony (1630) followed. By the mid-1700s, thirteen English colonies stretched along the Atlantic seaboard, governed through a mix of royal charters, proprietary grants, and elected assemblies. The colonial economy depended on tobacco in Virginia and Maryland, rice and indigo in the Carolinas, and maritime trade in New England — all increasingly reliant on enslaved African labor after 1619. Conflict with Indigenous peoples over land was continuous, punctuated by major wars including King Philip's War (1675–1676) in New England and the Yamasee War (1715–1717) in the South. The French and Indian War (1754–1763), part of the global Seven Years' War, ended French power in North America and left Britain deeply in debt — triggering the taxation disputes that would lead to revolution.
34 English colonists killed, 54 captured; attacker casualties unknown
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