ity, that he would send a band of soldiers to assist me in bringing her away. Upon hearing this she made no farther resistance. But so extremely bigoted was she to the customs and religion of the place, that, after all, she left it with the greatest reluctance, and the most bitter lamentations, which she continued as we passed the streets, and wholly refused to be comforted. My good friend, Major Small, whom we met with on the way, tried all he could to console her; and was so very kind and obliging as to bear us company, and carry my daughter behind him on horseback.

But I have run on a little before my story, for I have not yet informed you of the means and manner of my own redemption, to the accomplishing of which, the recovery of my daughter just mentioned, and the ransoming of some of my other children, several gentlemen of note contributed not a little; to whose goodness therefore I am greatly indebted, and sincerely hope I shall never be so ungrateful as to forget. Col. Schuyler in particular was so very kind and generous as to advance 2700 livres to procure a ransom for myself and three of my children. He accompanied and conducted us from Montreal to Albany, and entertained us in the most friendly and hospitable manner a considerable time, at his own house, and I believe entirely at his own expense.

I have spun out the above narrative to a much greater length than I at first intended, and shall conclude it with referring you, for a more ample and brilliant account of the captive heroine who is the subject of it, to Col. Humphrey's History of the Life of Gen. Israel Putnam, together with some remarks upon a few clauses in it. I never indeed had the pleasure of perusing the whole of said history, but remember to have seen some time ago an extract from it in one of the Boston newspapers, in which the colonel has extolled the beauty and good sense, and rare accomplishments of Mrs. Howe, the person whom he endeavors to paint in the most lively and engaging colors, perhaps a little too highly, and in a style that may appear to those who are acquainted with her to this day romantic and extravagant. And the colonel must needs have been misinformed with respect to some particulars that he has mentioned in her history. Indeed, when I read the extract from his history to Mrs. Tute, (which name she has derived from a third husband, whose widow she now remains,) she seemed to be well pleased, and said at first it was all true, but soon after contradicted the circumstance of her lover's being so bereft of his senses, when he saw her moving off in a boat at some distance from the shore, as to plunge into the water after her, in consequence of which he was seen no more. It is true, she

said, that as she was returning from Montreal to Albany, she met with young Saccapee on the way; that she was in a boat with Colonel Schuyler; that the French officer came on board the boat, made her some handsome presents, took his final leave of her, and departed, to outward appearance in tolerable good humor.

She moreover says, that when she went to Canada for her daughter, she met with him again, that he showed her a lock of her hair, and her name likewise, printed with vermillion on his arm. As to her being chosen agent to go to Europe, in behalf of the people of Hinsdale, when Colonel Howard obtained from the government of New York a patent of their lands on the west side of Connecticut river, it was never once thought of by Hinsdale people until the above-mentioned extract arrived among them, in which the author has inserted it as a matter of undoubted fact.

NARRATIVE

OF THE CAPTIVITY OF FRANCES NOBLE, WHO WAS, AMONG OTHERS, TAKEN BY THE INDIANS FROM SWAN ISLAND, IN MAINE, ABOUT THE YEAR 1755; COMPILED BY JOHN KELLY, ESQ. OF CONCORD, NEW HAMPSHIRE, FROM THE MINUTES AND MEMORANDA OF PHINEHAS MERRILL, ESQ. OF STRATHAM, IN THE SAME STATE; AND BY THE FORMER GENTLEMAN COMMUNICATED FOR PUBLICATION TO THE EDITORS OF THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF NEW HAMPSHIRE.

JAMES WHIDDEN, the maternal grandfather of Mrs. Shute, was a captain in the army at the taking of Cape Breton in 1745. He owned a tract of land on Swan Island, in the river Kennebec, where he lived with his family. One of his daughters married Lazarus Noble, of Portsmouth, who lived on the island with her father. The Indians had been accustomed to visit Capt. Whidden for the purposes of trade. There was a garrison on the island to secure the inhabitants from the attacks of the enemy in time of war.

One morning, a little after daybreak, two boys went out of the garrison and left the gate open. The Indians were on the watch, and availing themselves of the opportunity, about ninety entered the garrison. The inhabitants immediately discovered

that the enemy was upon them; but there was no escape. Captain Whidden and his wife retreated to the cellar, and concealed themselves. Noble and his hired man met the Indians at the head of the stairs, and fired upon them, wounding one of them in the arm. The Indians did not return the fire, but took Noble, his wife, and seven children, with Timothy Whidden and Mary Holmes, prisoners. The hired man and the two boys escaped. The captives were carried to the water's side and bound; excepting such as could not run away. The Indians then returned to the garrison, burnt the barn and plundered the house, cut open the feather beds, strewed the feathers in the field, and carried off all the silver and gold they could find, and as much of the provisions as they chose. It was supposed they omitted to burn the house from the suspicion that the captain and his wife, from whom they had, in times of peace, received many favors, were concealed in it. Capt. Whidden, after the destruction of his property on the island, returned to Greenland, in this state, which is supposed to have been his native place, and there died.

The Indians also took in a wood on the island an old man by the name of Pomeroy, who was employed in making shingles. Having collected their captives and plunder, they immediately left the island, and commenced their return to Canada to dispose of their prey. Pomeroy was old and feeble, and unable to endure the fatigue of the march, without more assistance than the savages thought fit to render him, and they killed him on the journey. They were more attentive to the children, as for them they undoubtedly expected a higher price or a greater ransom. Abigail, one of the children, died among the Indians. The other captives arrived safe in Canada, and were variously disposed of. Mr. Noble was sold to a baker in Quebec, and his wife to a lady of the same place as a chambermaid. They were allowed to visit each other and to sleep together. Four of the children were also sold in Quebec, as were Timothy Whidden and Mary Holmes. The captives in that city were exchanged within a year, and returned to their homes. Mr. Whidden and Miss Holmes were afterwards united in marriage.

FANNY NOBLE, the principal subject of this memoir, at the time of her captivity, was about thirteen months old. She was carried by a party of Indians to Montreal. In their attempts to dispose of her, they took her one day to the house of Monsieur Louis St. Auge Charlee, an eminent merchant of that place, who was at that time on a journey to Quebec. His lady was called into the kitchen by one of her maids to see a

poor infant crawling on the tile floor in dirt and rags, picking apple peelings out of the cracks. She came in, and on kindly noticing the child, Fanny immediately caught hold of the lady's gown, wrapped it over her head, and burst into tears. The lady could not easily resist this appeal to her compassion. She took up the child, who clung about her neck and repeatedly embraced her. The Indians offered to sell her their little captive, but she declined buying, not choosing probably in the absence of her husband to venture on such a purchase. The Indians left the house, and slept that night on the pavements before the door. Fanny, who had again heard the voice of kindness, to which she had not been accustomed from her savage masters, could not be quiet, but disturbed the slumbers and touched the heart of the French lady by her incessant cries. This lady had then lately lost a child by death, and was perhaps more quick to feel for the sufferings of children, and more disposed to love them, than she would otherwise have been. Early the next morning the Indians were called into the house; Fanny was purchased, put into a tub of water, and having been thoroughly washed, was dressed in the clothes of the deceased child, and put to bed. She awoke smiling, and seemed desirous of repaying her mistress' kindness by her infantile prattle and fond caresses. Fanny could never learn for what price she was bought of the Indians, as her French mother declined answering her questions upon that subject, telling her to be a good girl, and be thankful that she was not still in their power.

Mons. and Mad. St. Auge took a lively interest in their little captive, and treated her with much tenderness and affection. She felt for them a filial attachment. When her parents were exchanged, her mother, on her return home, called upon Fanny, and took the child in her arms, but no instinct taught her to rejoice in the maternal embrace, and she fled for protection to her French mamma. Mrs. Noble received many presents from the French lady, and had the satisfaction to see that her little daughter was left in affectionate hands.

Fanny was taught to call and consider Mons. and Mad. St. Auge as her parents. They had her baptized by the name of Eleanor, and educated her in the Roman Catholic religion. She learned her Pater Nosters and Ave Marias, went to mass, crossed herself with holy water, and told her beads with great devotion.

When four or five years old, she was enticed away from her French parents by Wheelwright, who had been employed by the government of Massachusetts to seek for captives in Canada. He carried her to the Three Rivers, where he had sev

eral other captives, and left her, as he pretended, with a relation of her French father's for a few days, when she expected to return to Montreal. But she had not been to the Three Rivers more than twenty-four hours, when the old squaw who had sold her to Mad. St. Auge came along in a sleigh, accompanied by a young sanop, seized upon Fanny, and carried her to St. Francois, where they kept her about a fortnight. She had now attained an age when she would be sensible of her misfortunes, and bitterly lamented her separation from her French parents. The Indians endeavored to pacify and please her by drawing on her coat or frock the figures of deers, wolves, bears, fishes, &c.; and once, probably to make her look as handsomely as themselves, they painted her cheeks in the Indian fashion, which very much distressed her, and the old squaw made them wipe off the paint. At one time she got away from the savages, and sought refuge in the best-looking house in the village, which belonged to a French priest, who kissed her, asked her many questions, and treated her kindly, but gave her up to the claim of her Indian masters. While at St. Francois, her brother, Joseph Noble, who had not been sold to the French, but still lived with the Indians, came to see her, but she had a great aversion to him. He was in his Indian dress, and she would not believe him to be a relation, or speak to him if she could avoid it. She was at last turned back by the Indians to Montreal, and to her great satisfaction was delivered to her French father, who rewarded the Indians for returning her. It was doubtless the expectation of much reward which induced the old squaw to seize her at the Three Rivers, as the Indians not unfrequently stole back captives, in order to extort presents for their return from the French gentlemen to whom the same captives had before been sold. Before this time she had been hastily carried from Montreal, hurried over mountains and across waters, and concealed among flags, while those who accompanied her were evidently pursued, and in great apprehension of being overtaken; but the occasion of this flight or its incidents she was too young to understand or distinctly to remember, and she was unable afterwards to satisfy herself whether her French father conveyed her away to keep her out of the reach of her natural friends, or whether she was taken by those friends, and afterwards retaken as at the Three Rivers and returned to Montreal. The French parents cautiously avoided informing her upon this subject, or upon any other which should remind her of her captivity, her country, her parents or her friends, lest she should become discontented with her situation, and desirous of leaving those who had adopted her. They kept her secreted from