Mary+Rowlandson



Mary Rowlandson was born in England in early 1600s. She was brought to the colonies when she was a toddler. Her father had became a founder of Lancaster, in Massachusetts bay colony. Mary was born one out of ten children to John and Joan White. Mary got married in 1656 to Joseph Rowlandson. He was a recent graduate at Harvard College and he became a minister in Lancaster. Their Garrison house was focused on an Indian Attack during King Philip War because their location was nearest to town. Mary was captured along with her three children while her husband was away in Boston to convince the Colonies leaders to provide military protection for the town that the Indians attacked in February 10, 1676. Her six year old child was wounded during the surrender. They was taken to the west and north.
 * Biography**

Mary brought back Mt. Wachusettes area of Massachusettes. She was redeemed by John Hoar. Mary Rowlandson published her narrative of her being captured in 1682. It became America's best seller. In that time, it was very unusual for a woman to publish a book. As she was writing her book, she decribed about the indians life first hand. The King Philips War was the bloodiest war to this day.

Mary was miserable when she got captured. She had to eat things that she did not want to eat. She did not want to eat but she had to in order for her to survive. Her stomach got to where she did not want anything to eat. She would eat horse leg broth. She met some woman that gave her food to eat. The woman gave her piece of bear. She did not have no way to boil it, so the woman let her boil it and she also gave her groundnuts. Mary would buy food from her.

This is where Mary Rowlandson and her kids was captured. When her daughter Sarah died, Mary would lay there beside her. They put her in the woods in the middle of no where. When she was captured by the Indians, she had to sew and knit for them as they captured other people. She had returned to Princeton, Massachusettes on May 2, 1676. Soon after, her surviving two children was released. Their house was destroyed from the attack, so they moved to Boston. Joseph Rowlandson was called to a congregation in Wethersfield, Connecticut, in 1677. He preached a sermon on his wife's capture in 1678. Joseph died suddenly three days later.

Mary Rowlandson married Captain Samuel Talcott. No detail of her life are known except court testimony in 1707, her husbands death in 1691 and her own death on Janurary 11, 1710.

Quotes from Mary Rowlandson:

"Thus these murderous wretches went on, burning, and destroying before them"

"God seemed to leave his people to themselves, and order all things for His own holy ends....It is the Lord's doing,and it should be marvelous in our eyes"

"I trembled to hear him, yet I was fain to go to him, and he drank to me, showing no incivility"

"Now hath God fulfilled that precious Scripture which was such a comfort to my distessed condition"