Settler Colonialism

“May we not observe here one reason of God's transplanting some of his people into this wilderness, that they might be instrumental to carry his name and gospel unto some of these heathen?”

Daniel Gookin, Historical Collections of the Indians in New England

The denial of Native cultivation of the land is just one hallmark of settler colonialism.

Settler Colonialism

A structured form of colonialism that seeks to replace existing populations with a new society.

The tactics of settler colonialism range from warfare and genocide to “legal” land appropriation and assimilation. Settler colonialism in New England included all of these tactics, but began primarily with land encroachment. English methods of land encroachment in the earliest period of settlement were numerous.

Method 1: Spoil the Land

The English set their livestock free to graze and root unchecked, destroying Native planting grounds and other cultivated ecosystems in the process. When Native people protested, settlers insisted that Native villages be fenced to keep the livestock out. This practice made desirable land unusable for Native people while forcing them to confine their surviving spaces within fencing, leaving adjacent lands “free” to be claimed. This demonstrates that even as the English claimed New England was wilderness, they understood how important cultivation of the land was to Native subsistence.

Method 2: Force Debt

As soon as the English obtained any kind of written agreement from Native people, they interpreted it as Native subservience and acceptance of the English legal system. Native participants, for their part, agreed to alliances often with little understanding that this was the case.

After obtaining these agreements, English settlers forced allied Native individuals into debt, often through fraudulent means such as false imprisonment. These debts were imposed with full knowledge that the Indigenous population rarely kept English money, thus forcing them to pay in an equivalent value of land.

Method 3: Assimilate and Consolidate

The precursor to the modern Indian Reservation can be found in 17th century Praying Towns, English-style villages established by Reverend John Eliot for the conversion of local Algonquian groups, including the Nipmuc, to Christianity. Establishing these spaces allowed the English to supplant Native culture with their own and consolidate large groups of Indigenous populations within borders that the English defined themselves. The Native people who inhabited these towns were referred to as "Praying Indians."

The land that is now Framingham had many of these Towns nearby: Natick, Magunkaquog (Ashland), Hassanamesit (Grafton), and Okommakamesit (Marlborough).

No matter how subtle, all tactics of settler colonialism are inherently violent, as they are driven by a philosophy of replacement and dispossession.

Nipmuc Land Deed, 1656

FHC Collections, LD105

This 1656 land deed transfers ownership of “a parcell of Broaken up and ffenced in land” near the Saxonville Falls from five Nipmuc men — William Boman, Captain Josiah (Pennahannit), Roger, James, and Keaquisam — to English settler John Stone. The men were former residents of the land in question, once a Nipmuc village and planting grounds.

Because the document notes the land was fenced, we know that it had already been encroached upon by English livestock. It is possible that the men who made this sale were looking to get some benefit from an abandoned settlement that had already been rendered unusable.

Click on the document to read a transcription.

In the face of encroachment methods, Native people had 3 choices: cede, share, or resist. Each person made their own choices for complex individual reasons which did not preclude changing one’s approach in the future.