Miss S. E. Chapin
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just made to the Merrimack river, swooped down upon the sleeping settlers on that morning just before the light, so suddenly and so impetuously, that but feeble resistence could be made, and the whole settlement, nineteen in all, were either killed or driven out as captives. One of the houses, that of Benoni Jones, was somewhat fortified, but they rushed upon it, fired on the inmates, set fire to the dwelling, and all in so fierce a manner that they could do nothing but fall into their hands.
The two Janes families were almost annihilated, Samuel, his wife and three children, and four children of Benjamin Janes being killed. The latter and his wife were taken along as captives. Mr. Janes, loaded down with a bed-tick load of pork contrived to fall behind and disappear out of sight in the bushes, then dashed across a ravine there, ran to the water, and seizing a skiff, which he probably knew was there, rowed across the overflowed meadows to Northampton, where he told the dreadful story. A company of horsemen, led by Captain John Taylor, started at once to intercept the inhuman savages, and if possible rescue the captives. They came through Pomeroy Meadow near the present road leading from Easthampton to Westhampton, and passed on south to the present Westfield Road. Here they encountered the Indians, who finding they were pursued, killed in a most atrocious manner all the boys they had taken, excepting Elisha Searle, son of John Searle. This youth, witnessing the fate of the others, seized up a pack, and ran on, as if to show that he would serve them if they would spare his life, and he was not killed.
Captain Taylor, quite in advance of his men, and exposed to the onslaught of the Indians, probably in ambush, fell dead at their first firing, thus adding another to the list of dead that sad day. The wife of Benjamin Janes was carried to the top of Pomeroy Mountain, knocked in the head, scalped, and probably left for dead, but she was not killed. She was found by the rescuing party and carried on a litter to Northampton, where she recovered and lived many years. The wife of John Searle, wounded in the head with a tomahawk, scalped and left for dead, also recovered, married again and lived to be ninety-three years old.
Not until eleven years later was Pascommuck again settled, but "Pascommuck and Bartlett's Mills were the nuclei of Easthampton."
The first settler on the plain was Sergeant Ebenezer Corse, who laid out the present Main Street by cutting a road through the wilderness
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