NIANTIC

Niantic (Nehantic, Niantique) - signifies "at a point of land on a (tidal) river or estuary"

The Eastern and the Western Niantic were parts of one original tribe split in two perhaps by the Pequot

Eastern Niantic

LOCATION

The western coast of Rhode Island and neighboring coast of Connecticut

VILLAGE

Wekapaug

HISTORY

Eastern Niantic were closely connected with the Narraganset, but they refused to join them in King Philip's war and at its close the remnants of the Narraganset were settled among them

Western Niantic

LOCATION

On the seacoast from Niantic Bay to Connecticut River

VILLAGES

Niantic (Nehantucket), Old Lyme, Oswegatchie

HISTORY

1600 - population was at 600

1634 - Western Niantic warriors killed John Stone, a Boston trader (more accurately described as a pirate and slaver), near the mouth of the Connecticut River

1637 - were nearly destroyed in the Pequot war and at its close were placed under the control of the Mohegan

1638 - population was at 100

1655 - Mohegan's treatment of the Pequot and Western Niantic had become so harsh that the English, who usually were not inclined towards sympathy in these matters, removed the Pequot to separate locations in eastern Connecticut and some of the Western Niantic went with them

1761 - population was at 85

1788 - many joined the Brotherton Indians

1809 - a small village of Niantic was reported as existing near Danbury, but this perhaps contained remnants of the tribes of western Connecticut

1928 - Speck found several Indians of mixed Niantic-Mohegan descent living with the Mohegan remnant, descendants of a pure-blood Niantic woman from the mouth of Niantic River

©2001
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