For one winter night in the early years of the 18th century, the English settlement of Deerfield in the colony of Massachusetts became the scene of violent clashing among European colonial empires, diverse Native American nations, and personal visions and ambitions. This attack came to symbolize English struggles in the settling of America.

In the pre-dawn hours of February 29, 1704, came the flash of fire, the smell of gunpowder, and the shouts of attackers and their victims as 47 French Canadian soldiers and 200 Abenaki, Penacook, Kanien’kehaka (Mohawk), and Wendat (Huron) allies attacked Deerfield. What brought this diverse group to the site of the little village between the Deerfield and Connecticut Rivers on this snow-covered night? What caused the violence that raged through the palisade and resulted in the death of 44 residents and the capture of 109 others, more than half the total population?

The attack on Deerfield was a complicated event. What started as a European struggle spread to the colonies as England and France vied for political and commercial control of North America. Between 1689 and 1763 (with a peaceful interlude 1714-1744), France and England and their Indigenous allies fought a series of wars, known collectively as the “French and Indian Wars” or the “Colonial Wars.” The 1704 attack on Deerfield was one of a series of battles in what was known in Europe as the “War of Spanish Succession.” As part of this conflict, England and France fought Queen Anne’s War (1703-1713), struggling for control of North America. The 1704 attack was an effort by the French and their allies to halt the gradual expansion of English settlement up the Connecticut River Valley in Massachusetts. For Indigenous peoples, many of whom had their own agendas in addition to supplying manpower to the French, another motive was to regain their sovereignty by wresting their homelands from the English.

Although the French and English shared certain goals in the colonization of the “new” world, mainly the enrichment of their respective mother countries, there were differences in their methods. England was concerned with placement of its excess population and in securing the flow of raw materials back to the homeland. In addition, they expected the colonists to bolster England’s economy with demands for manufactured goods. To meet these goals, the colonists were encouraged to bring their families to the new world and establish permanent agricultural settlements. These spread throughout the Northeast and threatened the beaver population, which, in turn, impacted the French.

On the other hand, the French were more concerned with controlling trade routes, with furs being the driving force. Many Frenchmen came to Canada for much-needed financial gain. Although it did not always happen, they expected to work there for a few years and return to France. Their goal was not to settle and raise families in this new land- “New France.”

The lands contested by the French and English were not uninhabited, but were home to a complex web of people with their own histories of both conflict and cooperation- Algonquian peoples lived east of the Hudson River and Iroquoian peoples were to the west of it. Many Indigenous peoples, threatened by the land-taking English, allied themselves with the fur-trading French with whom they often shared political and religious beliefs, if they had been convinced to join the Catholic Church.

These factors influenced the French and their allies to attack on Deerfield on February 29, 1704.