Hannah Dustin

1657–1736

Hannah Dustin
HANNAH DUSTIN BEING CAPTURED BY INDIANS
Hannah Dustin is remembered for her brave defense against a raid of Indians who held her against her will for fifteen days. Assisted by only two companions, she killed her Indian captors and managed to escape back home.

Hannah was living a comfortable life in her colonial Massachusetts home when the settlement was attacked by Abenaki Indians. Her husband and eight children managed to escape, but she, her infant daughter, and her nurse were captured and forcibly taken back to the Indians’ camp. Her daughter was immediately taken and killed against a tree, but Hannah and her nurse were led further north, where they were joined by a 14-year-old captive. After journeying for several days, the natives stopped to rest for the night, and Hannah and her consorts immediately set upon them and killed ten of the twelve present, using the Indians’ own tomahawks as weapons. They traveled downriver back to their hometown, taking the Abenakis’ scalps as proof and to collect a bounty for their deed. They were rewarded for killing the raiders, and Hannah was later immortalized in literature by both Cotton Mather and Henry David Thoreau.


Key events during the life of Hannah Dustin:


Year
Event
1657
Born in colonial New England
1697
Haverhill, MA was attacked by Abenaki Indians; Hannah was captured
  Hannah killed and scalped Indians before returning home
1702
Magnalia Christi Americana was published, featuring the story of her bravery
1736
Died
1874
Monument was erected in memory of her

Other Resources


Story Links
Book Links
Hannah Dustin  in  America First—100 Stories from Our History  by  Lawton B. Evans
Indians on the Warpath  in  Story of the Thirteen Colonies  by  H. A. Guerber


Image Links


For fifteen days the Indians required Mrs. Dustin and
 in America First—100 Stories from Our History


Contemporary
Short Biography
Madeline de Vercheres Fended off a tribe of Indians attacking her for when she was only fourteen.
Cotton Mather Puritan minister in colonial New England who was a prolific writer and pamphleteer.
William Penn Quaker, and founder of the colony of Pennsylvania.
George Calvert Founded Maryland, with the goal of providing a haven of religous tolerance in the new world.