United States History I- Honors
Summer 2014
Reading Assignment
The Unredeemed Captive: A Family Story from Early America
By John Demos
A Reader’s Introduction
For most of you, John Demos’s The Unredeemed Captive will be a new experience in
reading history. Most of your historical reading and learning to this point in your
education has emphasized significant periods of social, political and economic
change often with a focus on famous personalities and leaders, and that’s a good
thing! You need to understand the basic overview of a historical period before you
can zoom in and dig more deeply into its importance and significance. Thus, you
will need to read the assigned pages in your Foner text before you start The
Unredeemed Captive.
As John Demos states in the title, The Unredeemed Captive is a family story. The
members of the Williams family of early eighteenth-century Deerfield,
Massachusetts were not very well known outside of their small frontier town and
would have been largely forgotten today if historian John Demos had not decided to
reach back 300 years and tell their story. So, why write about them? Why read
about them?
The Unredeemed Captive is a prime example of what many historians now call
“micro-history.” This type of history focuses on investigating relatively minor,
lesser-known people and events, in this case the Williams family of Deerfield and
the terrible ordeal they endured. In a micro-history, the historian uses the stories of
people like the Williams family to open up an entire period of the past for
questioning and to investigate it on a deeper, more personal level that increases our
understanding of the human experience and the social environment from which
modern America developed.
Questions for Understanding the Text
While you read The Unredeemed Captive you may find it helpful to keep your
Foner notes and these questions close at hand. These resources will guide
your understanding of the book, the time period and the opening lessons in
September.
What were the basic differences in the various places where Demos states that the
story begins?
What were the reasons that the French and Mohawks attacked the town of Deerfield
and took so many captives?
What factors determined why some of the English captives were killed and others
survived?
How did the Reverend John Williams use his religious beliefs to understand the
events of the Deerfield attack?
Are there any connections between Williams’s religious thinking and the description
of Puritanism in your Brinkley text?
What were the main differences in how the French and English viewed and treated
the Indians?
How and why was warfare in the North American wilderness different from warfare
in Europe during this period?
Create an overview of how the Indians at Kahnawake lived from the following
questions. What were their family and clan structures and relationships? In what
sort of houses did they live? What roles were assigned to men and women at
Kahnawake? What were their responsibilities?
How does Demos keep the story moving when he lacks direct documentary
evidence? Provide one example and explain.
Describe the importance of trade between the French, English and Iroquois. Where
is the Champlain Valley and what two trade centers did it connect?
How did Eunice Williams’s attitude toward her family in Massachusetts change over
time?