f the
village, which they approached early in the afternoon of the twelfth.
In the belief that some of the Indians would be in their cornfields on
the river above, Harmon, who was in command, divided the force, and
moved up the river with about eighty men, while Moulton, with as many
more, made for the village, advancing through the forest with all
possible silence. About three o'clock he and his men emerged from a
tangle of trees and bushes, and saw the Norridgewock cabins before them,
no longer enclosed with a stockade, but open and unprotected. Not an
Indian was stirring, till at length a warrior came out from one of the
huts, saw the English, gave a startled war-whoop, and ran back for his
gun. Then all was dismay and confusion. Squaws and children ran
screaming for the river, while the warriors, fifty or sixty in number,
came to meet the enemy. Moulton ordered his men to reserve their fire
till the Indians had emptied their guns. As he had foreseen, the excited
savages fired wildly, and did little or no harm. The English, still
keeping their ranks, returned a volley with deadly effect. The Indians
gave one more fire, and then ran for the river. Some tried to wade to
the farther side, the water being low; others swam across, while many
jumped into their canoes, but could not use them, having left the
paddles in their houses. Moulton's men followed close, shooting the
fugitives in the water or as they climbed the farther bank.

When they returned to the village they found Rale in one of the houses,
firing upon some of their comrades who had not joined in the pursuit.
He presently wounded one of them, on which a lieutenant named Benjamin
Jaques burst open the door of the house, and, as he declared, found the
priest loading his gun for another shot. The lieutenant said further
that he called on him to surrender, and that Rale replied that he would
neither give quarter nor take it; on which Jaques shot him through the
head.[264] Moulton, who had given orders that Rale should not be killed,
doubted this report of his subordinate so far as concerned the language
used by Rale, though believing that he had exasperated the lieutenant by
provoking expressions of some kind. The old chief Mogg had shut himself
up in another house, from which he fired and killed one of Moulton's
three Mohawks, whose brother then beat in the door and shot the chief
dead. Several of the English followed, and brutally murdered Mogg's
squaw and his