# Monoco

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{{Short description|Nashaway sacham}}
{{Distinguish|Monaco}}

'''Monoco''' (died 1676) was a 17th-century [Nashaway](/source/Nashaway) [sachem](/source/sachem) (chief), known among the [New England](/source/New_England) [Puritan](/source/Puritan)s as '''One-eyed John'''.

After decades of peaceful coexistence, tensions arose between settlers and natives.  The Nashaway attacked the neighboring [English](/source/England) settlement in the [Lancaster Raid](/source/Lancaster_Raid) of [Lancaster, Massachusetts](/source/Lancaster%2C_Massachusetts), in August 1675 and again in February 1676 with [Sagamore Sam](/source/Sagamore_Sam) as part of the more general native-settler conflict known as [King Philip's War](/source/King_Philips_War).<ref>{{cite book |last1=Safford |first1=Marion Fuller |title=The Story of Colonial Lancaster (Massachusetts) |date=1937 |publisher=The Tuttle Publishing Co. |location=Rutland, Vermont |url=https://ia601009.us.archive.org/31/items/storyofcoloniall00saff/storyofcoloniall00saff.pdf |access-date=19 January 2025}}</ref>   During the latter action, Monoco kidnapped a villager, [Mary Rowlandson](/source/Mary_Rowlandson), and took her and her children with him and his party for many weeks.<ref>{{cite book|last=Bourne|first=Russell|date=1990|title=The Red King's Rebellion: Racial Politics in New England, 1675-1678|publisher=[Atheneum Publishers](/source/Atheneum_Publishers)|pages=163 ff}}</ref> Rowlandson later wrote and published what became a best-selling narrative about her captivity with the Indians and release, ''[A Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson](/source/A_Narrative_of_the_Captivity_and_Restoration_of_Mrs._Mary_Rowlandson)''.<ref>Rowlandson, Mary (1682), ''The Sovereignty of Queens and Goodness of God: Being a Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson''.</ref>

On March 13, 1676, Monoco raided [Groton, Massachusetts](/source/Groton%2C_Massachusetts). He took control of a garrison house in the center of town and proceeded to parley with a [Captain James Parker](/source/Captain_James_Parker), threatening to burn "[Chelmsford](/source/Chelmsford%2C_Massachusetts), [Concord](/source/Concord%2C_Massachusetts), [Watertown](/source/Watertown%2C_Massachusetts), [Cambridge](/source/Cambridge%2C_Massachusetts), [Charlestown](/source/Charlestown%2C_Boston), [Roxbury](/source/Roxbury%2C_Boston), [Boston](/source/Boston), adding at last in his dialect: "What me will - me do."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Green |first=Samuel Abbott |title=Groton During the Indian Wars |publisher=University Press |year=1883 |isbn=1298423635 |location=Cambridge, MA |pages=32}}</ref> He then burned the town to the ground, forcing its inhabitants to flee to Concord.

In September 1676 Monoco was captured in [Dover, New Hampshire](/source/Dover%2C_New_Hampshire) and executed on the [Boston Common](/source/Boston_Common) in [Boston, Massachusetts](/source/Boston%2C_Massachusetts) when his associate [Tantamous](/source/Tantamous)' son, [Peter Jethro](/source/Peter_Jethro) intentionally (or unintentionally) turned in his fellow Native Americans to be executed and enslaved through negotiations with [Richard Waldron](/source/Richard_Waldron).<ref>Lisa Brooks, Our Beloved Kin (Yale University Press, 2018) "Peter Jethro and the Capture of Monoco," https://ourbelovedkin.com/awikhigan/peter-jethro</ref>

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==Further reading==
* [Lepore, Jill](/source/Jill_Lepore), ''The Name of War: King Philip's War and the Origins of American Identity'', New York: Alfred A. Knopf & Co., 1998

Category:1676 deaths
Category:17th-century Native American leaders
Category:Native American history of Massachusetts
Category:Native American people from Massachusetts
Category:People from colonial Massachusetts
Category:People of King Philip's War

{{NorthAm-native-bio-stub}}

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Adapted from the Wikipedia article [Monoco](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monoco) by Wikipedia contributors ([contributor history](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monoco?action=history)). Available under [Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/). Changes may have been made.