Hen, together with an Indian, was slain in Stafford County, by a party
of the hostile tribe of Doegs, and the victims were found by the people
on their way to church.[284:C] Colonel Mason and Captain Brent, with
some militia, pursued the offenders about twenty miles up the river, and
then across into Maryland, and, coming upon two parties of armed
warriors, slaughtered indiscriminately a number of them and of the
Susquehannocks, a friendly tribe. These latter, recently expelled from
their own country, at the head of the Chesapeake Bay, by the Senecas, a
tribe of the Five Nations, now sought refuge in a fort of the
Piscataways, a friendly tribe near the head of the Potomac, supposed to
be near the spot where now stands the City of Washington. In a short
time several Marylanders were murdered by the savages, and some
Virginians in the County of Stafford. The fort on the north bank of the
Piscataway consisted of high earth-works having flankers pierced with
loop-holes, and surrounded by a ditch. This again was encircled by a row
of tall trees from five to eight inches in diameter, set three feet in
the earth and six inches apart, and wattled in such a manner as to
protect those within, and, at the same time, to afford them apertures
for shooting through. It was probably an old fort erected by Maryland as
a protection to the frontier, but latterly unoccupied. The
Susquehannocks, to the number of one hundred warriors, with their old
men, women, and children, entrenched themselves in this stronghold.
Toward the end of September they were besieged by a thousand men from
Virginia and Maryland, united in a joint expedition, at the instance of
the latter. The Marylanders were commanded by Major Thomas Truman, the
Virginians by Colonel John Washington.[285:A] John Washington had
emigrated from Yorkshire, England, to Virginia in 1657, and purchased
lands in Westmoreland. Not long after, being, as has been conjectured, a
surveyor, he made a location of lands, which, however, was set aside
until the Indians, to whom these lands had been assigned, should vacate
them. In the year 1667 he was a member of the house of burgesses.[285:B]

To return to the siege: six of the Indian chiefs were sent out from the
fort on a parley proposed by Major Truman. These chiefs, on being
interrogated, laid the blame of the recent outrages perpetrated in
Virginia and Maryland upon the Senecas. Colonel Washington, Colonel
Mason, and Major Adderton now cam