Gravesite: Rev. John Williams: Deerfield, MA

Rev. John Williams

Old Deerfield Burying Ground

Deerfield, MA

N 42° 32.708 W 072° 36.597

Short Description: 

Rev. John Wiliams who wrote the account of the 1704 Raid on Deerfield is buried near, in front and to the left,  his wife Eunice in the Old Deerfield Burying Ground

Long Description:

On February 29, 1704, During the  Queen Anne's War,  a party of French and Indians destroyed the settlement of Deerfield,   killed many inhabitants, and carried the rest into captivity. Rev. John Williams' two youngest children John (6) and Jersuha (6 weeks) were killed in the raid. Williams, his wife Eunice, and five of his children were captured: Samuel (15), Esther (13), Stephen (9), Eunice (8), and Warham (4). Williams' wife, weakened by recent childbirth and unable to continue, was murdered by the Indians on March 1, 1704 at the crossing of the Green River. John Williams was ransomed in 1706 and returned to Massachusetts to write the story of his capture and release and of  Eunice, his daughter, who refused to return and lived out the rest of her life with the Indians.

The brownstone gravestone of Rev. John Williams is inscribed:

Here lyes ye Body of the

Rev. Mr. John Williams

The Beloved & Faithfull

Pastor of this place: Who

dyed on June ye 12th 1729

In the 65th Year of his age.

Rev.14:13 Write Blessed

are ye Dead, which die

in the Lord.