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The Pennacook Indians became part of the Abenaki Nation. First they were their own confederacy. Pennacook means "at the bottom of the hill." They spoke Algonquin. At one time there may have been 12,00 Pennacook Indians. They settled along the Merrimack River.
The Pennacook Confederacy was a unit of Algonquins, centered where modern day Concord is located. A confederacy is a group of tribes helping each other. The Pennacook confederacy was made up of the following tribes: Nashua, the Souhegans, Winnapusakees, Pemigaussets, Piscataquas, and the Syouamscotts. By the seventeenth century, The Pennacook Confederacy was very strong. They had formed a confederacy to protect themselves from other warring tribes.
The head of the Pennacook Indians, which practically meant all of New Hampshire's Indians, was the great Indian, Passaconaway. He was also called "Bashaba", which means he who is greatest in height, greatest in war, greatest in magic and craftiness, and greatest in wisdom. Kancamungus was the Sachem of the Pennacooks, and son of Passaconaway's son. Another great Pennacook Sachem was Wonalancett, Passaconaway's son.
The Pennacooks and European colonists co-existed peacefully for 50 years. In 1784, Jeremy Belknap said, "By such singular means did devine providence prepare the way of the peaceable entrance of the Europeans into this land." By the time of the first English in the territory, there was only a remnant of the Pennacooks all of one language. They had become a part of the Abenaki Confederacy to fight the Europeans.
The last of the "hostile" Pennacooks are believed to have eventually retreated to St. Francis in Quebec, Canada.
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