Mary Rowlandson’s “A Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson’s”
... garrison was known as a basic house, usually only one story high with two rooms consisting of a center hall and a parlor, and a central chimney. Can you imagine how crowded this small home was back then, with over thirty people living under one roof! Rowlandson’s captivity narrative clearly gives us an understanding and connection of early America. With these images that she has pointed out so vividly, gives us her readers the opportunity to vision what her adventure was like without even being there, or to face the imminent danger in the region that surrounded her. In her narrative she tells us” now away we must go with those Barbarous Creatures, with our bodies wounded and bleeding, and our hearts no less than our bodies” (63). All of her talk about barbarous creatures, beasts and evil helps us to understand the way the new world was as a vast, uncivilized wilderness with danger and threats to destroy the Puritans. She relates “ I had often before this said , that if the Indians should come, I should chuse rather to be killed by them than taken alive, but when it came to the tryal, my mind changed. I chose to go along with those (as I may say) ravenous Beasts, then that moment to end my dayes (63). On her first day of being captured February 10th, 1675 not one of the thirty-seven people that lived in Rowlandson’s house (garrison), escaped from the Indians. Rowlandson explains that none escaped either present death, or a bitter captivity, save only one, who might say as he, Job1.15” (63). During Rowlandson’s captivity there were thirteen killed and twenty-four of her people held captive. Rowlandson’s flight with the Indians took her to the Connecticut River to Vermont and on to New Hampshire. The next morning when Mary was put upon a saddle less horse with her wounded child moaning in her arms she says ” I went with a very heavy heart, and down I sat with the picture of death in my lap”(65). Later that night Mary’s six-year-old child Sarah dies. “Lambe departed this life, on February 18, 1675” (65). Rowlandson then carefully guides her readers through her sorrowfulness and unhappiness over the loss of her child. From my personal experience, I must say that I do not think that Mary ever fully recovered from the death of her child. Watching a child die slowly in front of you and in your arms would definitely put me over the edge. My second born son died at birth and although he did not suffer as Mary’s child did, it took me five years to even mention a word about him with dropping a tear. The grief and emptiness still stays within my heart and most likely will for the rest of my life. Rowlandson was not allowed basic practices of her religion. When the Sabbath came, she told them it was the Sabbath and she desired them to let her rest. Mary then makes an offered to Indians that she promises to work twice as hard the next day to make up any loss of work. Her work for the Indians demanded her knitting, sewing and cooking skills. The Indians deny her request and tell her if she stops her work to read her bible, that they would break her face. Throughout the readings, Mary then guides her read...