PEQUOT derived from pekawatawog, pequttoog, or Paquatanog, meaning 'destroyer' or 'invader'. A New England Algonquin tribe, which came from the upper Hudson River in New York, near Lake Champlain. Around the year 1500 they moved into the Thames River Valley in southeastern Connecticut. It was massacred in 1637 by English settlers in alliance with the Mohegan tribes (who were Pequots who separated in 1634) and the Narragansett. They were between 12000 and 15000 but epidemics of bubonic plague, hepatitis A and smallpox decimated and weakened them, leaving about 3000 to 5000. John Manson, in an act of revenge killed between 300 and 700, including children, women and the elderly, of whom only 300 were warriors. About 1000 were turned into slaves and 500 of them were sold in the West Indies and the Caribbean and the rest scattered among other tribes. It is forbidden to name them by their origin. It took 350 years to be repaired and get some land. Today there are only two groups, the Mashantucket, who have formed the Mashantucket Pequot Nation, and live in Connecticut.
