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Encyclopedia entry: King Philip's War
- Article from:
- The Oxford Companion to American Military History
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Copyright© The Oxford Companion to American Military History 2000, originally published by Oxford University Press 2000. (Hide copyright information)
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King Philip's War
(1675–77).The first large‐scale military action in the American colonies, King Philip's War pitted bands from various tribes against the New England colonists and their Indian allies. The causes of the war were rooted in the frictions between an expanding, assertive culture and a threatened, increasingly dependent one. Native Americans, whose currency (wampum) was losing value, had to sell land to acquire trade goods. Tribal leaders also resented the imposition of European authority and the decline of their own power. Indians had other grievances as well.
The war began in Plymouth Colony in 1675, then spread throughout New England. Although colonists blamed ...