August 2, 1689, dawned bright and clear on the southern coast of Maine. A respected colonial farmer named Thomas Gyles led his three sons out of Fort Charles to begin gathering the harvest from their fields three miles upriver from the fort. Other men and boys from the fort were laboring in the surrounding fields. All morning the father and his three boys labored quietly, and then stopped to eat their lunch together.

Suddenly, the quiet afternoon was shattered by the booming of cannon from Fort Charles! Mr. Gyles assured his sons that the cannon were probably signaling good news from other parts of the colony.

But this false assurance was short-lived. Terrible howling arose from the bushes, followed by a volley of shots. Then fierce, unfriendly Indians rushed out of the woods!

Some of the men, including Mr. Gyles, quickly seized their guns. They put up a determined resistance. But the few colonists were overwhelmed by nearly forty Indian warriors. In moments, the fight was over. The bodies of both men and boys lay scattered about on the bloody ground.

One lad, John Gyles, was unarmed, as he had no knife or farming implement with which to defend himself. As such, he was pursued by a stout warrior brandishing a cutlass! As he fled, the boy tripped and fell to the ground. Any moment he expected a fatal blow! But the boy was surprised when his pursuer grabbed him by the arm and roughly lifted him to his feet.

John Gyles became part of a small band of captives which the Indians had gathered up from neighboring fields. Among those captured, John saw his own father, bleeding from multiple wounds. Mr. Gyles was pale and weak from loss of blood, but he rejoiced to see his son John alive.

The dying father asked the Indians if he might be permitted to pray with his son. John noticed that blood was seeping from his father’s shoes as he began to pray. Committing young John into the hands of God Almighty, he asked the Lord to protect his son and guide him through life until the day they would be reunited again in glory.

With tears streaming down his face, John watched as the Indians dragged his dying father into the bushes and dispatched him with their hatchets. John remembered hearing the crushing blows. He later related that his father had died courageously, without a shriek or a groan.

Later the same day as the field massacre, John encountered his mother and two younger sisters. They had been captured during the attack on Fort Charles. Two of his brothers were taken at the same time as he was, but his older brothers were unaware of the fate of their youngest brother. John told his mother of his father’s death, and she burst into tears at the heartbreaking news.

Soon the Indians separated the captured Gyles family. It was the last time John saw his mother. Upon parting, she urged him to be faithful to the God of his fathers.

For six long years, John Gyles lived with his captors in the vast interior of Maine. He learned to live on fish, wild grapes, and roots. At first, he was barbarously tortured by the Indians. Young Gyles also saw the Indians torture to death some of his fellow captives. He watched in horror as one old squaw threw a shovel filled with burning embers onto the bosom of an Englishman. Young captive Gyles saw men and other boys beaten on their backs and shoulders until blood ran from their mouths and they died.

But God was merciful to John Gyles. By God’s grace, he found favor in the eyes of his Indian master. Gyles learned to hunt moose with the warriors of the tribe and to spear salmon in the streams. He learned to observe the habits of the porcupine and the beaver, and he was one of the first Englishman to describe the wolverine in detail.

The only shirt that John had was the shirt he was wearing the day he was captured. Once this shirt became ragged, he dressed like the Indians. He ate their food, learned their language, and eventually earned their trust. But Gyles always kept in his heart the Scriptures that he had been taught as a boy. He despised the paganism of the Indian religion, and he shuddered in horror to witness their pow-wows.

Six years after his capture, Gyles’s Indian master died. Next, he was sold to a Frenchman. For the first time in years, John Gyles was given a linen shirt and a Frenchman’s cap.

Because the former captive could not speak a word of French, his new master addressed him in the Indian language. A Jesuit priest tried in vain to convert Gyles by communicating with him in the Indian tongue. When Gyles was called by the priest to make a confession, the young man remembered his mother’s final charge and answered the priest resolutely that no man could grant forgiveness. Instead, he would confess his sins to God alone.

After three years in the service of the Frenchman, an English military expedition brought hope of release. Gyles had several opportunities to run away and join the English soldiers, but he had experienced such kindness from his French master and his wife that he could not desert them in an hour of danger. Gyles’s French master was away from home at the time of the expedition, and his wife was alone with two young children. Wisely, Gyles stayed with the French lady and protected her and her little children from any harm. In response to his kindness and faithfulness as a servant, the French woman promised him liberty as soon as her husband returned.

When the French master returned and heard the account of Gyles’s faithfulness, he honored his wife’s promise. John Gyles was released! He was given liberty to board a Scottish trading vessel that was going down the river toward the sea and eventually to Boston.

On June 19, 1698, nine years after his captivity, Gyles sailed into the harbor at Boston. Upon his arrival, a young man came aboard the ship and began asking Gyles many questions about his captivity and his parents. Eventually, the young man revealed to Gyles that he was his younger brother! He had escaped from the Indians on that fateful day of the massacre. Now he came bearing news about the rest of the family. Their mother eventually had been released from captivity. However, she died not long after her release. One of their brothers had been tortured to death by the Indians. But John Gyles had two other brothers and two sisters who were still alive! With joy and gratitude, the united brothers and sisters enjoyed a tearful reunion.

Gyles married, raised a family of his own, and lived to an advanced old age. In later years, he was asked by his children and grandchildren to write down the story of his captivity as a testimony to “the goodness of God” in a time of “extreme difficulties.”

John Gyles left us with an example of faithful reliance upon a faithful God in times of trouble. He closed his account with these words, “May the most powerful and beneficent Being accept of this public testimony of it, and bless my experiences to excite others to confide in His all-sufficiency, through the infinite merits of Jesus Christ.”

Sources and Further Reference:

Gyles, John. Nine Years a Captive. Part Three of a three-part volume titled Captive: Classic Captivity Narratives from the American Colonial Period, edited by R. A. Sheats. Parker, CO: Generations, 2022.