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ConflictNorth America

King Philip's War

1675 – 1678

Proportionally the bloodiest war in American history

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In depth

The Wampanoag are the people who lived where Plymouth was founded, and who had for fifty years lived alongside the colonists. Metacom was the son of Massasoit, who had made the agreement that let Plymouth survive. The war ended a fifty-year period of negotiated coexistence and established displacement instead as the normal form in New England. It is also where a particular idea took hold: that Indigenous people and colonists could not share a landscape. Thousands of captives were sold into slavery in the Caribbean.

For children

The Wampanoag leader Metacom, called King Philip by the English, led an uprising against the New England colonies. Measured against population it is the deadliest war ever fought on American soil — more than half the towns in New England were attacked.

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Part of Terra Saga — the story of Earth on a timeline. terrasaga.org · Last changed 2026-08-16