User:Czar/drafts/Fort Neck

The Battle of Fort Neck is an apocryphal colonial era conflict between Massapequa natives and the colonist soldiers of John Underhill on the south shore of New York's Long Island. Originally believed to have occurred in 1653, historians began to scrutinize its historical evidence in the 20th century. If it did take place, it would have been the only major battle between colonists and natives to take place on Long Island.

Standard account

 * https://archive.org/details/historyoflongisl01thom/page/94/mode/1up
 * https://books.google.com/books?id=ncjfoARAjboC&pg=PA176
 * https://books.google.com/books?id=3JGc8nbaDjEC&pg=PA147
 * https://books.google.com/books?id=Hx98AgAAQBAJ&pg=PA1398

Historiography
In 1942, historian of Long Island indigenous peoples, John H. Morice, published an article doubting aspects of the battle. Citing conflicting accounts, he concluded that the battle took place, if it occurred at all, in 1644 during Kieft's War. While he found historical consensus that the Massapequa people had a fort on the peninsula (neck) south of the present day Massapequa village, and that this stronghold was destroyed by Dutch and English colonists under Captain John Underhill, the historian could not corroborate these events with the circumstances of the battle. Notably, the first historical details were written 150 years after the supposed battle. Long Island historian Paul Bailey simiarlly wrote a manuscript for the Underhill Society of America that denies the battle's existence.

A Dutch colonial manuscript mentions an event in which 120 colonists, some under Underhill's command, march on Hempstead and attack Matsepe, a native village. Scholars disagree on the location of this village, many claiming it was not Fort Neck and some claiming it was in Westchester. The undated account was published in 1647, meaning that any battle would have occurred prior to that date.

An excavation of a nearby site believed to be the burial grounds for the battle's victims found no human remains.

Within 20 years of Morice's article, multiple accounts of Long Island history omitted mention of the battle, with one volume on the History of the Massapequa noting the existence of a fort but doubting the battle.

Legacy
One historian posited that the battle's myth endured by historians romanticizing the idea of courageous settlers fighting natives on Long Island, rather than seeing the event as, more likely, the murder of peaceful indigenous people.

By the mid-20th century, the Town of Oyster Bay had preserved the Massapequa native village area as a public park.