Hobbamock
Almost nothing is known about Hobomok before he began living with the English settlers who arrived aboard the Mayflower and settled at the location they called Plymouth in December 1620.
Samoset, an Abenaki sachem from the coast region of Maine near the mouth of the Pemaquid River "bodly came" into the Plymouth settlement and greeted the startled men in English.
"[5] Squanto had been living among the English settlers since the establishment of amity between the English and the Pokanoket, and during that time had shown the settlers how to plant maize and other native crops, had acted as their guide and pilot to surrounding areas, facilitated understandings between the colony and its native neighbors and established trade relations with a number of villages.
Both Bradford and Winslow first record Hobomock's actions in connection with a crisis in which Squanto was thought to have been kidnapped and possibly murdered.
As Winslow told the story, word reached Plymouth that the Narragansett had driven Massasoit "from his country" and that a sub-sachem, tributary to Massasoit named Corbitant (written Coubatant by Winslow) (possibly conspiring with them) was at the nearby village of Nemasket attempting to disaffect the people their from their loyalty to Masassoit and attempting to foment hostility against the English and because of the recent peace treaty they made with the natives of Cape Cod, Squanto also because he effected the treaty.
[6] Another Pokanet living among them, Tokamaham, set off to see Massasoit (or perhaps Corbitant, Winslow's account is not clear) but Squanto and Hobomok were afraid.
[7] Bradford's account makes no mention of any threat to Massasoit> He only writes that Hobomok and Squanto returning from "bussines amonge the Indeans" met Corbitant at Nemasket where they began quarreling and Corbitant threatened to stab Hobomok, broke free and came running to Plymouth where he told Bradford that he feared Squanto had been killed, all on account of their friendship to the English.
They determined to send a group of armed men to Nemasket and if it turned out that Squanto had been kill, they would cut off Corbitant's head.
Winslow said that a man and a woman returned with them to be treated, as well as Squanto and Nemasket villagers "offering all helpe that might be by carriage of anything wee had to ease us.
"[12] In January the Narragansett sachem Canonicus sent a messenger to deliver a declaration of war (a bundle of arrows wrapped in a rattlesnake's skin).
They decided to impale the settlement by taking down tall trees, dragging them from the forest and sinking them in deep holes closely bound to prevent arrows from passing through.
Moreover, Standish divided the men into four squadrons and drilled them on how to respond to an emergency, including instructions on how to remain armed and alert to a native attack even during a fire in the town.
[14] At the beginning of March, amidst this concern over possible attack, it came time for a promised visit to the Massachuset (a people to their north and outside the confederation led by Massasoit) to trade for furs.
The Governor conferred with his advisors and determined that to cancel the promised trading trip was ill-advised both because they desperately needed to replenish their food stores and because it would project an image of fearfulness to "mew up our selves in our new-enclosed towne"[16] which might be invited attack.
By the beginning of April Standish and 10 men set out in a shallop taking both Squanto and Hobomok with them (as Bradford put it) "in regarde of the jelocie between them.
