there was an attack on haverhill in march, 1697, and a mr. dustin was at work in the field. he ran to his house and got his seven children ahead of him, while with his gun he protected their rear till he got them away safely. mrs. dustin, however, who ran back into the house to remove a pie from the oven as she feared it was burning, was captured, and, with a boy of the neighborhood, taken to an island in the merrimac, where the indians camped. at night she woke the boy, told him how to hit an indian with a tomahawk so that "the subsequent proceedings would interest him no more," and that evening the two stole forth while the ten indians slept, knocked in their thinks, scalped them to prove their story, and passed on to safety. mrs. dustin kept those scalps for many years, showing them to her friends to amuse them.