instructions were to go to Ninigret's quarters, demand the tribute, and insist that he end the war against the Long Island Indians. On the approach of the troops, Ninigret fled to a distant swamp and was not pursued, but the Pequots who had been under his control were transferred to Harmon Garrett to oversee. On October 13, 1660, Ninigret gave Pettequamscot to the Colony of Rhode Island. He took no part in King Philip's War (1675-76) and so escaped the ruin which overtook the other tribes. His remains are said to be buried at a place near Charlestown, Rhode Island called Burying Hill. The Puritans achieved little in trying to convert the Narragansetts and Niantics to Christianity. Roger Williams recorded his discouragement about it. Thomas Mayhew asked Ninigret to allow him to preach to his tribe, and he replied: "Go and make the English good first." Successors Ninigret's daughter succeeded him as sachem. At her death, she was succeeded by her half-brother Ninigret, who granted a large portion of his people's lands to the colony of Rhode Island in 1709. This cession of land later created difficulties for the Niantics. The younger Ninigret died about 1722, leaving sons Charles Augustus and George. Charles Augustus died shortly afterward and left an infant son. Some of the tribe acknowledged the boy as their sachem, while another portion adhered to his uncle George, who assumed the entire government in 1735. George's son Thomas Ninegret became chief in 1746. He sold additional Niantic lands to the colony of Rhode Island which caused discontentment among his people, some of whom tried to depose him. They appealed for relief to Sir William Johnson, the colonial superintendent of the Indians in the Northeast (he was based in upstate New York). They made the case that the Niantic lands which Thomas Ninegret had sold were needed to support the families of men who had died serving the English king in the French and Indian War. In one letter to Johnson, they addressed the question of whether they had the authority to depose a sachem: “As it was in the power of the nation to put him in, we think it in the power of the nation to turn him out.” The controversy continued for several years, but Rhode Island ultimately obtained the lands. A small remnant of the Niantic people were still living in Rhode Island in 1812.