Ashbow, Robert, 1725 - 1810

Robert Ashbow was the brother of the Reverend Samuel Ashbow and perhaps of John and Joseph Ashbow as well.  With his wife Betty, Robert had one son, Joel (1763) and several daughters, including one who died in 1776 and Hannah Ashbow Brushell Uncas (1769).  As a young leader in the Mohegan community, Robert’s mark appears on a document in support of the appeal of the Mohegan Indians against the Colony of Connecticut dated July 23, 1746.  In April of 1756 he enlisted under the command of General John Winslow for service to Crown Point, most likely as a substitute for Nathan Willis and Jonathan Howard of Captain Jonathan Howard’s Company of Bridgewater, Massachusetts.  On his return he assisted his brother Samuel in ministering to the local Indian community. In 1772 and 1773, he was guest of his tribesman Joseph Johnson at Tunxis in Farmington, Connecticut and began to be active in religion and politics.  Four years later he accompanied Samuel to religious meetings in Rhode Island and Massachusetts and assisted at Samson Occom’s services at Groton in 1780.  While his name appears on a list of men, women, and children belonging to the Mohegan tribe in 1771, his right to be considered a Mohegan was called into question by other tribal members three years later.  However, he reappears on a Mohegan membership list taken in August 1782 and in 1799.  After the death of Zachary Johnson in 1787, Robert joined Henry Quaquaquid as a Mohegan tribal leader until early the early 1800s.  On February 10, 1810, his frozen body was found near Norwich.  He is buried in the Ashbow Burial Ground at Mohegan. Brown and Rose, Black Roots, 13.  Murray, To Do Good to My Indian Brethren, 162, 164. J. Brooks, The Collected Writings of Samson Occom, 284-288, 334.  New London County Court, Inquests.  The Norwich Courier (Norwich, Connecticut), February 14, 1810, p. 3.