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Indian Clambakes In the days when the Wampanoag Indians claimed this section of the country and later when they first sold portions of it to the white men, they journeyed each year from their winter quarters on the shores of Mount Hope Bay to a place near Westport Point called in recent years Cape Bial - here to hold their annual clambake. This trip was made partly by land and partly by water. The canoes were launched in Mount Hope Bay, paddled as far north as Steep Brook, and then carried over the land to North Watuppa Pond, which in Indian language means "at the place where they draw water." Here the Indians again launched their canoes and proceeded southward to a place on the east bank of the pond where a landing was made. From here the canoes were carried a distance of several miles along the trail to a point about one-eighth of a mile north of the present village of Head of Westport, near the old saw and grist mill. From this point the Indians paddled down the Noquochoke or Acoaxet River, past the present village of the Head of Westport, past the present site of Hix Bridge (where the trail from Acushnet to Seaconnet then crossed the river), and on past the present village of Westport Point then called Paquachuck, up the West River to a point which in recent years has been known as Cape Bial. It was on Cape Bial that the Indian braves and their chief Massasoit prepared their annual feast - the clambake. This occasion was one of the important events of the year in the Wampanoag tribe, was long anticipated and long remembered by all those who participated in it. The heaps of clam shells that today can be seen on Cape Bial are said to be the remains of the clambakes held years ago by these Wampanoag braves. |
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Reprinted
from an old menu used at Remington's Clambake Pavilion at Hix Bridge