By ERIN-LEIGH HOFFMAN, Staff Writer, Greenfield Recorder, August 4, 2025

TURNERS FALLS — Clear blue skies and mild temperatures set the scene Friday for an afternoon of reflection and healing along the banks of the Connecticut River.

Before the Pocumtuck Homelands Festival began in 2012, the 2004 Reconciliation Ceremony was held in Unity Park to recognize the Great Falls Massacre of 1676, where English forces led by Capt. William Turner killed more than 300 noncombatant Native Americans, mainly women and children, in a surprise attack. The Reconciliation Ceremony, when Montague and members of the Narragansett tribe formally recognized the massacre, was a turning point toward healing for Native American people.

Twenty-one years on, another step was taken Friday by honoring Tom “Sakokwenionkwas” Porter, spiritual leader of the Mohawk community of Kanatsiohareke in New York, with a white pine tree dedicated to him in Unity Park at the end of a peace walk led by the New England Peace Pagoda of Leverett. This tree, known as the Great Tree of Peace, is rooted in significance for the five tribes of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy — the Mohawks, Oneidas, Onondagas, Cayugas and Senecas. It symbolizes the union of these tribes in peace after years of war…read full article here