Paddling by Stage Island and its former appendage, Little Stage or Fort Island, one would never guess it’s enormous historical significance. I’m not talking about Its use by European fishermen as a place to dry their fish long before Plymouth Rock was glorified, nor grazing sheep there in the 1800s, or even harvesting gold from the sea there. Stage Island was the site of another incident in 1689 that entirely depopulated Kennebunkport for more than a decade.

A very unpopular Royal Governor, Sir Edmund Andros came through here in 1688 setting up forts along the coast of Maine to protect the settlers from attack by the angry Indigenous population, who resented all the provisions of the Treaty of Casco that had been disregarded since King Phillip’s War. A fort was constructed at Little Stage Island in Cape Porpoise, commanded by Lt. John Puddington and manned with reluctant militiamen.

They were bitterly opposed to Governor Andros for his authoritarian rule over New Englanders. Andros treated his soldiers appallingly. He also imposed new taxes on his subjects and stripped them of their rights to local self-rule. In a rough draft of a letter in his own hand dated April 12, 1689, Gov Edmund Andros wrote to Puddington ordering him to come to Boston immediately to answer charges that he had released the soldiers under his command, against orders.

When Puddington’s soldiers got word from England that Andros’ boss, the Papist King of England, James II, had been overthrown, they jubilantly marched to Boston to help overthrow of Gov. Andros. After the soldiers left, 7 or 8 Indigenous people known to the settlers sheltered at the fort, crossed onto Stage Island thereby trapping the settlers at the fort on Little Stage Island until almost all their food and ammunition were gone. Lame millman, Nicholas Morey, whose mill and home had just been burned to the ground, successfully rowed from Stage Island to Portsmouth for help in a damaged canoe.

Governor Andros was deposed in Boston April 18, 1689. The remaining Cape Porpoise Settlers escaped and did not return for more than a decade.