When the first colonists began to settle in the Americas there were attempts to coexist with the natives, but this way of thought quickly deteriorated over time. When the Puritans landed in Connecticut they sought help from the Native Americans. Luckily for the Puritans, the Pequots helped them with farming, hunting, and trading with neighboring tribes. Sadly as these two cultures reacted with one another the colonists formed assumptions about the natives that are quite harsh for today's standards. The colonists of Connecticut were mainly Puritans, so they thought that the only way to worship was in a church and therefore the natives were godless people. Another assumption they made was due to the fact that the native women did the farming, cooking, and gardening. This type of work was thought by the Puritans to be done by only the men. So by the colonist's standards the Puritans believed that the native men didn't do actual work. Still under all of these assumptions these two cultures were able to communicate and barter with one another. In the end the Native Americans were unable to defend themselves from the growing power of the colonists and were either killed or forced into servitude under the white man.

   A major difference in these cultures, that the Puritans found disturbing, was the native's lack of churches. Puritans thought that because the Pequots didn't have a dedicated building for religious processes they were godless savages. This was a very untrue assumption that the colonists made. The Pequots actually did have a religion and they believed in many gods, but the bigger difference was in their technique on how to worship these gods. In order for the Native Americans to pray to their gods they would in some cases smoke, sing, and dance together while using either a bonfire or one of their many huts for these types of ceremonies. Also these ceremonies didn't take place on a certain day, place, or time, unlike the Puritans who always prayed on Sundays within a church. This method must have greatly separated the two cultures who came to meet in Mystic, Connecticut.

   One of the factors that brought them together was trade. When the Puritans first arrived they were in dire need of supplies and wished to obtain the delicacies from the New World. There was an item though that worked as a medium of exchange, the wampum. The wampum was a small trinket made of shells that the natives saw as a sacred object, all the Native American tribes did, but the English saw it as a currency used to be traded with other tribes. This was an example of how with limited communication and understanding, objects can be thought to have different uses. Still this discovery did help the native relations with the Puritans, because this lead to an increase of trade between them. Some items that the Pequots were interested in were: clothes, pots, kettles, and axes. The Puritans were primarily drawn to the native's furs, crops, and wampums. After some time though the rate of trade dropped as the Puritans became self-reliant and didn't need the help of the Pequots.

   So as the division of the cultures grew eventually the Puritans saw the Pequots as a threat to their lifestyle. Soon enough the Puritans knew that they weren't going to allow the Pequots to defeat them in the future, so they planned an attack. When the colonists realized that if the Native Americans who bordered their land were to take up arms and fight together, the colonists wouldn't stand a chance. So they believed in a means of self defense that they would under the cover of night in only one hour lead an attack against the Pequot people. This makeshift battalion was composed of a large group of Puritans as well as other Native American tribes who saw the Pequot people as a threat. This raid ended with the Pequot's camp being burned to the ground and nearly every man, woman, and child either killed or enslaved. Another difference between these two cultures was their battle ethics. When a Pequot warrior defeats a man in battle their choice of life or death for their opponent is consistently chosen to be life which shows that the warrior had discipline. While the Puritans after promising to kill only the men of the Pequot tribe to gain the help of other Native American tribes, the Puritans continued to kill without consideration of age or gender. Another difference of opinion, was that the Pequots valued their women much higher than the Puritans did. Pequot women were the primary gardeners and suppliers for their tribe. They were also able to make arguments as well as decisions in matters regarding the tribe. These settlement's differences seemed to be all that was needed to end in a battle to the death of a large majority of the Pequot population, the rest of which were forced into servitude.

   This horrible encounter was one example of how the coexistence of these two different cultures was difficult to bring into one society. Unfortunately reality proved this to be true, after the attack and pillaging of the Pequot encampment by the Puritans. As the colonists began to expand, the Pequot culture struggled to remain known in this developing society. This was a major example on how differences could in fact cause the destruction of a settlement of people, while their attackers believed that they were being commanded as God's warriors against the heathens of the New World. The Puritans believed that they were surviving in the New World because God decided that this was where his people would thrive, therefore the Puritans thought that what they did was both ethical and righteous. Yet what they actually committed was the death sentence onto thousands of innocent people. When one looks back on the actions of the developing America they would find that the date May 26, 1637 was host to a massacre that defines the true nature of the first settlers in America. In the end one could argue that the attitudes that began the development of this nation were that of irrational and fearful people who, by Manifest Destiny, believed that they should not focus on coexisting with the natives but conquering them in the name of God.