PEQIIOT  , an Algonquian tribe of

North-American Indians, a branch of the Mohicans . They occupied the coast of Connecticut from Niantic river to the Rhode Island boundary . Together with their kinsmen, the Mohegans, they formed a powerful and warlike people, bitterly hostile to the early settlers . In 1637 the Pequots were surprised by the whites at their fort on the Mystic river, and suffered so completely a defeat that the tribe was broken up, and its remnants took refuge with neighbouring tribes . The Pequot country passed under the control of the Mohegans . At the height of their power the Pequots numbered, it is estimated, some 3000 .