Originally the Mohegan's came from the upper Hudson River Valley in New York near Lake Champlain. Sometime around 1500, they left this area and moved to the Thames River Valley in southeastern Connecticut.
Because of the Mohegan, Connecticut suffered very little during the King Philip's War. At the end of that war, the Mohegan were the only important tribe remaining in southern New England. However, warfare and epidemic's had reduced them to less than 1,000. So long as there were enough Mohegan warriors to form a war party, Connecticut had a very powerful security service. The Mohegan's served as English scouts during the King William's War (1689-1696), and during the Queen Anne's War (1710-1713). They guided two expeditions into the upper Connecticut Valley against the Abenaki. During Grey Lock's War (1723-1727), forty-two Mohegan volunteered as scouts, but by this time those forty-two warriors represented every able-bodied man the Mohegan had left.
As the population declined, debts owed to English traders forced the Mohegan to sell land until by 1721, the 4,000 acres along the Thames was all that remained. Maybe because they had found the Mohegan more useful the way they were, the English did not seriously attempt to convert them to Christianity until the efforts of Reverend James Fitch in 1671. However, the Mohegan were already beginning to feel victimized by this time, and Fitch did not find them receptive.
Only 200 Mohegan's were living in eastern Connecticut in 1790 when the last 2,300 acres of their lands were divided into individual plots. The excess was leased to whites, but Connecticut seized and sold the unoccupied land in 1861 without Mohegan permission. After 1861, they no longer owned any of the land they had helped the colonist take. The Mohegan melted into the general population so well that of the 400 listed in the 1850 census, only 22 could be found in 1910. Reorganized as a tribe during the 1970's the Mohegan currently have an enrollment near 1,000 and received federal recognition in 1994.