He was killed while defending his family during and Indian attack. His wife
fled into the house, but was shot with her infant child in her arms. The shot killed the child instantly and seriously wounded the mother. Mrs. Means and her sister were carried off by the Indians. The following is an account that appeared in DOWNEAST, The Magazine of Maine, Aug. 1980, p. 34."Late one night in 1756, Indians raided the home of farmer Thomas Means. They killed Means, his wife and son, and took Mrs. Means' young sister, Molly Phinney, captive. Molly's fiance, a young Freeport captain named William McLellan, knew that his girl would likely be taken to Canada and given over to the Indians' French allies as a servant if she survived the ordeal. Since this was his only possible hope he acted on it.
Posing as a neutral trader, McLellan sailed to Quebec. It was a risky scheme for a British subject during the French and Indian War but the captain apparently had plenty of pluch -- and luck. Her traced Molly down through tavern gossip and resuced her in the dead of night from the French estate where she'd been placed as a servant. Then together they sailed back to Freeport, married and -- in one's imagination at least -- lived happily ever after."
She was carried off by Indians in a raid, after her husband and infant child was killed. What happened to her afterwards is unknown.
In another report, she and her infant son were killed in an Indian raid and her sister, Mollie Phinney, was carried off as a hostage. The sister was later sold as an indentured laborer to a farmer in Quebec. She was later rescued by her fiance, Captain McLellan who sailed his schooner to Quebec to rescue her. See notes for Thomas Means, Rin 1722.
Killed in his mother's arms during an Indian raid.
Birth date from Hoar ancestry at ancestry.com
Other information from Barbara Hill, 168 Little Bay Rd., Newington, NH