Wahaunay was an Indigenous leader who lived on Great Hill on the north bank of where the Mousam River meets the sea in what is now Kennebunk. He was a leader of approximately 160 Indigenous people who lived along the Mousam at that time.

"The whole Indian population in Wells was about one hundred and sixty; they were of different tribe ... but classed under the general name of Abnekis [sic]....Tom Wawa, or Wahaunay, was the leading Sagamore, having his home on Great Hill." - Bourne, p. 326

"Wawa was the leader in the [1726] attack on the Durrell family; he was, we suppose, well acquainted with all the members; yet he and his treacherous band could, in the absence of the father, cruelly murder his wife and children, and soon afterward return and dwell among the people, as if they had no agency in their death." - Bourne, p. 327

In 1723, "a company of twenty [were] under the command of Wahwa, one of the two chiefs, who commanded at Lovewell's celebrated fight. Wahwa was brought up in an English family, but was induced to join the French and Indians, by the offer of the command of a company. He was well known in this town, having visited it frequently, both it times of war and peace.

Bourne's account continues: "Wahwa was extremely irritated with his men for alarming the garrison, merely for the scalp of the white headed old man, Mr. Baily. He afterwards placed the scalp on a pole in view of the people of the garrison. Although dissapointed in their plans, they committed many depredations, killing the cattle, destroying the remaining crops, and annoying the whites whenever they left their houses." Bradbury, pp. 114-115"

"Tom Wawa, or Wahaunay, was the leading Sagamore, having his home on Great Hill. The inhabitants called him the king; he was well known to the whites; entered freely into conversations; visited their houses, and was well acquainted with their various employments and habits of life; and thus gathered all the information necessary to aid him in any subsequent raids upon them. He was not the Hopewood, as some may have supposed, who died long before this time, for he lived serveral years after the Lovewell fight, in which he was second in command. Like most of the Indians who dwelt among the English, he was addicted to the free use of intoxicating liquors; and while savage by nature, he was made much more so by its frequent use. He was in the habit of beastly intoxication, as were all the Indians then commorant in this vicinity.

"It was with these wild savages that the people of Wells had been involved in the terrible wars of which we have given an accoount. While dwelling among them, familiar with their houses and families, enjoying a social intercourse, and manifesting toward them the kindest friendship, suddenly their hearts would overflow with malice, and they would be found wreaking out their vengeance upon them in relentless torture, and cruelties the most revolting. Wawa was the leader in the attack on the Durrell family; he was, we suppose, well acquainted with all the members; yet he and his treacherous band could, in the absence of the father, cruelly murder his wife and children, and soon afterward return and dwell among the people, as if they had no agency in their death. They could one day exhibit all the innocence of a true and honest friendship toward their white neighbors, and the next, without provocation, but merely from the promptings of an infernal spirit, riot in their blood." - Bourne, pp. 326-7 [Note that Bourne's description continues for several additional pages.]

"One Wawa, a noted Indian chief, resided here about 1750, and pretended to claim the territory in Wells, and that of adjoining towns. It formerly comprised within its limits the territory of Kennebunk and contained forty thousand acres, one thousand of which is salt marsh. It was formerly a portion of the possessions of Sir Ferdinando Gorges, who, in 1641, presented five thousand acres of it to Thomas Gorges, deputy governor of Maine and mayor of Gorgeanna. He was permitted to select whatever portion he pleased, and made choice of the tract near the small river Ogunquit, in the southwesterly part of Wells." - Coolidge & Mansfield, p. 349

Bibliography:

The History of Wells and Kennebunk from the Earliest Settlement to the Year 1820 - by Edward Bourne (1875)

History of Kennebunk Port from its First Discovery (1602-1837) - Charles Bradbury (1837)

History and Description of New England - Maine - Austin Jacobs Coolidge & John Brainard Mansfield (1860)