USA > Massachusetts > Berkshire County > Pittsfield > The Berkshire jubilee > Part 11
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You scarce can go, thro' the world below, But you'll find the Berkshire men: And if you rove the world above, You'll find them there again.
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THE DINNER.
SONG:
[Composed by a member of the Young Ladies' Institute, and sung by the Young Ladies of the School. The whole company joined in the chorus.]
Glad sounds of joy are on the air, And shouts rise loud and free, Our quiet vale resounds with mirth And hearts o'erflow with glee. For days of auld lang syne, dear friends, For days of auld lang syne, We'll have sweet thoughts of kindness yet For days of auld lang syne.
Thrice welcome, brothers, wanderers, all Who filially have come, Our voices high in song we raise And bid you welcome home! For days of auld lang syne, &c.
How sweet for friends to gather home, Where once they've happy been, Though paler now life's lamp may burn And years have rolled between. For days of auld lang syne, &c.
And since those eyes beam welcome yet That smiled in gladness then, Now, in the smiles of friends thus met, Whole years are lived again. For days of auld lang syne, &c.
The days of life's glad spring return With all their hopes and fears, Where fondly mem'ry plucks sweet flowers To bloom through future years. For days of auld lang syne, &c.
Soon, greeting smiles to sadness turn As drops the parting tear, But mem'ry long shall sacred keep Our glorious gathering here. For days of auld lang syne, &c.
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At the close of the ode, sung to the tune of Auld Lang Syne, by the Young Ladies of the Institute, the President called Judge BETTS, Chairman of New-York Committee, who said-
Mr. PRESIDENT AND GENTLEMEN AND LADIES-Whilst the me- lody of this sweet song rests so pleasantly on the hearts of all pres- ent, I should most unwillingly disturb the grateful emotion by an address of my own. Indeed had I tones at command which would embrace this wide family encampment, of what could I so fitly speak to you here as of Auld Lang Syne ? and no words of mine could express the feelings swelling our bosoms on this occasion, so impressively as the parting chant those young voices have left on our memories.
In place then of occupying your attention with a speech myself, permit me to employ the moment of the day and of our festivities yet remaining, in offering a suggestion which may enable each one of us, by the transactions of yesterday and to-day, to speak for all and to every heart in this broad land, and to the children of Berkshire in all times to come.
I am authorized by the Committees of Berkshire and New-York, to invite a meeting this evening of the Committees and all others concurring in the object, to take measures for publishing and pre- serving the proceedings of this Jubilee.
Mr. President -May I ask your indulgence in parting, to offer a sentiment which seems to me brought strikingly home to all of us, children of this choice region, and who have gone out from among you.
The opportunity has been afforded me the past few days, in vis- iting a series of your beautiful towns, to compare, to some extent, the present, with the state of the country in 1806, when my resi- dence in it ceased.
Since that period the doubled population-the improved cul- ture of the land-the thrifty appearance of villages and farm residences and manufactories-the increase of churches, schools and academies-all denote an eminent and solid advancement in wealth, refinement, and the substantial comforts of life. In view of this great and interesting progress in improvement and well being here, the thought seems appropriate to us-that we, emigrants, should realize that there is much before us to do to ren- der our conditions abroad of equal fellowship with those in Old Berkshire, at home.
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THE DINNER.
The President called upon the Rev. Mr. TODD, Chairman of the Berkshire County Committee.
Mr. TODD responded to the call as follows:
MR. PRESIDENT-The difficult and painful duty has fallen upon me, of bidding farewell to these friends who have honored us so far as to come from their several homes to revisit the scenes of their childhood, to revive the memory of other days, and to renew the acquaintances of early life. Were it not that time is too precious, and one individual of too little consequence at this moment, I might express my deep regret that this duty had not fallen upon some other one.
We have often thought, sir,-thought with pride, of our gor- geous hills and valleys, which have been so beautifully celebrated at this time; we have often taken pride in this our home, and in all that is included in the term "Berkshire," and thought that we had scenery unsurpassed in nature. We thought that this occa- sion would bring bright and loved beings around us - brighter and more loved than whom, could not be found on the face of the earth. But, I doubt not, this pride in the present occupants of Berkshire, has been justly rebuked and deeply humbled. We had no con- ception of the beauty, the intellect, the character, and the real no- bility of nature, which this meeting would call home; and here- after we shall look back upon this gathering as one of the bright- est and most beautiful occasions in our earthly pilgrimage. We have been thinking how we could erect some monument of this Jubilee. In our wisdom, we have spoken of several; but after all, God has been before us, and his mighty hand hath reared the Monument. That HILL from which we came to this pavilion, will hereafter bear the name of "JUBILEE HILL!" and when our heads are laid in the grave, and we have passed away and are forgotten, we hope our children, and our children's children, will walk over that beautiful spot and say, "here our fa- thers and mothers celebrated the Berkshire Jubilee!" This monu- ment shall stand as long as the footstool of God shall remain.
Friends, dear friends! we have been greatly honored by your presence. We come now to give you the parting hand. We hope you will not forget these scenes that must live with the mem- ory of childhood, of the homes you have loved, and of the friends
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you have greeted. You leave us now forever. But we shall not forget you. We shall remember you in our morning and evening prayer. We shall bear you up to heaven, and go where you will, we pray that our fathers' God, the God of Jacob, may be your God. We hope that you will not forget that your character was formed by the domestic hearth, by the humble school house, by the bright meadow, the lofty mountain and the deep glen; and above all things, we hope you will not forget, nor let your children for- get, the old family Bible,- our fathers' Bible, King James' old English Bible! Don't forget how
" That Bible,- the volume of God's inspiration, At noon and at evening, could yield us delight, And the prayer of our sire was a sweet invocation, For mercy by day, and for safety through night. Our hymns of thanksgiving, with harmony swelling, All warm from the heart of a family band,
Half raised us from earth to that rapturous dwelling, Described in the Bible, that lay on the stand : The old fashioned Bible, the dear blessed Bible, The family Bible, that lay on the stand !"
Don't forget this old Bible, the chart of liberty; that which has made New England, which has made the "Old Bay State," and especially, that which has made Berkshire what it is.
And now in the name of your Committee, Fathers, Mothers, Bro- thers, Sisters, Friends, while the band stand ready to strike the notes that are to part us, we pause simply to say, thank you! God bless you! Farewell! We shall not think the less of that son or daughter who drops a tear, as we say to one another, Farewell! Farewell! till we meet on the great day of meeting!
Three hearty cheers were then given for the Old Homestead, and the Emigrant! The band played a farewell while the immense multitude separated, most of whom were in tears.
..
PRASE.ỨC
STOCKBRIDGE, FROM THE NORTH.
1
APPENDIX.
APPENDIX.
A RECOLLECTION OF THE STOCKBRIDGE INDIANS.
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BY THOMAS ALLEN, ESQ., OF ST. LOUIS.
THERE are a living people, an entire class, whose Father-land is this on which we tread, not one soul of whom mingles in this ge- neral Jubilee of the Sons and Daughters of Berkshire. This, our native soil, was once theirs, and sacred to them by the dust of their ancestors mingling with it. But for them the "home-call" had no charms, and they are not here. No joy to them to come back and see the old forests gone, their fathers' bones scattered in the furrow, and our homes built upon fields where their genera- tions sleep. But let us not be so ungenerous, amid our rejoicing, as to disdain a recollection of the poor Housatonic Indian.
At the period of the first settlement of the English in Berk- shire, there were no Indians permanently situated within its limits bearing a distinctive appellation as a tribe, or living together as a separate and independent community. Small bands dwelt in the southern portion of the County, and the middle and northern por- tions were often penetrated and traversed by individuals and par- ties from the tribes beyond the County, north, east and west. As the white settlements extended in eastern Massachusetts, the native tribes moved gradually westward. Many of them fled before the whites in alarm, and it is probable that Berkshire was often the temporary refuge of the doomed and terrified fugitives. It is said that as early as King Philip's war, (1675,) some 200 fugitive In= dians were pursued by soldiers of the Connecticut colony, from Westfield to the banks of the Housatonic, where a battle ensued in which many Indians were captured.
Y
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The first purchase of land by the whites in Berkshire, was made on the 25th of April, 1724, by citizens of the county of Hamp- shire, of Indians dwelling in the neighborhood of the present town of Sheffield. The deed was executed by an Indian chief named Konkepot, and twenty other Indians, at Westfield, and conveyed the sites of the present towns of Sheffield, Egremont, Mt. Washing- ton, Gt. Barrington, Alfred, and portions of Lee, of Stockbridge, and of West Stockbridge. The consideration was "£460, three barrels of cider, and thirty quarts of rum." These Indians were called at that time River Indians, and Housatonic Indians, and were probably of Mohawk or Mohegan connection. The desire of Konkepot to be instructed in the Christain religion, led to the establishment in 1734, of a mission and school by Mr. John Ser- geant, a native of New Jersey, assisted by Timothy Woodbridge at Wnahtukcook, or Great Meadow, since known as Stockbridge, where a few families of Indians under Capt. Konkepot, resided. A few other families lived on lands situated near the present divisional line between Gt. Barrington and Sheffield, under Lieut. Umpachene; their settlement was called Scatekook. Both these chiefs received their military titles from the British Governor of Massachusetts, Jonathan Belcher, and are said to have been respectable men. To remedy the inconvenience of instructing settlements so far apart, the Indians agreed to meet and dwell together during the winter season, at a point about half way between their two little villages. For this purpose, they began to erect a school and meeting house, with small huts around it, in Gt. Barrington. After three winters' trial, this arrangement proved inconvenient, owing to their being obli- ged to return to the fields they cultivated, in the spring. Being acquainted with their wants and condition, the Legislature granted them a township of land in 1735, where Stockbridge now is, and the Indians removed there in 1736. In 1737, the Legislature ordered for them the erection of a meeting house, thirty feet by forty, and of a school house, at the expense of the Province. In 1739, the settlement, called then " Indian Town," was incorpora- ted as a town, and received the name of Stockbridge, probably from a town of the same name in England, and the Indians have been called the Stockbridge Indians from that day to the present. The settlement increased from the number of eighty souls at the time of its commencement, to one hundred and twenty in 1740,
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by accessions from various quarters external. The inhabitants of a small village called Kannaumeek, near the present Brainerd's Bridge, joined them in 1744, and in 1747 they numbered two hundred souls. They were afterwards increased to about four hundred, which is believed to have been about their average num- ber afterward, so long as they remained in this county. Mr. Ser- geant translated the whole of the New Testament, except the book of Revelation, into the Indian language. He baptised one hun- dred and twenty-nine Indians, and contributed to the conversion of fifty or sixty to Christianity ; and forty-two were communi- cants with the church when he closed his labors by death, in 1749.
Jonathan Edwards became the teacher of these Indians in 1751, and labored among them about seven years, when he became Pre- sident of Nassau Hall. It was during his sojourn among the Stockbridge Indians, that President Edwards composed his famous work on the Will. His studies were pursued in a room but six feet square, and with one window. The house he occupied is yet standing. He was followed by Dr. Stephen West, in 1759, who was at that time Chaplain at Fort Massachusetts, in Adams. Dr. West and President Edwards, addressed the Indians through an interpreter. Dr. West relinquished the labor of instruction in 1775, to Mr. John Sergeant, son of the first missionary, who, as did his father, taught the Indians in their native tongue. This language was said to have been the common language of the In- dians of New England; of the Penobscots near Nova Scotia, of the Indians of St. Francis in Canada, and of other tribes west and south, and that it was spoken more generally than any other In- dian language in North America. Elliot's translation of the Bi- ble was said to have been into a dialect of the Stockbridge lan- guage. Many of the Indian youth received a very good common school education from these missionary teachers; and one of them, Peter Pohquonnoppeet, was graduated at Dartmouth College in 1780. As a tribe they were peaceable, tractable and intelligent, capable of transacting ordinary business, and of discharging the duties of town officers, which devolved upon some of them. From the earliest time they were uniformly friendly to the white race, and probably in their whole history to the present time, an act of hostility or violence committed by them against the white popula- tion, cannot be found. On the contrary, they performed numer-
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ous kind offices for the early settlers of the County, often fought, and sometimes shed their blood for them. Other Indians made attacks, and committed murders and depredations within the Coun- ty, often spreading terror through the settlements, causing the in- whabitants to erect forts and block houses for their defence. But the friendship of the Stockbridges served against foes white or red, and never failed. They took part with the English in the two French wars of 1744 and 1754. They served, some of them as Massachusetts soldiers, and in 1775, one of the chiefs formally tendered his services in the Revolutionary war, in a speech made to the Massachusetts Congress. In a letter addressed from Pitts- field, May 9, 1775, by Rev. Thomas Allen to Gen. Seth Pomeroy, at Cambridge, it is said : " Solomon, the Indian King, at Stock- bridge, was lately at Col. Easton's, of this town, and said there that the Mohawks had not only given liberty to the Stockbridge Indians to join us, but had sent them a belt denoting that they would hold in readiness five hundred men, to join us immediately on the first notice, and that the said Solomon holds an Indian post in ac- tual readiness to run with the news as soon as they shall be want- ed." The Stockbridges composed part of a company of rangers acting near Boston, commanded by Capt. Timothy Yokun, one of their own tribe. A full company of them fought for the Ameri- cans at White Plains, under Capt. Daniel Nimham, where four were slain. Others served elsewhere. A feast was given them at the close of the war, by command of Gen. Washington, in con- sideration of their gallant conduct in the American service. It was given in Stockbridge, near the residence of King Solomon, and the whole tribe partook of it. King Ben, or Benjamin, Kok- Icewenaunaut, the immediate predecessor of Solomon, died in 1781, at the great age of 104 years.
The Stockbridges did not remain long in Massachusetts after the close of the war. Previously to that contest, a township of land had been given them by the Oneidas in the State of New- York. Selling their possessions in Stockbridge gradually to their white neighbors, they began to remove to New-York in 1783, af- ter the peace, and all, numbering about four hundred and twenty, reached their new homes in 1788. They called the settlement New Stockbridge. The school, which had accomplished so much in improving them since 1734, followed, and the son of their first
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teacher did not desert them. Mr. Sergeant, who had been their teacher, became also their pastor, sixteen of the tribe professing religion, and forming themselves into a new church. Mr. Ser- geant spent six months in a year with them, until 1796, when he removed his family to New Stockbridge, and remained altogether in the service of the Indians until his death. They continued a peaceful, agricultural people, and their little church slowly in- creased. Samson Occom, was an Indian preacher, a Mohegan, who lived in their vicinity, resided with them during the last years of his life, and died among them in 1792. Mr. Sergeant died in 1824, at the age of seventy-seven.
The white man's star of empire continuing westward, another removal was deemed advisable. The Delawares had given the Stockbridges a tract of land upon the White River in Indiana, to which many of the latter seemed desirous of removing. Some of them went to Indiana, but government agents, it is charged, wronged them of their title. Subsequently, a large tract of land was purchased at the head of Green Bay in Wiskonsan, for seve- ral New-York tribes, and a provision was also there made for the Stockbridges. They began to move thither in 1822-some lin- gered, some strayed into Canada, but most of them finally reached the shores of Lake Winnebago, where still remembering native Berkshire, they established another Stockbridge. The little church and school, whose seed was planted in Massachusetts, survived this removal also, and still flourishes beyond the shores of Michi- gan. But the terms of their leases of any particular spot of earth, as with other tribes, have been growing shorter and shorter. They were permitted to remain in Stockbridge of Massachusetts forty- nine years, in the Stockbridge of New-York, thirty-four years, but they had dwelt in Wiskonsan only seventeen years, when they were summoned again to depart. By a treaty made in 1839, they ceded their land in Wiskonsan, and the government agreed to re- move them to the west of the Missouri as soon as they were ready to go, to subsist them one year afterward, and in conjunction with the Munsees, they receive per annum, the interest of $6,000, viz: $360 .* About seventy of them, of their own accord, in the fall
* A communication from the Commissioner of the Indian Office at Washington, ad- dressed to me under date of August 31, 1814, and since this paper was prepared, states
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of 1839, sought their own way to the Missouri, and reached the lands of the Delawares in great poverty. They were invited to this neighborhood by the Delawares. But their situation is not permanent. They have applied for an independent location, and the application is now under the favorable consideration of the de- partment at Washington. The larger portion of the tribe, viz. 207, remained in Wiskonsan, and they have applied to Congress for the privileges of citizenship which are enjoyed by their friends and neighbors, the Brothertown Indians. As they are deemed sufficiently civilized, the privilege of being placed upon a footing with citizens of the United States, will probably be extended to them .* Their merits and services seem to entitle them to it. But the little band on the Missouri, have probably sought a different destiny, viz: that of being mingled perhaps with the great tribes west of the boundaries of the United States, whose language of complaint is,
" They waste us-aye-like April snow In the warm noon, we shrink away; And fast they follow, as we go Toward the setting day,- Till they shall fill the land, and we Are driven into the western sea."
This little band of Stockbridges are settled by permission, on the lands of the Delawares, about five or six miles below Fort Leavenworth, on the western bank of the Missouri river. I saw them there in 1842. Their dress is such, that at a distance they are easily mistaken for white people. Their manners and customs are also quite civilized. They plough and hoe, and keep oxen, cows and hogs. They have built neat cabins of hewn logs, fenced
that, " the annuities of which the Stockbridges are now in the receipt, are $350, as their portion of the annuities provided for by the treaty of '94 with the Six Nations of New-York, of which $280 goes to the Stockbridges still east, and the interest (six per cent payable quarterly.) on $6,000 invested, as per treaty of September, 1839, in public stock as a permanent school fund, which also is secured exclusively to the Stockbridges east. It will thus appear that the Stockbridges east receive $640, and those west $70 in annuities."
. This application, I now learn, was granted by the twenty-seventh Congress, in the form of an act constituting them "citizens of the United States to all intents and purposes,"- it is however, understood that a portion of them are opposed to having their nationality thus merged in ours, and have applied to Congress with the purpose of effecting a repeal of the law.
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their farms, and are very orderly and industrious. They sometimes produce a little surplus corn to sell, and sometimes they labor for others for wages. They enjoy the benefits of a mission school .* Missouri and Iowa are settled up to the boundary line, and many of the white settlers are beginning already to desire the lands of the Delawares, which are beyond. They are of the most fertile and beautiful description, and destined, as settlement has hitherto been prosecuted, to fall very soon into the clutches of the white man, when the Indian, the Stockbridge included, must take ano- ther step toward " the western sea." The Stockbridges have pre- served a very uniformly respectable character - continued friend- ship for the people of the United States, and what is more singu- lar, nearly the same average number of souls in their tribe, from about 1750 to this day.
Let us imagine the Stockbridge Indian returned to-day, like us, to his native Berkshire. Does any kindred welcome him? Does any thing living give him a friendly token of recognition? Me- thinks I hear him sadly saying, in the language of our honored and honoring poet:
" It is the spot I came to seek,- My father's ancient burial place, Ere from these vales, ashamed and weak, Withdrew our wasted race. It is the spot-I know it well- Of which our old traditions tell.
" For here the upland bank sends out A ridge toward the river side; I know the shaggy hills about, The meadows smooth and wide : The plains, that toward the southern sky, Fenced east and west by mountains, lie.
* The Delawares have heretofore opposed the establishment of a Stockbridge house of worship and school among them on the Missouri. But the Stockbridges there have a native teacher among them, who is no doubt employed, and may, in some measure supply the want of the regular teacher whom the Baptist Missionary Society were desirous to furnish, and who is understood to be awaiting the withdrawal of the op- position of the Delawares, which now precludes her from entering upon her duties. As to religious instruction, though from the same opposition they are without a re- sident missionary, they still have the occasional pastoral services of a member of the Baptist Shawnee Mission.
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" A white man gazing on the scene, Would say a lovely spot was here, And praise the lawns so fresh and green Between the hills so sheer. I like it not ;- I would the plain Lay in its tall old groves again.
" The sheep are on the slopes around, The cattle in the meadows feed, And laborers turn the crumbling ground, Or drop the yellow seed, And prancing steeds, in trappings gay, Whirl the bright chariot o'er the way.
" Methinks it were a nobler sight To see these vales in woods arrayed, Their summits in the golden light, Their trunks in grateful shade, And herds of deer, that bounding go O'er rills and prostrate trees below.
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