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The Pennsylvania and New York Frontier
·WILLIAM BREWSTER
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GENEALOGY COLLECTION
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ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY 3 1833 01068 6159
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The Pennsylvania and New York Frontier
History of from 1720 to the Close of the Revolution
by
WILLIAM BREWSTER
PHILADELPHIA GEORGE S. MacMANUS COMPANY 1954
Copyright, 1954, by WILLIAM BREWSTER
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced without permission.
Printed by THEO. GAUS' SONS, INC., Brooklyn, N. Y., U.S.A.
1264093 CONTENTS
Publ. 5
00
huhu Chapter
Page
FOREWORD
V
I. SHAMOKIN 1
II. SHIKELLIMY AND CONRAD WEISER 9
III. THE GREAT LANCASTER TREATY
19
IV.
WINNING THE WEST
26
V. THE ALBANY CONGRESS AND SUSQUEHANNA PURCHASE
32
VI. THE FRONTIER IN 1754
41
VII.
SIR WILLIAM JOHNSON
49
VIII.
THE FRENCH INVASION
54
IX.
BRADDOCK'S DEFEAT
62
X. THE BATTLE OF LAKE GEORGE
68
XI.
DESOLATION OF THE FRONTIER
74
XII.
DESTRUCTION OF OSWEGO
83
XIII. THE FRONTIER FORTS
87
XIV. FORT WILLIAM HENRY MASSACRE
95
XV.
1758
102
XVI.
END OF FRENCH AND INDIAN WAR
110
XVII. THE INDIAN UPRISING OF 1763 (PONTIAC'S WAR) 115
XVIII. THE CONESTOGA MURDERS
127
XIX.
FRIEDENSHUETTEN
133
XX.
THE FORT STANWYX TREATY
143
XXI. THE FAIR PLAY REPUBLIC
147
CONTENTS
Chapter Page
XXII. CUSHIETUNK 151
XXIII. THE SEVENTEEN TOWNSHIPS 156
XXIV. TICONDEROGA 165
XXV. BATTLE OF ORISKANY 169
XXVI. BURGOYNE'S INVASION 175
XXVII. THE WYOMING MASSACRE 184
XXVIII. FRANCES SLOCUM 191
XXIX. THE CHERRY VALLEY MASSACRE 194
XXX. THE SULLIVAN EXPEDITION 198
XXXI. SOUTHWESTERN PENNSYLVANIA 206
XXXII. THE LAST RAIDS .210
AUTHORITIES 215
INDEX 217
FOREWORD
Inasmuch, as no connected and complete history of the Pennsylvania and New York frontier has been published, this work was undertaken.
The pioneer raised what he ate, made what he wore, doctored himself and worshipped alone, if at all. His long, loose, fringed hunting shirt partly covered his buckskin breeches ; and he had a rifle and carried a tomahawk and scalping knife. He lived in a cabin of unhewn logs without windows or floor, save the hard ground. Many of the pioneers were so poor, that with- out horse or cow, they made their way into the woods and squatted in a secluded cove of the mountains or on the fertile bend of an upland stream. The sun never penetrated the dense foliage of the trees and warmed the ground beneath ; and surrounded as they were by this unlit and unwarmed forest land, late springs and early frosts blighted their scant crops of corn, squashes and beans.
In New England, the adjoining townships, fully organized at the time of settlement, with churches and schools, were closely knit together, insur- ing mutual support and protection. The large plantations of Virginia were located along the lowland rivers and these streams afforded easy access and communication, and floated with the tide, the English tobacco ships stocked with European luxuries. Only, across the mountains in the western part of the colony, was there a limited frontier.
In New York, the fringe of land, on either side of the Hudson, the seat of the great patroon estates, was fully settled and suffered no Indian depredations, except during the New Netherland War, in 1643, and the Esopus War fought in 1663, when Wildwyck, now Kingston, was sacked and many of the inhabitants were killed and captured. Schenectady was burned by the French and Indians in 1690, and sixty persons were killed and twenty seven taken to Canada. Early in the Eighteenth Century, the fertile lowlands along the Mohawk, above Schenectady, were occupied by Dutch and Palatine settlers who established well ordered communities with churches, schools, substantial buildings and carefully tilled farms. It was not a region of isolation and poverty, but the proximity of Canada and the imminence of French attack made it a frontier of danger. But, southward across the divide on the headwaters of the Delaware and Susquehanna rivers, a different condition prevailed. This vast country, extending north and west of the Kittatinny mountains and from the Delaware river to Shamokin (now Sunbury, Pennsylvania) and thence over the Allegheny mountains to the confluence of the Ohio, was the real frontier of isolated cabins and unprotected settlements. Although spreading over much of the distinct colonies of New York and Pennsylvania, it was one territory by
V
reason of interlinked events occurring and similar causes and conditions prevailing.
Living in friendly alliance with the English settlers, were the Six Nations and these valiant Indian people, comprising the Iroquois Con- federacy, continually protected the northern colonies from French ag- gression and made possible the English conquest of Canada. The desolation of the frontier was provoked by the French and committed by their Indian allies, mostly of the Algonquian stock. Any comprehensible history of the frontier must recount the intermingled lives and fortunes of the settlers and Iroquoian people.
In compiling this work, the writer has visited the present Iroquois reservations, the various battlefields, the sites of most of the fortifications and scenes related ; and has relied, mainly, on the written works of contem- porary actors, and the public records contained in the Dutch, French, English and Colonial archives. The period covered is from about 1720, when settlement commenced to the close of the Revolution after which the savagery of this frontier borderland was succeeded by the culture and progress of peace.
W. B.
vi
CHAPTER ONE
SHAMOKIN
Long before the English settled there, the confluence of the Susque- hanna was the site of the Indian town of Shamokin.1 It was not unlike other native villages of the time, and was squalid and dirty and inhabited, mostly, by dissolute and roving Indians. Some historians have called it the vice-regal capital of the Six Nations, which is an exaggeration, as the Iroquois Confederacy had no kings and vice-roys and none of the trappings of royalty.2 Yet, in a sense and for a time, Shamokin was the most impor- tant Indian town in the Province of Pennsylvania; and this importance was due to the natural situation of the place and the conquests and policies of the Six Nations.
These Six Nations were the conquerors of the continent. No other Indians, north of Mexico ever equalled them. By rivers, lakes and trails, through the forests and over the prairies, their relentless and valiant war- riors pushed their way to the Ohio, Illinois and Mississippi; and their roving bands had for generations trodden deep the great warpath, which led, from Onondaga, their capital, to the Tennessee. Their business was war and government.
They subjugated, not only, their kindred people, Eries, Hurons, Neu- trals and Andastees ; but also the surrounding and alien tribes. From Lake Huron to Quebec, down the Delaware and Susquehanna to the sea, through the mountains to Carolina and Tennessee and westward to the Mississippi, all lay in their path of conquest ; and most of this vast region, they governed by the great council of their sachems at Onondaga.
There is a natural reason why the Romans ruled the world; and also why the Six Nations conquered and governed. The situation and aspect of the country they occupied, the sufficiency of the clothing they wore and the abundance of food which sustained them made the Iroquois a mighty people.3 Their homeland was central New York, in the fertile valleys of the Mohawk and Genesee and about the beautiful lakes, the warmth of whose waters tempered the severity of the climate. The richness, of the soil with moderate labor, yielded an abundance of vegetables, fruit and corn; and the wild regions of the Adirondacks and the Endless Mountains of Pennsylvania4 to the south afforded a sufficiency of furs for their rai- ment and meat for their sustenance. Situated, as they were, adjacent to the
1
Great Lakes and on the headwaters of the Delaware, Susquehanna and Ohio rivers, they dominated the open roads of travel to the lands they conquered.
The celebrated "long house" was the dwelling place of the Iroquois, and it symbolized their confederacy and government. The building con- sisted of a frame work of long vertical poles bedded in the ground, bent and bound together at the top, so as to make an oval roof; and these were strengthened by lateral poles lashed to them by ropes of slippery elm bark. It was covered with long, lapped strips of bark fastened to it by a similar outer frame work and thongs of slippery elm. The house was about eighty feet long and seventeen feet wide. It was without windows or open- ings in the sides and was entered at both ends. The interior was divided by a six foot passage way, upon which fires were made, the smoke escap- ing through holes made in the roof. On both sides of this way, were long pole platforms covered with bark, the lower one was about a foot above the ground and the upper one some five feet above it. These platforms were divided by bark partitions into compartments, about eight feet long. Each compartment housed a single family, and some twenty families were accommodated in the building.5
These long houses were irregularly arranged in palisaded .villages, containing two or three thousand people. Around the village were garden plots allotted to each family, and upon which were raised crops of corn, squashes, melons and beans, which together with maple sugar, dried berries, fish and game comprised the principal articles of diet.
The Indian utensils were few, knives, axes and tomahawks made of stone, bone awls and neeedles, and cooking vessels made of burned clay. Their greatest implement was the bow and arrow. The bow was between three and four feet long, and the arrows of various lengths were pointed with bone, horn or flint. At its string end were set feathers, which passed around its opposite side in a twist so as to make it twirl in its flight, like a revolving bullet and add effectiveness to the shot.6 The canoe was next in importance and usually made of birch bark, in one piece, stitched with bark thread to a light framework pointed at both ends. Canoes ranged in size from twelve to forty feet in length, with capacities of from two to thirty persons.
The Indians clothed themselves with deer skins upon which the fur remained and wore moccasins of tanned deer skin on their feet.
The Iroquois were great gamblers and in their games, the warriors often wagered away their entire possessions.
In their social organization and government, the Iroquois manifested their marvellous genius. The basis of their social organization was the family, which developed into the clan, every member of which was supposed to be descended from the same mother. The clans were designated by totems, usually animals ; and among the Iroquois, there were the following clans : Bear, Wolf, Beaver, Turtle, Deer, Snipe, Hawk and Heron. All marriages were exogamous, that is without the clan. Thus, a man of the Bear clan could not marry a woman of that clan, but might marry one, of
2
another clan, belonging to his own tribe or another tribe. Inheritance was in the female line and the children belonged to the mother and inherited her privileges, name and clan, but nothing descended from the father. This arrangement insured absolute purity of blood, as the mother is always known and the father sometimes uncertain and only the reputed sire. The relationship of individuals was classified by certain names. All the women in the clan of the same generation were regarded and called sisters and their children, all called brothers and sisters, regarded these various women as their mothers. All the men in the clan of the same generation as the mother were designated as her brothers, but the children called them uncles. The reputed father was called father, and all the men of his generation and clan were called stepfathers; and all the women aunts and their children cousins. This relationship extended to the members of the same clan in all the tribes; and it constituted a kindred of clans and not of tribes and bound the Iroquois Confederacy together by the indissoluble tie of blood.
These clans were united in tribes or nations viz, Mohawks, Oneidas, Onondagas, Cayugas and Senecas, originally the Five Nations, but by the admission of the Tuscaroras in 1715, they became the Six Nations. They formed a union, variously called by Europeans, the United Nations, the League of the Iroquois and the Iroquois Confederacy.
Each clan was represented, in the tribal councils and the great council of the confederacy, by a sachem, an inheritable office in the female line. Accordingly, the son of a sachem never became sachem, the office being inherited by the deceased sachem's brother or nephew descended from the same mother. The Mohawks had nine sachems, the Oneidas nine, the Onondagas fourteen, the Cayugas ten and the Senecas eight, making a total of fifty ; but, as two vacancies among the Mohawks were never filled, actually forty eight sachems constituted the great council at Onondaga.
The council at Onondaga, which governed the greater part of the territory east of the Mississippi, was in appearance no imperial Roman Senate. It was only a conclave of forty eight half naked, greasy savages squatted ape like on the ground around a smoky fire built in the center of a dingy bark structure "the great long house," the capitol of the Iroquois Confederacy.
The proceedings were in the nature of negotiations, and decisions were not made by a majority, as in other parliamentary bodies, but by the assent of all the sachems. The results were powerfully influenced by the orators, men of remarkable eloquence; and the wampum keepers,7 men with prodi- gious memories who when called upon, recited the history, laws and cus- toms of the people. As assistance to memory, they fingered variously marked and colored strings of wampum. Their government was aristocratic, but it was not based on wealth or landed property. It was an aristocracy of blood. The sachem was as poor, as the meanest member of his clan, and enjoyed no advantages, except the great privilege of government. To counteract the evils of an aristocracy and popularize the government, the chiefs, men of great abilities, were elected, by the people, in the tribal councils. They had much influence, but exercised no voice in the actual determinations.
3
Religion had little effect in moulding the manners, methods and morals of the Iroquois. They were, only, superstitious animists, with traces of polytheism in their later development. If they had any deity, it was the sun. The conception of the Great Spirit was the introduction of the Jesuit missionaries, and as it corresponded, to an extent, with their awe of the sun, they readily adopted it.8
It is improbable, that at any time, the Iroquois Confederacy numbered more than 20,000 and perhaps not over 15,000 members. Yet, they con- quered and destroyed tribes much more numerous. Some of their captives, they spared and adopted, some they burned alive and others they quartered, cooked, and ate with great relish. Infants were roasted on spits, like little pigs and eaten before their agonized mothers.9
The Iroquois had no notion of nations, alliances, leagues and con- federacies, appelations, Europeans used in describing them. Among them- selves, they were simply Ho-de-no-sau-nee, the people of the long house.
In 1675, the Andastees or Susquehannocks succumbed to the Iroquois and lost all their territories along the Susquehanna river and its tributaries. About 1682, the Five Nations put petticoats on the Lenni Lenape (Dela- ware Indians), i.e. made women of them and took their lands lying in the eastern part of Pennsylvania. The Iroquois made no use of these con- quered lands, except to sell them to the English colonies of Pennsylvania, Maryland and Virginia. Ostensibly to manage the Shawnee Indians, a sub- ject people living along the Susquehanna, but actually to look after this territory and negotiate with the Proprietary Government of Pennsylvania, the Great Council at Onondaga, in 1728, sent Shikellimy to Shamokin.
At the junction of the north and west branches of the Susquehanna, Shamokin was the superbly situated entrance to the great Iroquois empire of the south and west. The waters, of these rivers after long and torturous courses through the hills of New York and the mountains of Pennsylvania, flow as placid streams to their union in the great river which bears them to the sea. An extending and undulating plain rising, from the Northumber- land shore, separates the approaching rivers. From the narrow intervale on the southerly bank of the Susquehanna, the long range, of eastern moun- tains, ascends to a lofty and gloomy height ; and high on the abrupt cliff which rises from the verge of the western stream, "Shikellimy's face," like a sentinel faces the north.10
The forks of the Susquehanna was a place of more importance to the Iroquois, than to the other people who have resided there. The extreme sources of the North Branch are but a few miles south of the then Upper Castle of the Mohawks; and a tributary, the Unadilla drains the lands assigned to the Tuscaroras. The Chenango, joining the Susquehanna at Binghamton, runs through the Oneida territory and its main branch, the Tioughnioga reaches the uplands overlooking the Onondaga valley. The southern boundary of the Cayugas was the Susquehanna and Tioga river (now Chemung) ; and into the latter flows the Cohocton river, which rises in the lands, then, possessed by the Senecas. Figuratively speaking, an
4
Indian, of any of the nations, could board his canoe, at his own door-step, and float down these waters to Shamokin.
But, to reach the place, the Iroquois were not confined to the rivers, for like the roads to Rome, from Shamokin radiated the great warpaths of the Six Nations. A warpath led through the forest, usually the shortest distance between two places, irrespective of natural impediments; and was from twelve to eighteen inches wide and worn about a foot deep. The main highways and railroads of today follow nearly the courses of these old warpaths.
The principal highway to the Ohio region was the great Shamokin path, which ran up the east side of the West Branch and over the Alle- ghenies; and was accessible to the Senecas by the Tioga river and a trail through the mountains. Diverging from it were two by-paths leading to Shickshinny. The Wyalusing path intersected the Shamokin trail at the mouth of Muncy creek, which it followed to its source, crossed the Loyal- sock near the present Dushore and went down Sugar Run to Wyalusing. The great Sheshequin path began near the mouth of the Loyalsock, passed to Lycoming creek and by it ran to the present hamlet of Grover, thence to Towanda creek, which it followed to West Franklin, went through the hills to Sugar creek and down it to a point a little above Towanda. It was the most direct route from Shamokin to Onondaga. The Wyoming path, intersected by the former trails, ran up the west side of the North Branch to Wyoming and thence to Tioga Point. The Catawissa path led from Shamokin by way of Roaring creek to the Indian town of Catawissa. The route to Philadelphia was by the Tulpehocken path and led from Shamokin over the mountains to the present Pine Grove on Swatara creek and thence to the Tulpehocken settlements. The southern trails to Maryland, Virginia and the Carolinas were the Paxtang path leading down the east side of the Susquehanna; and the Susquehanna path which went down the west side of the river to the mouth of the Juniata. The Tuscarora path ran from Shamokin to the present Mifflintown and thence followed the Juniata to Standing Stone now Huntington.11
By the rivers and these trails, there was a complete system of com- munication from Shamokin ; and by them messages were carried, as swiftly, by the Indian runners, as by mounted couriers in Europe, at that time.
In the play of imagination, we may dimly see, again, these fleet messengers of the forests. There are two of them and they carry in their minds, the orders of the Great Council of the Iroquois. Guiding their way by the sun and the stars, they have come in almost a bee line from Onon- daga to Sheshequin. They are young and tall and finely formed and their hardened muscles sustain incredible endurance. They can run from a hundred to a hundred and fifty miles a day, but since childhood, they have been trained for this. They are as naked as nature made them, save the breech-cloths they wear and the moccasins on their feet. It is fall but they plunge into the chilling waters of the Susquehanna, swollen wide over its lowlands and swim to the western shore. There in autumn's fading sun, they dry and rest themselves with a few hours of needed sleep, but long
5
before its setting beyond the Towanda hills, they are up and on, again, along the great Sheshequin path, which leads through the mountains, over dank forest mould unturned since the verdure began, through open uplands of oak, maple and beech and dark intervals of hemlock, spruce and pine. At a spring by the path, they refresh themselves with lumps of maple sugar and a few kernels of parched corn. Running one after the other, they never speak and the soft rhythm of their footfalls is the only noise they make. The awful loneliness of forest darkness descends and the stillness of the night is only broken by a prowling panthers' screams and the weird moaning of the trees. At a fork in the path, they stop and search the heavens for the Pleiades which always guide them right. By the moonlit sky, they swim the swift, swollen, sullen Loyalsock and warm themselves from the water's chill, by a quickened pace. With heads bent low, knotted muscles and swaying arms and falling feet in perfect time, they run on with the mountain tumbled waters of the West Branch, now flowing tran- quilly to their union in the great river which bears them to the sea. At the break of day, they speak their message to Shikellimy at Shamokin.
Well would, we leave the tale of the trails with the romance of the runners ; but along them were enacted scenes of toil, blood and anguish. Migratory bands of Indians passed over them, the warriors striding freely forth, bearing only their bows and arrows, followed by toiling and sweating squaws bent low under back breaking burdens, the luggage of the tribe. Painted warriors went down these paths with such incredible speed, that it took only five days from Onondaga to reach the unspecting foe in the Carolina mountains ; and they returned with strings of dangling scalps and long trains of heartbroken captives bearing the spoils of their victory.
The first mention, in the colonial records, of Shamokin was made in 1728, where it was called Chenasky.12 At that time, James Le Tort, an Indian trader had his store located in what is now Northumberland. Shamokin was the name applied to the present Sunbury and Northumber- land also the adjacent region on the West Branch.13 In 1743, when John Bartram, the botanist visited it, there were only eight cabins14 but the Rev. David Brainerd, in 1745, described it as a town, lying on the east and west shores of the river, and containing upwards of fifty houses and three hundred inhabitants.15 These were Iroquois, Delawares and Shawnees of the Algonquian stock, and Sapoini and Tutelos, Siouxan people. They were mostly a roving, drunken, ruffianly population of Indians. Sometimes, the town was filled with these mischievous fellows and at other times practically deserted. Its importance was not due to them, but because it was a tarrying and distributing place of the Six Nations and the residence of Shikellimy.
Shamokin was the residence of another renowned Indian, Sassoonan also called Allummapees, the principal chief of the Delaware Indians, who was said to have been son of the great chief Tamany. He is first mentioned, in the colonial records, in 1712;16 and thereafter, he was treated with the greatest consideration by the Pennsylvania government and esteemed as a friend of the English. But after 1728, the records indicate, the Proprietary
6
authorities realized, that the Delawares were bereft of all real power ; and that the important Indian in Pennsylvania was Shikellimy, whose good graces were ever after courted, with all courtesy and kindness. However, Allummapees continued as an instrument to bring Indian complaints to the Council and to keep the Delawares settled in eastern Pennsylvania under the watchful eyes of the Iroquois and the Proprietary government. The old chief was a drunkard and this impaired his influence and authority. Conrad Weiser, in July, 1747, wrote of him: "Allummapees would have resigned his crown before this but has the keeping of the public treasure (council bag) consisting of belts of wampum, from which he buys liquor and has been drunk for 2 or 3 years almost constantly, and it is thought he won't die as long as there is one single wampum left in the bag." The bag must have, then, been about empty as he died in the following Sep- tember.
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