USA > New York > Livingston County > Geneseo > A history of the treaty of Big Tree : and an account of the celebration of the one hundredth anniversary of the making of the treaty, held at Geneseo, N.Y., September the fifteenth, eighteen hundred ninety-seven > Part 7
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This proposed treaty ought to be held immediately before the hunting season or another year will be lost, as the Indians cannot be collected during that season. The loss of another year, under the pay-
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ments thus made for these lands, would be ruinous to my affairs ; and as I have paid so great deference to public considerations whilst they did exist, I expect and hope that my request will be readily granted now, when there can be no cause for delay, especially if the Indians are willing to sell, which will be tested by the offer to buy.
With the most perfect esteem and respect, I am, sir, your most obedient and most humble servant,
Robert Morris.
George Washington, Esq., President of the United States.
President Washington appointed a member of congress from New Jersey, named Isaac Smith, as the commissioner. But having been subsequently appointed a judge of the Supreme Court of his state, Mr. Smith found that his judicial duties would prevent his attendance at the treaty ; accordingly he declined, and Colonel Jeremiah Wadsworth, who had been a distinguished member of congress from Connecticut, was appointed in his place.
Unable himself to take part in the treaty, Robert Morris appointed his son, Thomas, and Charles Williamson as his attorneys ; but Cap- tain Williamson, busy with his affairs at Bath, declined to act, and so the responsibility for conducting the difficult and delicate negotiations fell entirely upon the younger Morris.
It was resolved to hold the treaty at Big Tree, near the settlement which afterwards became Geneseo. In meadow lands within the cor- porate limits of the village of Geneseo, southwest from the park, about a quarter of a mile above the Erie railroad, and about the same distance west of the Mt. Morris road, is a cobblestone house ; on the site of this building there stood, 100 years ago, a small dwelling erected by William and James Wadsworth. This was rented by Thomas Morris for the entertainment of the principal persons at the treaty. He also caused a large council house to be erected, covered with boughs and branches of trees. Doty's "History of Livingston County" says that the Indian village of Big Tree was west of the Genesee river and that the big tree itself stood on the eastern bank. Some Geneseo anti- quarians of today declard that the village was east of the Genesee. Both are correct, the explanation being that the village was moved. At the time of the treaty, however, the village was west of the Gene- see. It not only appears so on the first map of the region made from actual surveys, but the treaty as agreed upon declared that the reserva- tion of Big tree should embrace the village, and Ellicott's map of 1804 shows the reservation to be west of the river. In 1805 the village was moved, and on the map showing the Phelps and Gorham purchase in 1806 Big Tree village appears east of the Genesee. The probability is that the council house was erected on the eastern bank, and Charles Jones, who derived his information from his father, Horatio Jones, who attended the treaty and took a prominent part in the negotiations, thinks it stood 500 feet northwest of the Wadsworth dwelling.
The Indians began to arrive at Big Tree late in August, not the Senecas alone, but groups from the other nations-attracted doubtless, by the hope of presents and the possibility of good living. Fifty-two Indians signed the treaty. Many of them were famous in Indian annals. Young King, Chief Warrior, Handsome Lake, the Prophet,
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Farmer's Brother, Red Jacket, Little Billy, Pollard, the Infant, Corn- planter, Destroy Town, Little Beard, Black Snake-these were the leaders of the Senecas at Big Tree, interesting men all of them. Time will not permit me to give biographies. It seems necessary, however, to explain that there were two Indians known to the whites as Big Tree.
Ga-on-dah-go-waah, called sometimes Big Tree and sometimes Great Tree, was a full-blooded Seneca of the Hawk clan and resided for many years at Big Tree village. He attended the Buffalo treaty of July 8, 1788, when Phelps and Gorham made their purchase, and went to Philadelphia in the winter of 1790 with Cornplanter and Half Town to protest against what they regarded an unjust treatment from Phelps and his associates. He was there again with Red Jacket in 1792 and died in that city in April of that year. Consequently he did not attend the Big Tree treaty. This chief's daughter had a son whose father was a Niagara trader named Pollard. The boy grew up in the Indian village and became in time a famous chief. His name was Ga-on-do- wau-na, which also meant Big Tree. He made himself conspicuous in border warfare, and was at the massacre of Wyoming. He it was who signed the Big Tree treaty. As an orator he was but little inferior to Red Jacket, and his character was finer. After the death of Corn- planter he was, perhaps, the noblest of the Senecas. He was among the first Indians on the Buffalo Creek reservation to embrace the truths of Christianity and thereafter his life was singularly blameless and beneficent. He was sometimes called Colonel John Pollard. He died on the reservation April 10, 1841, and was buried in the old Mission cemetery.
Thomas Morris reached the Genesee on August 22d. The commis- sioners arrived four days later, Colonel Jeremiah Wadsworth to repre- sent the United States and General William Shepherd to represent the commonwealth of Massachusetts. Captain Israel Chapin, who had succeeded his father, General Israel Chapin, as superintendent of Indian affairs, attended ; James Rees, subsequently of Geneva, was there and acted as secretary, and among other white men who attended and were greatly interested in the negotiations were William Bayard of New York, the agent of the Holland land company; two young gentlemen from Holland named Van Staphorst, near relatives of the Van Staphorst who was one of the principal members of the Holland company, Nathaniel W. Howell, Jasper Parish and Horatio Jones.
Turner's two Histories, Stone's "Life of Red Jacket," and Doty's "History of Livingston County," contain accounts of the treaty of Big Tree which are practically the same, for they were based upon the careful, but not in all respects, accurate statement which Thomas Morris prepared in 1844 for the use of our local historians. But while I have condensed this narrative greatly in some respects, I have sup- plemented and corrected it, with the aid of several documents of con- siderable historical importance, which have been carefully preserved for nearly a hundred years.
Through the kindness of the New York Historical society I have been able to procure a copy of Robert Morris's Letter of Instructions to Thomas Morris and Charles Williamson, his agents, for the man- agement of the treaty, and also a copy of Thomas Morris's Rough
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Memoranda of the proceedings at the treaty. Both are unpublished manuscripts. The letter shows what Robert Morris wanted done and how his agents were to go about it. The memoranda are valuable because they contain copies of all the principal speeches delivered at the treaty. These documents are very long and the reading of them would occupy too much of your time. I will give a condensation of the Letter of Instructions.
This is dated Philadelphia, August 1, 1797. Robert Morris says he has not the interest in the lands that he ought to have retained, but is in duty bound to extinguish the Indian title. Then follow instructions under twenty-four heads. He thinks the business of the treaty may be facilitated by withholding liquor from the Indians, "until the business is finished, showing and promising it to them when the treaty is over." He adds that the liquors and stores he sends up "must be used and if not sufficient more must be got." The commissioners and other white men at the treaty must be entertained properly, and Mr. Morris insisted that Jones, Smith, Johnson, Dean, and Parish must be employed to assist in the negotiations, and that they should be "compensated with a reasonable liberality." Mr. Morris thought an annuity of $4,000 or $5,000 forever would be a sufficient price for the land he desired ; but he added that if the Indians wanted the full purchase price in cash he would pay $75,000 within sixty or ninety days. He said : "The whole cost and charges of this treaty being at my expense, you will direct everything upon the principles of a liberal economy. The In- dians must have plenty of food, and also of liquor, when you see proper to order it to them." Concluding his voluminous instructions, Robert Morris said : "You are to consider what I have already written, rather as outlines for your conduct on this business than as positive orders not to be departed from. I have perfect confidence in your friendship, and also in your integrity, good sense and discretion, and therefore I confide to your management the whole of this business without limita- tion or restriction. * * If you can make the purchase on better terms than I have proposed I am sure you will do it, or on the contrary, should you be obliged to give more, I shall acquiesce. You know it is high time this purchase should be made, and it is of vast importance to all concerned to have it accomplished, therefore you must effect it at all events, and I can only repeat that although I wish to buy as reasonable as may be, yet I do not mean to starve the cause, for I must have it."
The council was formally opened at 1 o'clock on the afternoon of August 28, 1797. Cornplanter spoke first. Turning to Thomas Morris he acknowledged the speech of invitation conveyed by Jasper Parish and Horatio Jones, and returned the string of wampum that had reached him with the invitation to the treaty. Then the commission- ers from the United States and Massachusetts presented their creden- tials and addressed the assembly, assuring the Indians that their inter- ests would be duly guarded and that no injustice would be done. Thomas Morris then made a short address, saying that his father was unable to appear, but had directed the delivery of the following speech which he had written to them from Philadelphia, (and which is now made public for the first time :)
Brothers of the Seneca Nation-It was my wish and my intention
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to have come into your country and to have met you at this treaty, but the Great Spirit has ordained otherwise and I cannot go. I grow old and corpulent, and not very well, and am fearful of traveling so far during the hot weather in the month of August.
Brothers, as I cannot be with you at the treaty, I have deputed and appointed my son Thomas Morris, Esq., and my friend Charles Williamson, Esq., to appear for me and on my behalf to speak and treat with you in the same manner and to the same effect as I might or could do were I present at this treaty with you, and it is my request that you will listen to them with the same attention that you would to me.
Brothers, I have the greatest love and esteem for my son and my friend. They possess my entire confidence and whatever they engage for on my behalf you may depend that I will perform the same as exactly as if I was there and made the engagements with you myself ; therefore I pray you to listen to them and believe in what they say.
Brothers, it is now six years since I have been invested with the exclusive right to acquire your lands. During the whole of this time you have quietly possessed them without being importuned by me to sell them, but I now think that it is time for them to be productive to you. It is with a view to render them so that I have acquiesced in your desire to meet you at the Genesee river. I shall take care imme- diately to deposit in the bank of the United States whatever my son and my friend may agree to pay you in my behalf.
Brothers, from the personal acquaintance which I have with your chiefs and head men, I am assured that their wisdom and integrity will direct the object of the treaty to the happiness of yourselves and your posterity. It is a pleasing circumstance to me that my business is to be transacted with such men, because while on the one hand they will take care of your interests, on the other whatever is done between them and ine will be strong and binding. I hope that wise men will always be at the head of your councils, but for fear that those that succeed your present leading men should not deserve and possess your confi- dence as fully as these do, you had better have your business so fixed now as not to leave it in the power of wrong-headed inen in future to waste the property given to you by the Great Spirit for the use of yourselves and your posterity.
Brothers, I have now opened my mind to you, and as I depend on my son and iny friend to carry on and conclude the business with you I shall only add that the President of the United States, approving of this treaty and being your father and friend, has appointed an honor- able and worthy gentleman, formerly a member of congress, the Hon. Jeremiah Wadsworth, Esq., to be a commissioner on behalf of the United States to attend and superintend this treaty, and the governor of the state of Massachusetts also appointed an honorable and worthy gentleman, formerly a general in the American army and now a mem- ber of congress, the Hon. William Shepherd, Esq., to be a commis- sioner to attend this treaty on behalf of the state of Massachusetts. These gentlemen will attend to what is said and done on both sides in order to see that mutual fair dealings and justice shall take place. Their office and duty will be rendered agreeable so far as depends on me because I desire nothing but fair, open and honest transactions.
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Brothers, I bid you farewell. May the Great Spirit ever befriend and protect you.
After the delivery of this shrewdly written speech, the council adjourned to give the Indians time to deliberate. There was a brief session the next day, when Red Jacket declared that something had been kept back, and asked for full particulars. On the following day Thomas Morris delivered a long and carefully prepared speech, setting forth the reasons why, in his opinion, the Indians should sell their lands. Among other things, he said : "You will receive a larger sum of money than has ever yet been paid to you for your lands; this money can be so disposed of that not only you but your children and your children's children can derive from it a lasting benefit. It can be placed in the bank of the United States from whence a sufficient income can annually be drawn by the President, your father, to make you and your posterity happy forever. Then the wants of your old and poor can be supplied, and in times of scarcity the women and children of your nation can be fed and you will no longer experience the miseries resulting from nakedness and want. * * Your white brethren are willing to provide you with the things which they enjoy provided you furnish them with the room which they want and of which you have too much. Brothers, you may perhaps suppose that by selling your lands you will do an injury to your posterity. This, brothers, is not the case. By disposing of the money which you will receive for them in the manner which I have mentioned, your children will always hereafter be as rich as you are now." Concluding, Mr. Morris said that if the Indians declined his offer "neither my father nor any person in his behalf will ever come forward and treat with you on the generous terms now proposed."
It will be observed that Mr. Morris did not say that his father had already sold the lands to the Hollanders and was required to extinguish the Indian title, and that he would be compelled to nego- tiate again if the Indians refused now. Mr. Morris also refrained from naming the price he was willing to pay.
On August 30th and September 1st there was no public council. On September 2d brief speeches were made by Farmer's Brother and Red Jacket, which were not at all friendly. In the evening Thomas Morris announced privately to some of the chiefs that he was willing to pay $100,000, to be invested so as to yield the Indians $6,000 a year. On the following day Red Jacket made an elaborate speech, setting forth the objections to the sale of the lands. Mr. Morris then publicly named the price he was willing to pay, and declared that if this were refused his father would never again meet the Senecas in general council-which, of course, was a decided stretching of the truth. On September 4th Cornplanter complained that the sachems were conduct- ing the whole business themselves, and threatened to go home. It was evident that there were serious divisions among the Indians. Indeed, a quarrel at this session was narrowly averted. There was no meet- ing on the 5th. Mr. Bayard and the two commissioners, becoming impatient, urged Mr. Morris to more vigorous action. He protested that he knew better than they the peculiarities of the Indian character; they insisted, and Mr. Morris, yielding reluctantly, gave at the next
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session an emphatic negative to a proposition by the chiefs, declaring that if they had nothing better to offer, the council might as well end. Red Jacket immediately sprang to his feet and exclaimed : "You have now arrived at the point to which I wish to bring you. You told us in your first address that even in the event of our not agreeing, we would part friends. Here, then, is my hand. I now cover up the council fire." Apparently this ended the council. The decision of the chiefs was received with great applause and the forest rang with savage yells. The commissioners and Mr. Bayard, seeing the unfor- tunate result of their interference, urged Mr. Morris to endeavor to rekindle the council fire, and promised that if he succeeded they would offer no further suggestions.
Meeting Farmer's Brother, Mr. Morris declared that according to Indian usage only he who had kindled a council fire had the right to put it out ; consequently Red Jacket had exceeded his authority, and "the fire was still burning." This having been admitted, and a very important point having been gained, Mr. Morris called the Seneca women together, distributed handsome presents and argued with them in favor of the sale of the lands. It was one of the features of the Indian policy that the lands belonged to the warriors who defended them and the women who tilled them, and though the sachems usually negotiated the treaties, the warriors and women had the right, when the sale of land was in question to interfere. In this instance the women exercised their right, and the council reassembled. Then Cornplanter conducted the Indian side of the negotiations, Red Jacket having been superseded.
Within a short time an agreement was reached and the Indian lands west of the Genesee, excepting ten reservations embracing 337 square miles, were sold to Robert Morris for $100,000, to be invested in the stock of the bank of the United States and held in the name of the President for the benefit of the Indians. The treaty was signed on September 15, 1797. The lands sold were described as follows :
All that certain tract of land, except as hereinafter excepted, lying within the county of Ontario and State of New York, being part of a tract of land, the right of pre-emption whereof was ceded by the State of New York to the commonwealth of Massachusetts, by deed of cession executed at Hartford, on the sixteenth day of December, in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and eighty-six, being all such part thereof as is not included in the Indian purchase made by Oliver Phelps and Nathaniel Gorham, and bounded as follows, to wit : easterly, by the land confirmed to Oliver Phelps and Nathaniel Gorham by the legislature of the commonwealth of Massachusetts by an act passed the twenty-first day of November, in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and eighty-eight; southerly, by the north boundary line of the state of Pennsylvania; westerly, partly by a tract of land, part of the land ceded by the state of Massachusetts to the United States, and by them sold to Pennsylvania, being a right angled triangle, whose hypothenuse is in or along the shore of Lake Erie ; partly by Lake Erie, from the northern point of that triangle to the southern bounds of a tract of land one mile in width lying on and along the east side of the strait of Niagara, and partly by the said tract to Lake Ontario ; and on the north by the boundary line between
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the United States and the king of Great Britain ; excepting neverthe- less, and always reserving out of this grant and conveyance, all such pieces and parcels of the aforesaid tract, and such privileges thereunto belonging, as are next hereinafter particularly mentioned, which said pieces or parcels of land so excepted, are by the parties to these pres- ents, clearly and fully understood to remain the property of the said parties of the first part, in as full and ample manner as if these pres- ents had not been executed.
The following were tlie reservations as agreed upon: Cattaraugus reservation, containing 26,880 acres, in the counties of Chautauqua and Erie; Allegany reservation in Cattaraugus county, containing forty-two square miles; Buffalo Creek reservation in Erie county, containing 130 square miles; Tonawanda reservation in the counties of Erie, Gene- see, and Niagara, containing seventy-one square miles; Conawaugus reservation, two square miles: Big Tree reservation, two square miles; Little Beard's reservation, two square miles; Squawky Hill reservation, two square miles; Gardeau reservation, twenty-eight square miles; Caneadea reservation, sixteeen square miles; in all 337 square miles.
The Senecas also intended to reserve the Oil Spring reservation, one mile square, containing their famous oil spring, three miles west of Cuba in the counties of Allegany and Cattaraugus, from which oil had been gathered for centuries. As it was not included in the deed, the title passed to Robert Morris and the Holland Land company, and then to three extensive land owners of Ellicottville. These men supposed it was an Indian reservation, and treated it as such until 1842, when one of them discovered that it was not one of the reservations mentioned in the treaty. Accordingly they had the land surveyed and sold. In 1856 the Indians began legal proceedings and ultimately succeeded in getting possession of the property. Governor Blacksnake supplied the most important evidence on the trial of the suit. He was present at the council at Big Tree and remembered that when the treaty was read over the omission of the Oil Spring reservation was noticed and commented on, and that Thomas Morris executed and delivered to Handsome Lake, the Prophet, a separate paper, reserving this tract to the Indians. Blacksnake also had in his possession a copy of the first map of the Holland Purchase made by Joseph Ellicott and presented by him, this map showing by means of red ink the eleven Indian reservations.
There were two incidents at the Treaty of Big Tree that deserve more than passing notice-one as to the purchase money and the second in regard to the claim which was made by Indian Allan's daughter to the Mt. Morris tract.
The consideration for the sale of the Indian lands to Robert Morris was $100,000 to be invested in the stock of the Bank of the United States, and the stock was to be held by the President for the benefit of the Indians. They were to receive interest or dividends on the stock, and it was very difficult for the white men to make the Indians understand how money could make money-or, as they expressed it, how money could grow. This was accomplished at length, however, and the Indians went away satisfied that Washington could guard their interests securely and that all would be well. Everything did go well till 1811, when there was a failure on the part of the government to pay. Then the anxious
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Indians held a council at Buffalo Creek and Farmer's Brother, Young King, Pollard, Chief Warrior, and other Seneca chiefs agreed upon the following letter, which was sent to the seat of Federal government by special messenger:
To the Honorable William Eustis, Secretary at War:
The sachems and chief warriors of the Seneca nation of Indians understanding you are the person appointed by the great council of your nation to manage and conduct the affairs of the several nations of Indians with whom you are at peace and on terms of friendship, come, at this time, as children to a father, to lay before you the trouble which we have on our minds.
Brother, we do not think it best to multiply words; we will there- fore tell you what our complaint is. Brother, listen to what we say: Some years since we held a treaty at Big Tree, near the Genesee river. This treaty was called by our great father, the President of the United States. He sent an agent, Colonel Wadsworth, to attend this treaty for the purpose of advising us in the business and seeing that we had justice done us. At this treaty we sold to Robert Morris the greatest part of our country. The sum he gave us was $100,000. The commis- sioners who were appointed on your part advised us to place this money in the hands of our great father, the President of the United States. He told us that our father loved his red children and would take care of our money, and plant it in a field where it would bear seed forever, as long as trees grow, or waters run. Our money has heretofore been of great service to us. It has helped us to support our old people and our women and children; but we are told the field where our money was planted is become barren. Brother, we do not understand your way of doing business. This thing is very heavy on our minds. We mean to hold our white brethren of the United States by the hand; but this weight lies heavy. We hope you will remove it. We have heard of the bad conduct of our brothers toward the setting sun. We are sorry for what they have done; but you must not blame us. We had no hand in this bad business. They have had bad people among them. It is your enemies have done this. We have persuaded our agent to take this talk to your great council. He knows onr situation and will speak our minds.
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