USA > New York > Erie County > Centennial history of Erie County, New York : being its annals from the earliest recorded events to the hundredth year of American independence > Part 3
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All European nations at this time recognized the right of dis- covery as constituting a valid title to lands occupied only by scattered barbarians, but there were wide differences as to its ap- plication, and as to the amount of surrounding country which each discoverer could claim on behalf of his sovereign.
Thus at the end of 1620 there were three distinct streams of emigration, with three attendant claims of sovereignty, converg- ing toward the county of Erie. Let but the French at Mon- treal, the English in Massachusetts, and the Dutch on the Hud- son all continue the work of colonization, following the great natural channels, and all would ultimately meet at the foot of Lake Erie.
For the time being the French had the best opportunity and the Dutch the next, while the English were apparently third in the race.
24
FRENCH TRADERS AND MISSIONARIES.
CHAPTER IV.
FROM 1620 TO 1655.
The French Traders .- Dutch Progress .- The Jesuits .- De la Roche Daillon .- The Company of a Hundred Partners .- Capture and Restoration of New France. -Chaumonot and Breboeuf .- Hunting Buffalo .- Destruction of the Kahquahs and Eries. - Seneca Tradition. - French Account. - Norman Hatchets .- Stoned-up Springs.
For the first twenty years little occurred directly affecting the history of Erie county, though events were constantly happening which aided in shaping its destinies. We learn from casual re- marks of Catholic writers that the French traders traversed all this region in their search for furs, and even urged their light bat- teaux still farther up the lakes.
In 1623, permanent Dutch emigration, as distinguished from mere fur-trading expeditions, first began upon the Hudson. The colony was named New Netherlands, and the first governor was sent thither by the Batavian Republic.
In 1625, a few Jesuits arrived on the banks of the St. Law- rence, the advance guard of a host of representatives of that remarkable order, which was in time to crowd out almost all other Catholic missionaries from Canada and the whole lake re- gion, and substantially monopolize the ground themselves.
In 1626, Father De la Roche Daillon, a Recollect missionary, visited the Neuter Nation, and passed the winter preaching the gospel among them.
In 1627, Cardinal Richelieu organized the company of New France, otherwise known as the Company of a Hundred Part- ners. The three chief objects of this association were to extend the fur trade, to convert the Indians to Christianity, and to dis- cover a new route to China by way of the great lakes of North America. The company actually succeeded in extending the fur trade, but not in going to China by way of Lake Erie, and not to any great extent in converting the Indians.
By the terms of their charter they were to transport six thou-
25
THE JESUITS.
sand emigrants to Canada and to furnish them with an ample supply of both priests and artisans. Champlain was made gov- ernor. His first two years' experience was bitter in the extreme. The British men-of-war captured his supplies by sea, the Iro- quois warriors tomahawked his hunters by land, and in 1629 an English flect sailed up the St. Lawrence and captured Quebec. Soon afterward, however, peace was concluded, New France was restored to King Louis and Champlain resumed his guber- natorial powers.
In 1628, Charles the First, of England, granted a charter for the government of the province of Massachusetts Bay. It in- cluded the territory between latitude 40°2' and 44°15' north, ex- tending from the Atlantic to the Pacific, making a colony a hun- dred and fifty-four miles wide and four thousand miles long. The county of Erie was included within its limits, as was the rest of Western New York.
The Jesuit missionaries, fired with unbounded zeal and unsur- passed valor, traversed the wilderness, holding up the cross be- fore the bewildered pagans. They naturally had much better success with the Hurons than with the Iroquois, whom Cham- plain had foolishly attacked on one of his earliest expeditions to America, and who afterwards remained the almost unvarying. enemies of the French.
The Jesuits soon had flourishing stations as far west as Lake. Huron. One of these was St. Marie, near the eastern extrem- ity of that lake, and it was from St. Marie that Fathers Bré- boeuf and Chaumonot set forth in November, 1840, to visit the Neuter Nation. They returned the next spring, having visited eighteen Kahquah villages, but having met with very little en- couragement among them. They reported the Neuter Indians to be stronger and finer-looking than other savages with whom they were acquainted.
In 1641, Father L'Allemant wrote to the Jesuit provincial in France, describing the expedition of Bréboeuf and Chaumonot,. and one of his expressions goes far to settle the question whether the buffalo ever inhabited this part of the country. He says of the Neuter Nation, repeating the information just ob- tained from the two missionaries : "They are much employed in hunting deer, buffalo, wild-cats, wolves, beaver and other
3
26
DESTRUCTION OF KAHQUAHS AND ERIES.
animals." There is no mention, however, of the missionaries crossing the Niagara, and they probably did not, but the pres- ence of buffalo in the Canadian peninsula increases the likeli- hood of their sometimes visiting the banks of Buffalo creek.
Up to this time the Kahquahs had succeeded in maintaining their neutrality between the fierce belligerents on either side, though the Jesuit missionaries reported them as being more friendly to the Iroquois than to the Hurons. What cause of quarrel, if any, arose between the peaceful possessors of Erie county and their whilom friends, the powerful confederates to the eastward, is entirely unknown, but sometime during the next fifteen years the Iroquois fell upon both the Kahquahs and the Eries and exterminated them, as nations, from the face of the earth.
The precise years in which these events occurred are uncer- tain, nor is it known whether the Kahquahs or the Eries first felt the deadly anger of the Five Nations. French accounts favor the view that the Neuter Nation were first destroyed, while ac- cording to Seneca tradition the Kahquahs still dwelt here when the Iroquois annihilated the Eries. That tradition runs some- what as follows :
The Eries had been jealous of the Iroquois from the time the latter formed their confederacy. About the time under consideration the Eries challenged their rivals to a grand game of ball, a hundred men on a side, for a heavy stake of furs and wampum. For two successive years the challenge was declined, but when it was again repeated it was accepted by the confed- erates, and their chosen hundred met their opponents near the site of the city of Buffalo.
They defeated the Eries in ball playing, and then the latter proposed a foot-race between ten of the fleetest young men on each side. Again the Iroquois were victorious. Then the Kah- quahs, who resided near Eighteen-Mile creek, invited the contest- ants to their home. While there the chief of the Eries pro- posed a wrestling match between ten champions on each side, the victor in each match to have the privilege of knocking out his adversary's brains with his tomahawk. This challenge, too, was accepted, though, as the veracious Iroquois historians assert, with no intention of claiming the forfeit if successful.
27
LAST OF THE ERIE NATION.
In the first bout the Iroquois champion threw his antagonist, but declined to play the part of executioner. The chief of the Eries, infuriated by his champion's defeat, himself struck the unfortunate wrestler dead, as he lay supine where the victor had flung him. Another and another of the Eries was in the same way conquered by the Iroquois, and in the same way dis- patched by his wrathful chief. By this time the Eries were in a state of terrific excitement, and the leader of the confederates, fearing an outbreak, ordered his followers to take up their march toward home, which they did with no further collision.
But the jealousy and hatred of the Eries was still more in- flamed by defeat, and they soon laid a plan to surprise, and if possible destroy, the Iroquois. A Seneca woman, who had mar- ried among the Eries but was then a widow, fled to her own people and gave notice of the attack. Runners were at once sent out, and all the Iroquois were assembled and led forth to meet the invaders.
The two bodies met near Honeoye Lake, half-way between Canandaigua and the Genesee. After a terrible conflict the Eries were totally defeated, the flying remnants pursued to their homes by the victorious confederates, and the whole na- tion almost completely destroyed. It was five months before the Iroquois warriors returned from the deadly pursuit.
Afterwards a powerful party of the descendants of the Eries came from the far west to attack the Iroquois, but were utterly defeated and slain to a man, near the site of Buffalo, their bodies burned, and the ashes buried in a mound, lately visible, near the old Indian church, on the Buffalo Creek reservation.
Such is the tradition. It is a very nice story-for the Iro- quois. It shows that their opponents were the aggressors throughout, that the young men of the Five Nations were inva- riably victorious in the athletic games, and that nothing but self-preservation induced them to destroy their enemies.
Nothing, of course, can be learned from such a story regard- ing the merits of the war. It tends to show, however, that the final battle between the combatants was fought near the terri- tory of the Senecas, and that some at least of the Kahquahs were still living at the mouth of Eighteen-Mile creek at the time of the destruction of the Eries.
28
NORMAN HATCHETS.
On the other hand, scattered French accounts go to show that the Kahquals were destroyed first; that they joined the Iroquois in warfare against the Hurons, but were unable to avert their own fate ; that collisions occurred between them and their allies of the Five Nations in 1647, and that open war broke out in 1650, resulting in the speedy destruction of the Kahquahs. Also that the Iroquois then swooped down upon the Eries, and exter- minated them, about the year 1653. Some accounts make the destruction of the Neuter Nation as early as 1642.
Amid these conflicting statements it is only certain that some time between 1640 and 1655 the fierce confederates of Central New York "put out the fires" of the Kahquahs and the Eries. It is said that a few of the former tribe were absorbed into the community of their conquerors, and it is quite likely that some of both nations escaped to the westward, and, wandering there, inspired the tribes of that region with their own fear and hatred of the terrible Iroquois.
It is highly probable that the numerous iron hatchets which have been picked up in various parts of the county belonged to the unfortunate Kahquahs. They are undoubtedly of French manufacture, and similar instruments are used in Normandy to this day. Hundreds of them have been found in the valley of Cazenove creek and on the adjacent hills, a mile or two south of East Aurora village. Many more have been found in Hamburg, Boston and other parts of the county.
They are all made on substantially the same pattern, the blade being three or four inches wide on the edge, running back and narrowing slightly for about six inches, when the eye is formed by beating the bit out thin, rolling it over and welding it. Each is marked with the same device, namely, three small circles something less than an inch in diameter, each divided into four compartments, like a wheel with four spokes.
The Kahquahs were the only Indians who resided in Erie county while the French controlled the trade of this region, as the Senecas did not come here, at least in any numbers, until after the American Revolution. These hatchets would be con- venient articles to trade for furs, and were doubtless used for that purpose. It is hardly probable that the Indians would have thrown away such valuable instruments in the numbers
29
STONED-UP SPRINGS.
which have since been found, except from compulsion, and the disaster which befell the Kahquahs at the hands of the Iroquois readily accounts for the abandonment of these weapons.
Some copper instruments have also been found, doubtless of similar origin, and, what is harder to account for, several stoned- up springs. Mr. John S. Wilson informs me that some thirty years ago he pushed over a partly rotten tree, over a foot in diam- eter, on his farm two miles south of East Aurora, and directly under it found a spring, well stoned up. There is no reliable ac- count of Indians doing such work as that, and it is a fair suppo- sition that it was done by some of the early French mission- aries or traders.
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IROQUOIS POWER.
CHAPTER V.
THE IROQUOIS.
Their System of Clans .- Its Importance .- Its Probable Origin .- The Grand Coun- cil .- Sachems and War-chiefs. - Method of Descent .- Choice of Sachems. --- Religion .- Natural Attributes .- Family Relations.
From the time of the destruction of the unfortunate Kah- quahs down to the time the Iroquois sold to the Holland Land Company, those confederates were by right of conquest the ac- tual possessors of the territory composing the present county of Erie, and a few years before making that sale the largest na- tion of the confederacy made their principal residence within the county. Within its borders, too, are still to be seen the largest united body of their descendants.
For all these two hundred and twenty-five years the Iroquois have been closely identified with the history of Erie county, and the beginning of this community of record forms a proper point at which to introduce an account of the interior structure of that remarkable confederacy, at which we have before taken but an outside glance.
It should be said here that the name "Iroquois" was never applied by the confederates to themselves. It was first used by the French, and, though said to have been formed from two In- dian words, its meaning is veiled in obscurity. The men of the Five Nations called themselves "Hedonosaunee," which means literally, "They form a cabin;" describing in this expressive manner the close union existing among them. The Indian name just quoted is more liberally and more commonly ren- dered, "The People of the Long House;" which is more fully descriptive of the confederacy, though not quite so accurate a translation.
The central and unique characteristic of the Iroquois league was not the mere fact of five separate tribes being confederated together; for such unions have been frequent among civilized and half-civilized peoples, though little known among the sav-
31
THE SYSTEM OF CLANS.
ages of America. The feature that distinguished the People of the Long House from all the world beside, and which at the same time bound together all these ferocious warriors as with a living chain, was the system of clans, extending through all the different tribes.
Although this clan-system has been treated of in many works, there are, doubtless, thousands of readers who have often heard of the warlike success and outward greatness of the Iroquois confederacy, but are unacquainted with the inner league which was its distinguishing characteristic, and without which it would in all probability have met, at an early day, with the fate of numerous similar alliances.
The word "clan " has been adopted as the most convenient one to designate the peculiar artificial families about to be de- scribed, but the Iroquois clan was widely different from the Scottish one, all the members of which owed undivided allegi- ance to a single chief, for whom they were ready to fight against all the world. Yet "clan " is a much better word than "tribe," which is sometimes used, as that is the designation ordinarily applied to a separate Indian nation.
The people of the Iroquois confederacy were divided into eight clans, or families, the names of which were as follows : Wolf, Bear, Beaver, Turtle, Deer, Snipe, Heron and Hawk. Accounts differ, some declaring that every clan extended through all the tribes, and others that only the Wolf, Bear and Turtle clans did so, the rest being restricted to a lesser number of tribes. It is certain, however, that each tribe, Mohawks, Oneidas, Onondagas, Cayugas or Senecas, contained a part of the three clans named, and of several of the others.
Each clan formed a large artificial family, modeled on the natural family. All the members of the clan, no matter how widely separated among the tribes, were considered as brothers and sisters to each other, and were forbidden to intermarry. This prohibition, too, was strictly enforced by public opinion.
All the clan being thus taught from earliest infancy that they belonged to the same family, a bond of the strongest kind was created throughout the confederacy. The Oneida of the Wolf clan had no sooner appeared among the Cayugas, than those of the same clan claimed him as their special guest, and admitted
32
ORIGIN OF CLANS.
him to the most confidential intimacy. The Senecas of the - Turtle clan might wander to the country of the Mohawks, at the farthest extremity of the Long House, and he had a claim upon his brother Turtles which they would not dream of repudiating.
Thus the whole confederacy was linked together. If at any time there appeared a tendency toward conflict between the different tribes, it was instantly checked by the thought that, if persisted in, the hand of the Heron must be lifted against his brother Heron; the hatchet of the Bear might be buried in the brain of his kinsman Bear. And so potent was the feeling that for at least two hundred years, and until the power of the league was broken by overwhelming outside force, there was no serious dissension between the tribes of the Iroquois.
It is quite probable that this system of clans was an entirely artificial but most skillful device, and was the work of some soli- tary forest-statesman, the predominant genius of his age. It has little of the appearance of a gradual growth, as will be seen by noticing some of the circumstances.
The names of the different nations of the confederacy, like those of other Indian tribes, have no uniformity of meaning, and were evidently adopted from time to time, as other names are adopted, from natural fitness. None of them were taken from any animal, and the adoption of the names of animals was never customary, so far as separate tribes of Indians were concerned. But the names of the clans are all taken from the animal creation-four beasts, three birds and a reptile ; and this uniformity at once suggests that they were all applied at the same time. The uniqueness of the clan-system, too, tends to show that it was an artificial invention, expressly intended to prevent dissension among the confederates. Nothing like it has ever grown up among any other people in the world.
The Scotch, as has been said, had their clans, but these were merely the natural development of the original families. Al- though the members of each clan were all supposed to be more or less related, yet, instead of marriage being forbidden within their own limits, they rarely married outside of them. All the loyalty of the people was concentrated on their chief, and, in- stead of being bonds of union, so far as the nation at large was concerned, they were nurseries of faction.
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" THE ROMANS OF THE NEW WORLD."
The Romans had their gens, but these, too, were merely nat- ural families increased by adoption, and, like the Scottish clans, instead of binding together dissevered sections, they served under the control of aspiring leaders as seed-plots of dissension and even of civil war. If one can imagine the Roman gens ex- tending through all the nations of the Grecian confederacy, he will have an idea of the Iroquois system, and had such been the fact it is more than probable that that confederacy would have survived the era of its actual downfall.
Iroquois tradition ascribes the founding of the league to an Onondaga chieftain named Tadodahoh. Such traditions, however, are of very little value. A person of that name may or may not have founded the confederacy. He may have been the originator of the clan-system, which appears much more like the work of a single genius than does the league of tribes. This latter is most likely to have begun with two or three weak tribes, and to have increased in the natural manner by the addi- tion of others.
Whether the Hedonosaunee were originally superior in valor and eloquence to their neighbors cannot now be ascertained. Probably not. But their talent for practical statesmanship gave them the advantage in war, and success made them self-confi- dent and fearless. The business of the league was necessarily transacted in a congress of sachems, and this fostered oratorical powers, until at length the Iroquois were famous among a hun- dred rival nations for wisdom, courage and eloquence, and were justly denominated by Volney, "The Romans of the New World."
Aside from the clan-system just described, which was entirely unique, the Iroquois league had some resemblance to the great American Union which succeeded and overwhelmed it. The central authority was supreme on questions of peace and war, and on all others relating to the general welfare of the confeder- acy, while the tribes, like the States, reserved to themselves the management of their ordinary affairs.
In peace all power was confided to "sachems;" in war, to " chiefs." The sachems of each tribe acted as its rulers in the few matters which required the exercise of civil authority. These same rulers also met in congress to direct the affairs
.
34
SACHEMS AND WAR-CHIEFS.
of the confederacy. There were fifty in all, of whom the Mo- hawks had nine, the Oneidas nine, the Onondagas fourteen, the Cayugas ten, and the Senecas eight. These numbers, however, did not give proportionate power in the congress of the league, for all the nations were equal there.
There was in each tribe the same number of war-chiefs as sa- chems, and these had absolute authority in time of war. When a council assembled, each sachem had a war-chief standing be- hind him to execute his orders. But in a war party the war- chief commanded and the sachem took his place in the ranks. This was the system in its simplicity.
Some time after the arrival of the Europeans they seem to have fallen into the habit of electing chiefs-not war-chiefs-as counselors to the sachems, who in time acquired equality of power with them, and were considered as their equals by the whites in the making of treaties.
It is difficult to learn the truth regarding a political and so- cial system which was not preserved by any written record. As near, however, as can be ascertained, the Onondagas had a cer- tain preëminence in the councils of the league, at least to the extent of always furnishing a grand sachem, whose authority, however, was of a very shadowy description. It is not certain that he even presided in the congress of sachems. That con- gress, however, always met at the council-fire of the Onondagas. This was the natural result of their central position, the Mo- hawks and Oneidas being to the east of them, the Cayugas and Senecas to the west.
The Senecas were unquestionably the most powerful of all the tribes, and, as they were located at the western extremity of the confederacy, they had to bear the brunt of war when it was assailed by its most formidable foes, who dwelt in that quarter. It would naturally follow that the principal war-chief of the league should be of the Seneca Nation, and such is said to have been the case, though over this, too, hangs a shade of doubt.
As among many other savage tribes, the right of heirship was in the female line. A man's heirs were his brother (that is to say, his mother's son) and his sister's son ; never his own son, nor his brother's son. The few articles which constituted an Indian's personal property, even his bow and tomahawk, never
35
METHOD OF DESCENT.
descended to the son of him who had wielded them. Titles, so far as they were hereditary at all, followed the same law of descent. The child also followed the clan and tribe of the mother. The object was evidently to secure greater certainty that the heir would be of the blood of his deceased kinsman. It is not supposed to require near as wise a boy to know his mother as his father.
The result of the application of this rule to the Iroquois sys- tem of clans was that if a particular sachemship or chieftaincy was once established in a certain clan of a certain tribe, in that clan and tribe it was expected to remain forever. Exactly how it was filled when it became vacant is a matter of some doubt, but as near as can be learned it was done by the warriors of the clan, and then the person so chosen was "raised up" by the congress of sachems.
If, for instance, a sachemship belonging to the Wolf clan of the Seneca tribe became vacant, it could only be filled by some one of the Wolf clan of the Seneca tribe. A clan-council was called, and as a general rule the heir of the deceased was chosen to his place; to wit, one of his brothers, or one of his sister's sons, or even some more distant relative on the mother's side. But there was no positive law, and the warriors might discard all these and elect some one entirely unconnected with the deceased. A grand council of the confederacy was then called, at which the new sachem was formally "raised up," or as we should say, " inaugurated " in his office.
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