USA > New York > Livingston County > Nunda > Centennial history of the town of Nunda : with a preliminary recital of the winning of western New York, from the fort builders age to the last conquest by our Revolutionary forefathers > Part 9
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CHAPTER XV. OUR IMMEDIATE PREDECESSORS.
"Realm of the Senecas no more
In shadow lies the 'Pleasant Vale :'
Gone are the Chiefs who ruled of yore.
Like chaff before the rushing gale.
Their rivers run with narrowed bounds
Cleared are their broad old hunting grounds, And on their ancient battle fields
The greensward to the plowmen yields ; Like mocking echoes of the hill Their fame resounded and grew still
And on green ridge and level plain Their hearths will never smoke again."
Bard of the Genesee-Hosmer.
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THE PREDECESSORS OF- THE PIONEERS.
W HEN the French, English and Dutch were alike striving to possess the Empire State nearly two hundred years ago, they seemed oblivi- ous to the fact that the Confederated tribes had had possession previous to the discoveries of Columbus, for their confederacy dates back to 1440 or 1450-and there must have been a time back of that when the Senecas er Nundawahonos stood alone in Canada, with slight relation to the other jour nations allied in action. Although they call themselves the Hill-born- race and name the place or hill from which they sprung Ge-nun-de-wa, and locate it at the head of a lake within the Genesee county. The Iroquois were, however, the immediate predecessors of the Europeans and the Ho-de-no-sau- nee, or long house of the confederacy of five tribes called by the French the Iroquois, extended from the Hudson to the Genesee. Well may they have been called "The Romans of America," for their conquests extended in every direc- tion, and they levied tribute from the extreme east to the foot of Lake Su- perior. Their war cry froze the tropical blood as far south as Florida, and the frosts of Algonquin and Huron placidity and stoicism melted before the fire of their wrath. To the valor of the Senecas is due the destruction of most of the Indian allies of France. Their wrongs exceeded that of their four allies and they redressed them Indian fashion by extermination or entire subjuga- tion. All must be Senecas or die. The remnant of the Hurons became Sen- ecas-their council fire was put out. Most of the western forages were con- lucted by the Senecas alone. With 600 warriors they invaded Illinois. and the Illini were put under tribute even to the Father of Waters. They extended their series of conquests. And if, when the struggle of the Colonists with the Sen- ecas' allies, the British, commenced, they kept their silver chain compact and bright, who can attribute blame to them for that. The English and colo- nists were all alike to them except that the English were rich and the colonists were poor. They must have smiled, Indian fashion, to see these intruders on their domain trying to exterminate each other. Every dead white man was one less invader. Most of the Oneidas and Tuscaroras took sides with the colonists ; those who did not. came to the Genesee and were merged with the Senecas. Two strands in the five fold cord, unstrained for more than three centuries, had nearly parted ; only this Genesee fragment of Oneida and Tus carora held firm. The Senecas were so inured to warfare that they went to look on and became as usual active participants-the "Romans of the West" began to meet their impending fate. Sullivan's campaign proved their final destruction as invincible warriors and closed forever their "west door."
OUR INDEBTEDNESS TO THE SENECAS
We owe our predecessors many a debt of gratitude for their hostility to the French, which kept Western New York from continuing to be a part of New France. We have reason to thank them also for their wars of extermina- tion that decimated their own numbers, in subjugating others till they saw the utter futility of trying to fight with a power that had subdued the united forces of their strong army of allies, the British, and themselves. How, then. could they contend alone? And when their generous conquerors pensioned
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their subdued foes and treated thein far better than their allies, the British. had done, and purchased from them the very lands they had won from them in battle, it is not a matter of surprise that in our second struggle with our hard-hearted Mother, the most of our former Seneca foes were ranged on our side and now won our gratitude, as they had before, by their valor, won our admiration.
We in this lovely valley shared thy name Nundawahono of the centuries past, We shared thy valor, and we won a fame, We trust like yours forevermore will last.
In 1819 a census of the Indians was taken and in all of their reservations along the Genesee there were only 456. These only did our permanent pio- neers know. Those from the "White Woman's" Gardeau Reservation were nearest, but Squeakie Hill. Big Tree and Caneadea were near enough, and the fine hunting grounds of East Hill and Chautauqua Hollow made them fre- quent guests, always ready to eat without urging. They were, after they be- came our allies, in 1812-14, well disposed, quiet and orderly, and began to prac- tice husbandry, Some keeping a few cattle, horses, sheep and hogs. Some of the chief sons were sent away to school and John Hudson, a second son of that name of Chief Hudson went to Dartmouth College.
THE LAST SENECAS OF THE GENESEE
Names of the Indians who signed the treaty at Buffalo creek on the last days of August, 1826, for the sale of the Caneadea Reservation to a syndicate of capitalists and land speculators for $48,216. Forty-seven Sachems, Chiefs and warriors affixed their mark. Some of them are as follows:
Sa-gu-ar-gar-luch-ta or Young King; Forh-cu-ga or Little Billy; Corn- planter or John A. Beel (O'Beal), mixed blood ; Ty-won-e-ash or Black Snake ; On-on-da-ka-i or Destroy Town ; On-a-ju-ah-ka-i or Tall Peter ; Kan-e-ac-go or Blue Eyes : Nat-wen-dy-ha or Green Blanket, a Nunda Chief : Muk-ha-da- gen or White Boy ; Ha-pan-guish or Henry Two Guns ; Shi-can-a-du-ah-que or Little Beard : Sa-tu-gan-a-cre or Twenty Canoes ; As-lan-a-sa-ish or Silver Heels; Kan-a-ja-u-a-ri or Big Kettle : Sa-wag-doc or George Red Eye: Kan- ish-shon-go or Captain Shongo, son Colonel S .: Tal-a-gau-a-ta or Red Jacket also called Sa-go-ya-hat-ha) ; Sa-ga-in-a-shat-se-a or Stiff Knee.
John Grieg, attorney for Robert Troup: Thos. L. Ogden and Benj. W. Rogers, Commissoners.
CHAPTER XVI. THE LAST COUNCIL ON THE GENESEE.
W HEN General Sullivan, on his memorable expedition in 1779. de- stroyed the Seneca village, Little Beardstown, he had closed the "Western door of the Long House." But there was an Indian vil- lage beyond unknown to him; this was Caneadea, described as "an open sylvan glade through which the river ran, shut in on either side by the dense forests and in front the open sky, where nestled Ga-o-ya-de-o-where the Heavens rest upon the earth-the last Seneca 'castle' on the Genesee."
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"Its twenty or thirty houses stood somewhat back from a high bank that overlooked the stream, and its central feature was the old Caneadea council house, so fortunately still preserved to tell its story of a far-off past." It stood in the present town of Caneadea, Allegany County, and in the language of Henry R. Howland, from whom the above is quoted, it "was built of well hewn logs, a foot or more in thickness, neatly dove-tailed at the corners, their crevices packed with moss plastered in with clay. In length it measured about fifty feet, by twenty feet in width, and was roofed with 'shakes' or large split shingles held in place by long poles fastened at the ends with withes, an open- ing being left in the center of the roof through which the smoke of the council fire might escape. Its eaves were low and at one end was built a rude stone fire place with three large hearth stones taken from the river bed, covering a space ten feet square. There was a door at either side.
"Its age we do not know, but Indian traditions ascribe to it an antiquity that is venerable, and it is believed to long antedate the American Revolution L'pon the inner surface of one of the logs the sign of the cross is deeply carved and another bears the rudely cut totem of the Snipe clan.
"About it cluster thickly the memories of long ago; upon its earth floor has been lighted many a famous council fire, and its walls, smoke-begrimed and dark with age, have listened to the glowing words of many a red-skinned orator, whose eloquence fired his people to action, or, perchance, calmed the passion of debate.
"From this last of the Seneca villages went out the great war parties of the Iroquois that followed the Ohio trail to the great river of the Southwest. Ilere, too, they gathered for the border forays that carried terror to the Penn- sylvania frontiers ; and here the returning warriors brought their captives to run the gauntlet. to death may be. or in rare cases to escape their tortures and to find refuge and safety within the walls of their desperate goal, this ancient council-house.
"Here with their scarcely less savage allies, it is believed they gathered, as the rallying point before the massacre of Wyoming; and in these ruthless days the old council-house had doubtless heard the crafty but not inhumane counsels of Thay-en-da-na-ge-a, the great Mohawk Chief whom we know as Joseph Brant, the silver-tongue of that most famous of Indian orators, Red Jacket, the wise and compelling utterance of Cornplanter and the speech of Hudson and Young, King and Pollard, Little Beard and Tall Chief and Half- town and many beside whose very names are now but dim traditions, but who wrought their part and were loved or feared, as the case might be, by their people and by those who knew their power a century or more ago.
"A gentler association is that which the old council house holds with the memory of the white captive, Mary Jemison, 'De-he-wa-mis,' for here in the autumn of 1759 that weary-footed traveler (whose life of scarce eighteen years had already seen such strange vicissitudes, adopted by her captors five years before and married by their wish to an Indian husband) rested with her adopted brothers, who accompanied her on her long and tiresome journey of nearly 600 miles through an almost pathless wilderness from the Ohio to the Genesee country.
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"By whose hand was carved the deeply cut symbol of the Christian faith within those ancient walls we may not know. Its presence would seem to show that in their time they have heard gentle teachings from lips that have told those husky hearers of long ago of the God of Revelation, of Christ the Saviour, of a gospel of love and peace, and in their own tongue, perhaps, made known to them the story of the Cross. Could the old council house but speak of all that it has seen, how filled with riches would be the record of its years. "But times change and we change with them. The years swept by and the changes of another century than its own crept slowly around the council house. Little by little its old-time friends passed away and when in 1826 the Senecas sold the last of their Genesee valley lands, they parted with Caneadea and soon the old council house was left alone and deserted.
. THE LAST COUNCIL OF THE GENESEE
"Shortly thereafter Joel Seaton, who had purchased the land where it stood, moved it to a new position near the roadside, some thirty or forty rods eastward from its old site and used it as a dwelling, making no changes in it, however, except to put on a new roof and to add three or four logs to its height, as was readily to be seen. Slowly it began to decay ; it ceased to be used as a dwelling ; neglected and forlorn it stood by the roadside, marked only by the curious gaze of the passer-by until, when it was about to be destroyed. shortly after 1870, it came to the notice of Honorable William Pryor Letch- worth of Glen Iris, whose deep interest in the historic associations of the Gen- esee Valley led him to take prompt measures for its rescue and preservation.
"With painstaking care he caused each timber to be marked when taken down, so that it might be replaced where it belonged, and effected its removal. without injury, to the beautiful plateau overlooking the river and valley at Glen Iris, where it now stands. There it was carefully re-erected in precisely the position and the form in which it originally stood, even to the roof of
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.hakes with withe-bound poles and its own old fire-place with the original hearth-stones as in days of yore ; the rotting timbers repaired where this was necessary for its preservation, and when all was completed and the venerable structure stood as of old time, the scattered children of those who had been most famous in the history of the Seneca occupation of the Genesee Valley were bidden to the memorable council of October 1, 1872. It was a strange and impressive occasion to those who gathered to hold a council of their people after the lapse of half a century, in the very house where generation after gen- eration of those that slept had gathered before. To them it brought untold memories of pathos and regret. Doubly strange and impressive was it to the fortunate guests of another race who came at the wish of the Guardian of the Valley to witness such an unwonted sight; it dwells within their hearts in unfading recollection.
"The dust of Mary Jemison, borne back from the neglected grave near Buffalo by loving hands of descendants and friends, now rests in the soil of the valley she loved so well, and the white stone of her tomb, reared but a few paces from the council house, with it will form an enduring monument of the early history of the Genesee country. Some trees, also, brought from her former grave and set around the old building, will cast upon the place a me- morial shade. One planted by the granddaughter of Brant, the Mohawk. stands guard at the eastern door ; another, planted by the descendant of Red Jacket, keeps watch at the door of the west. In the branches of a third, set in the soil by the hands of her grandson, the wind, perhaps, will sometimes seem to whisper the name of the 'White Captive of the Senecas.'
"To Glen Iris came the lamented David Gray in attendance upon the 'last council' and he reveled in the charm and grandeur with which nature in her most prodigal mood had made a setting for this gem of the valley. The river, he writes, has scarcely cleared the base of the bridge over which he had jour- neyed when it breaks and tumbles some sixty or seventy feet in the first of a series of charming falls to a still deeper deep. Thenceforward it winds through the heart of an oval shaped valley, shut in by an arc of high and wooded hills But following its downward course a little more than half a mile from the bridge, the eye is met by a rising cloud of spray, and easily descries the crest of the precipice from which the Genesee takes its second leap to find its chan- nel at the bottom of the dark gulf below. Beyond and on either side of the fallen river loom the perpendicular walls of the deep and narrow canon down which it rushes and finally disappears.
"It is a sight for the drowsy passenger, when, as he crosses, the summer morning has come over the hills and filled this valley. Innumerable lights and shades of the varied verdure, the warm tints of the rocks and the flashing of the falling waters enliven a picture to which its sunken remoteness superadds an almost visionary charm. The two or three cottage roofs that peer from thick nests of foliage far down beside the river. suggest a life blissfully held apart from the world and its ways. Over all an atmosphere of thinnest mist. smitten to whiteness by the sunlight, wavers and shines like a translucent sea. The valley, indeed, is a region of lapsing streams and delicate rising mists, and never a gleam of sunshine visits it, but it deserves its name of Glen Iris.
"From the west end of the bridge the descent into the glen is made by the
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aid of flights of rustic steps and a steep path through thick woods of beech. maple and hemlock, leading to the margin of the stream. Half way down and crossed by a foot-bridge, a little brook, christened by the valley folk De-ge-wa- nus-an Indian name of note along the Genesee-dashes headlong from the mysterious green darkness of the upper forest, and commits suicide at the cliff of the river's bank. On the way, too, fine views are afforded of the upper fall of the Genesee. which has hewn its way backward through the rock almost to the foundations of the great bridge. As we emerge from the wood the river grows quiet again among its stones, and the valley widens into tranquil pas- ture lands. Looking across to the easterly side of the river the line of the Genesee Valley Canal is seen, drawn tightly around the contour of the hills and half way to their summit. *
"Ascending the slope toward the farther end of the valley we come in sight of the second or middle fall, a full rounded shoulder and flounced skirt of rock, over which the water is flung in a single broad shawl of snow-white lace more exquisite of pattern than any artist of Brussels or Valanciennes dared to dream. On a green tableland almost directly above this fall is the dwelling of the valley's good genius, a rustic paradise embowered in foliage of tree and vine and islanded in wavy spaces of softest lawn. Here art has aided nature to plant a true garden of tranquil delights. Each group of trees becomes the cunning frame of an enchanting picture or beautiful vignette. The hills. sen- tineled at their summits by lofty pines, are walls that shut the world out. while across the upper and visible approach to the glen the bridge stretches like a vast portal reared by Titans. It is the Happy Valley of fable realized, and the lulling sound of the near cataract gives fitting voice to its perfect seclusion and repose.
"I have spoken of the deep and winding canon into which the Genesee rushes, below Glen Iris and the middle fall. Following its onward course. the tourist makes his way cautiously along the dizzy brink of the westerly wall of the gulf. Higher and higher, as he progresses, towers the perpendicular rampart on which he treads, until, soon, it is from a sheer height of about four hundred feet that he leans, shuddering, to descry the river in its rocky inferno, and hearken to its voice softened by distance to a rustling whisper.
"About a mile from the middle fall the gulf partially relaxes its hold upon the brawling prisoner. and the visitor may make his way down a steep and wooded bank to what are called the lower falls of the Genesee. Here. in the midst of a wilderness still virgin and primeval, the waters shoot furiously down a narrow rock-hewn flume, their descent being nearly one hundred feet and the width of the torrent at some points scarcely more than the compass of a good running jump. From the somber chasm in which the cataract terminates, the canon once more draws the river and repeats on a still more magnificent scale the scenery at which I have hinted above. A. walk of four or five miles down the river from the lower fall and along the westerly bank of the canon brings us to a sudden opening and retrocession of the rocky walls and here a fertile expanse of bottom land, extending from the river to the hills, are the Gardeau Flats, the ancient home of the White Woman. Nearly eighteen thousand acres of this and the scarcely less rich soil of the plateau above it were hers. the free gift of tlie Seneca Nation to their once helpless girl captive."
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To this admirable pen-picture of Glen Iris by David Gray, the journalist poet, quoted from his "Last Council of the Genesee," we supplement Mr. Letchworth's account of its purchase and improvement :
"Previous to my making a purchase of a few hundred acres of land in the immediate vicinity of the middle falls. I had been impressed with the beauty of the scenery on the Genesee River in the neighborhood of Portage. When I first saw that portion of it between Portage bridge and the lower falls I de- cided at once to secure, if possible. a site for a residence here. and as my eye
HON. WILLIAM P. LETCHWORTH
took in a beautiful rainbow arched above the falls, the name of Glen Iris sug- gested itself to my mind. The lumberman's axe had made sad havoc in the surrounding forests, and the scene with its saw-mill perched on a cliff beside the middle falls, and the logs, lumber and rubbish that everywhere met the eye, made the locality seem quite forlorn. After securing title to the property in 1859 I began making improvements, directing my efforts to assisting nature in assuming her ancient reign. To shield places denuded of forest verdure I planted many trees and vines, and endeavored to develop on natural lines
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whatever was attractive in the landscape. Finding it necessary to protect the scenery about me, I purchased from time to time tracts adjoining my own at high prices, until finally my purchase swelled the aggregate number of acres in the Glen Iris estate to about one thousand and included the upper, middle and lower falls of the upper Genesee.
"From the outset I set about improving the public highways and making private roads and woodland paths along the cliffs, with stairways leading to heretofore inaccessible places for the benefit of lovers of nature. Notwith- standing the many rocks and cliffs which came into my possession, my pur- chase included some good farming land. It soon became evident that my prop- erty here could be made of great benefit to mankind, and I have aimed to so improve it as to render it available for future benevolent purposes. It has seemed to me that the place being at the point of an angle about equi-distant from the large and growing cities of Buffalo and Rochester, it could be made a great health resort, especially for invalid children, who might be benefited by the pure air and natural delights of this elevated region. The possibility of this has afforded me great satisfaction in developing this project, and has more than compensated me for the large sums I have expended."
Mr. Henry B. Howland, in his admirable sketch of the "Old Caneadea Council House and Its Last Council Fire," published in volume 6 of the publi- cations of the Buffalo Historical Society, gives an extended account of the last council fire, on an October day in 1872, with characteristic speeches from the noteworthy guests whom Mr. Letchworth, with great and discriminating care, had assembled. We believe that the interest which the present generation of dwellers in the Genesee valley feel. in things pertaining to the aboriginal occupants. justifies us in quoting at considerable length Mr. Howland's account of the proceedings at the last council.
GLEN IRIS, MIDDLE FALLS
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"The morning of that perfect day, in the beautiful month of falling leaves, dawned brightly ; early frosts had tinged the forest and loosened the leaves that dropped softly in the mellow sunlight. Some of the invited guests had come on the previous day, and when the morning train arrived from Buffalo the old King George cannon on the upper plateau thundered its welcome, as onice it was wont to wake the echoes from the fortress of Quebec, and all climbed the hill to the spot where the ancient council house stood with open doors to receive them. They were the lookers-on who found their places at one end of the Council-hall where rustic seats awaited them, save that in a more suitable and dignified chair was seated a former President of the Repub- lic, Hon. Millard Fillmore, of Buffalo, whose gracious and kindly presence- that of a snowy haired gentleman of the old school-honored the occasion.
"The holders of the council were 'robed and ready.' Upon the clay floor in the center of the building burned the bright council fire, and as the blue smoke curled upward it found its way through the opening in the roof to min- gle with the haze of the October day.
"Upon low benches around the fire sat the red-skinned children of the Ho- de-no-sau-nee, who had gathered from the Cattaraugus and the Allegheny and from the Grand River in Canada as well : for on that day for the first time in more than seventy years the Mohawks sat in council with the Senecas. They were for the most part clad in such costumes as their fathers wore in the olden days, and mamy of the buckskin garments, bright sashes and great necklaces of silver or bone and beads were heirlooms of the past, as were the ancient tomahawk pipes which were gravely smoked while their owners sat in rapt and decorous attention as one after another their orators addressed them. No sight could be more picturesque than was that combination of bright colors and nodding plumes. the drifting smoke of the council fire, and, most of all, the strong faces of the score or more of councilors, the appointed representatives of their people, to speak for them that day.
"They had been wisely chosen, for they were the grandchildren of re- nowned men and almost all bore the names of those who had been the recog- nized leaders of their nation in council and in war. As might well be expected, the personality of each was striking and noteworthy.
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