USA > New York > Columbia County > History of Columbia County, New York. With illustrations and biographical sketches of some of its prominent men and pioneers > Part 2
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* At that time the flag of Helland was formed by three horizontal bars,-orange, white, and blue; but in or about the year 1650 the orange bar gave place to one of red.
t " When some of them first saw the ship approaching afar off they did not know what to think about her, but stood in deep and solemn amazement, wondering whether it was a spock or apparition, and whether it came from heaven or bell. Others of them supposed that it might be a strange fish or sca-monster. They supposed those on board to be rather devils than human beings. Thus they differed among each other in opinion. A strange report soon spread through their country about the visit, and created great talk and comment among all the Indians. This we have heard several Indians tes- tify."- Yan Der Donck's Description of New Netherland.
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HISTORY OF COLUMBIA COUNTY, NEW YORK.
saw such great numbers of them collected together he had some misgivings as to their intentions, and the safety of himself, his crew, and his vessel, and he determined to sub- ject some of their principal men to a test, " to see whether they had any treachery in them," and it was a most cun- ning as well as efficacious one which he applied. "They took them down into the cabin and gave them so much wine and aqua vitæ that they were all merry. In the end one of them was drunk, and they could not tell how to take it." He argued most correctly that, however much they might be disposed to dissimulate, the test of the fire-water would tear away the veil and unmask their treacherous designs, if any such were entertained by them. But no indication of perfidy was discovered. All drank until their tongues were loosened, but one old chief went farther, and became help- lessly intoxicated. When his Indian friends began to see his manner change and his step grow unsteady, until at last he lay prostrate upon the deck, they set up sad howlings of grief, for they believed him to be dead. But the stran- gers assured them by signs that he was not dead, and that after a time he would be as well as ever. Then they de- parted for the shore, though in great sadness, for they left the old man uneonscious upon the cabin floor, and probably they doubted the truth of the white men's assurances that he would in due time recover. In the morning, however, they came back and found him alive and apparently none the worse for his excesses ; and he assured them that never iu all his life before had he been so happy as after he drank the strange liquid, and while he remained in the tranee. He asked that he might have more of the strong water, and his request was complied with, though this time with greater caution. A small quantity was also given to each of the other Indians, whose confidence and friendly feelings were thus fully restored ; and they departed in excellent spirits, and full of the belief that their recent entertainers belonged to a superior order of beings.
It was not long before they again returned, and " brought tobacco and beads," which they presented to the captain, " and made an oration, and showed him all the country round about. Then they sent one of their company on land again, who presently returned and brought a great platter full of venison, dressed by themselves ;" and after the captain had, at their request, partaken of this, " then they made him reverence and departed, all save the old man," who would probably have preferred never again to quit the In- dian paradise which he had discovered .*
As Hudson found that the river was shoaling rapidly he proceeded no farther with his vessel,t but sent his boats several miles higher up, to where they found the stream broken by rapids, which intelligence he received with great sorrow, as putting an end to all his hopes of finding here a practicable northwest passage to the eastern seas. Having
now no alternative but to return by the way he came, he left his anchorage ou the 23d of September for his voyage down the river. So difficult did he find the navigation among the islands and windings of the channel, that he did not reach the vicinity of the present city of Hudson until the afternoon of the 24th, when the little " Half-Moon" ran aground and stuck fast on the " bank of ooze in the middle of the river," now known as the " middle ground." How much difficulty he had in getting his vessel off we do not know ; whether she was freed without trouble by the rising of the tide, or whether the difficulty required the aid of kedge and capstan ; but it is certain that this mishap, to- gether with an adverse wind which sprang up, detained him here for two days, which interval he employed in storing his vessel with wood, in exploring the neighboring shores, aud in receiving a ceremonious visit of friendship from the peo- ple of the Indian village where he had first landed. There were two canoe-loads of these visitors, and Captain Hudson found-no doubt to his astonishment-that a chief person - age among them was the old savage who had passed the night on board the " Half-Moon" after his debauch. It may be inferred that, grieving at Hudson's departure, he had set out at once by the river trail, hoping to find the vessel at anchor at some point below, where he would again meet the agreeable strangers, and once more taste the ex- hilarating schnapps. He had found the vessel motionless in the river as he had hoped, and had now come off to pay her a final visit with his. Indian friends in the manner we have mentioned. With him had come another old man, apparently a chief, who presented the captain with belts of wampum, and "shewed him all the country thereabout, as though it were at his command." Two old women were also of the party, "and two young maidens of the age of sixteen or seventeen years with them, who behaved them- selves very modestly." And the old men and the old women and the maidens were taken to dine in the ship's cabin, where doubtless they were served with wine or aqua vitæ.
After the repast, they gave their host, by signs, a cordial invitation to visit them again at their village, but when given to understand that this could not be they departed very sorrowfully, though somewhat consoled by numerous presents, and the assurance that their white friends would again come across the great lake and visit them. The next morning, September 27, 1609, the " Half-Moon" spread her sails to a brisk northerly breeze, and soon was lost to sight beyond the wooded headlauds. At Catskill the "very loving people" called out, and made signs of invitation to the captain and crew ; but the wind was fair and the tide served, and so the little brigantine kept straight on her course. On the 4th of October she passed Sandy Hook . and stood out to sea, and her bold commander never again saw the beautiful river which he had discovered, and which now bears his name. During the stay of the vessel in the bay of New York she had lost one of her company by the arrows of the savages, and several Indian lives were after- wards taken in retaliation; but at every place above the highlands Captain Hudson's relations with the natives were entirely pacific, so that at his final departure they exhibited a grief which was only partially allayed by presents, and by
# A century and a half later, Heckewelder and other Moravian missionaries found, not only among the Delawarcs and the Mohicans, but also among the nations of the Iroquois, a tradition having refer- ence to a socne of drunkenness which occurred at the time when the red men first received the fatal gift of fire-water from the hands of Europeans.
+ While lying here the carpenter made a new forc-yard for the "Half-Moon," this being the first timher ever exported from the Hudson river.
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HISTORY OF COLUMBIA COUNTY, NEW YORK.
the assurance (imperfectly understood) that the ship's people would soon return from across the great waters and revisit them. This promise was in a measure performed, for although the same vessel did not return, there came in the following year another ship, commanded by the former mate of the " Half-Moon," and having on board a part of the crew who had accompanied Captain Hudson ; and we are informed that when these were met by the natives who had visited them on the previous voyage " they were much rejoiced at seeing each other."
Among the presents which Hudson had given them were some axes and other implements, to assist them in their rude agriculture. These the sailors now saw suspended as ornaments around the necks of the chiefs, as they had no idea of their proper manner of use; but when they were instructed how to handle them they were much delighted, and made great merriment over their mistake. But few incidents of the voyage of this second vessel are found recorded.
In 1612, two ships, named the "Tiger" and the " For- tune," fitted out by merchants in Amsterdam, and com- manded by Captains Block and Christiansen, came here for purposes of trade, and from that time the traffic with the natives along the river (the profitable nature of which had come to be fully understood) was regularly carried on by vessels sent hither for the purpose from Holland. Hudson had named his discovery the "River of the Mountains," but the Dutch traders who came after him called it the River Mauritius, in honor of Prince Maurice, of Nassau.
It was the Indian tribe or nation known as the Mohican -- the same which has been celebrated in Cooper's fascinating romances -- which, at the first coming of the white man, held as its rightful possession not only the present domain of Columbia, but also those of the adjoining counties of Rens- selaer and Berkshire; its chief village or council-seat being at Schodack, or, in their own tongue, Esquatak, " the fire- place of the nation," with other villages perhaps as popu- lous but less important on Beeren or Mohican island and at various points on the eastern shore of the river .* In 1690, after the burning of Schenectady, the Indians were removed from Beeren island to Catskill, and were employed by the government as " outlying scouts" towards the north. They were probably but few in number at that time. They had also a village at Wyomenock, another at Potkoke, a place "about three [Dutch] miles inland from Claverack," and others at different places in the interior ; as well as a rudely- fortified stronghold, erected near the present site of Green- bush, against the incursions of their enemies the Mohawks.
The Mohicans claimed (as also in fact did the other In- dian tribes) that theirs was among the most ancient of all aboriginal nations. One of their traditions ran that, ages before, their ancestors had lived in a far-off country to the west, beyond the mighty rivers and mountains, at a place where the waters constantly moved to and fro, and that, in the belief that there existed away towards the rising sun a
red man's paradise,- a land of deer, and salmon, and beaver, -- they had traveled on towards the east and south to find it ; but that they were scourged and divided by famine, so that it was not until after long and weary journeyings, during which many, many moons had passed, that they came at length to this broad and beautiful river, which forever ebbed and flowed like the waters from whose shores they had come; and that here, amidst a profusion of game and fish, they rested, and found that Indian Elysium of which they had dreamed before they left their old homes in the land of the setting sun.
At the present day there are enthusiastic searchers through the realms of aboriginal lore who, in accepting the narrative as authentic, imagine that the red men came hither from Asia across the Behring strait, through which they saw the tide constantly ebb and flow, as mentioned in the tradition.
The fact is, that all Indian tribes told of long pilgrimages and of great deeds performed by their ancestors far in the shadowy past, and claimed to trace back their history and descent for centuries. Missionaries and travelers among them gravely tell us of Indian chronology extending back to the period before the Christian era; and some enthusi- asts have claimed that the American aborigines were de- scendants of the lost tribes of Israel. But it is not the province of the historian to enter any such field of specu- lation. All their traditions were so clouded and involved in improbability, and so interwoven with superstition, that, as regards their truth or falsity, it need only be said that they afford an excellent opportunity for indulgence in the luxury of dreamy conjecture.
The Mohicans named their great river the " Shatemuc," but by the Iroquois it was called " Cahohatatea," and by the Delawarcs and other southern tribes, " Mohicanittuck," or the river of the Mohicans. With its inexhaustible store of fish, with shores and islands of such surpassing fertility as to yield abundant returns even to their careless and in- dolent husbandry, and bordered by forests swarming with game, it was a stream and a country such as Indians love ; and there was no nation or tribe, from the ocean to the lakes, who had more reason to love their domain than the Mohicans. They were a humiliated and partially-conquered people when the Dutch first came among them. Their fighting men then only numbered a few hundreds, and these were broken in spirit by continual defeat ; but they sadly boasted that the time had been, within the memory of some of their old men, when the call of their sagamores could muster more than a thousand warriors for the foray,t and when their council-house was sought by emissaries from dis- tant and weaker tribes desiring their alliance, aid, or inter- cession. They even claimed that theirs was once " the head of all the Algonquin nations." The Moravian mis- sionary, Heckewelder, relates what was told him by a very aged Mohican, as follows : " Clean across this extent of country (from Albany to the Susquehanna) our grandfather had a long house, with a door at each end, which door was always open to all the nations united with them. To this house the nations from ever so far used to resort and smoke
* Indian skeletons have been exhumed, in making excavations for building, on the lower end of Warren street, in the city of Hudson, which leads to the belief that an Indian village was once located in that vicinity. Arrow-heads, corn-pestles, and other Indian relies, are found in every part of the county.
+ This assertion of the Mohicans was confirmed by the Delawares, and also by the Iroquois, who boasted of having vanquished so strong a people.
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IIISTORY OF COLUMBIA COUNTY, NEW YORK.
the pipe of peace with their grandfather. The white people, coming from over the great water, landed at each end of this long house of our grandfather, and it was not long be- fore they began to pull it down at both ends. Our grand- father still kept repairing the same, though obliged to make it from time to time shorter ; until at length the white people, who by this time had grown very powerful, assisted the common enemy, the Muquas ( Iroquois), in erecting a strong house upon the ruins of our grandfather's."
The Mohicans told that, in the time of their strength, when their tribe mustered a thousand warriors, they had subdued and thoroughly cowed the afterwards dreaded Mohawks, and that it was only after the latter had sne- ceeded in banding together against them the Five Nations of the Iroquois* that they succeeded in turning the tide of victory against the Mohicans, and in forcing them across the Shatemue. Their pride and patriotism, how- ever, would never allow them to relate or to admit the ex- tent of their defeat, and indeed it does not appear that they had then been completely subjugated, thongh Smith, in his " History of New York," published in 1756, says that, " When the Dutch began the settlement of this country, all the Indians on Long Island and the northern shore of the sound, on the banks of Connecticut, Hudson's, Dela- ware, and Susquehanna rivers, were in subjection to the Five Nations, and, within the memory of persons now living, acknowledged it by the payment of an annual tribute." And Brodhead says, in his " History of New York," that "long before European discovery the question of savage supremacy had been settled ou the waters of the Cahohatatea," by the triumph of the Iroquois and the humiliation of the Mohican.
When Hudson came, and for nearly twenty years after- wards, the relations which we have described were those existing between the two nations. They were nominally at peace, but it was a peace brought about by the prostration of the Mohicans, in whose breasts there rankled the most intense hatred towards their Mohawk conquerors. It was the policy of the Dutch to promote peace between the tribes, for a state of war would injure the profitable trade which they prosecuted with both, and for which alone they cared. But they recognized the superiority of the Mo- hawks and the subordination of the Mohicans. At the great treaty held in 1617, at Nordman's Kill, or Tawa- sentha creek, Brodhead says, " The belt of peace was held fast at one end by the Iroquois, and at the other by the Dutch, while in the middle it rested on the shoulders of the subjugated Mohicans, Mincecs, and Lenni Lenapes."
The yoke grew more and more galling to the Mohicans, and slowly they were brought to the point of open revolt, and a renewal of the war against the Mohawks. It may have been that their possession of Dutch fire-arms gave them confidence; but if so it was unfounded, for the Mohawks were quite as well provided with these weapons
as themselves. But however this may have been, the Mohicans succeeded in uniting the Wappingers, Minsis, and other river tribes, and in the year 1625 again com- menced hostilities. In the following year they indueed Krieckbeck, the Dutch superintendent at Fort Orange (Albany), to set out with them, with a few of his men, in an expedition against the Mohawks. This foray was un- successful, and resulted in the killing of Krieckbeck and several of his men, and in spreading such a panic among the Dutch settlers near the fort that Governor Minuit removed all the families down the river, and ordered the garrison to observe strict neutrality in future during the continuance of the hostilities.
The war raged with great ferocity for three years, during which the advantage was oftener with the Mohawk than with the Mohican braves. There is a tradition that the final struggle for supremacy took place within the present county of Columbia, and not far from where the city of Hudson now stands. It is to the effect that, both tribes having mustered all their strength for the conflict, the Mohicans had retreated to decoy their enemies into their own territory, and, retiring before them, had come at last to a place nearly opposite to where the village of Catskill now is, and that there, upon ground of their own selection, they stood for battle, which each party fully understood must be a decisive one.
The fight raged through all the day, and at evening the Mohicans were ahost victors. Disaster stared in the faces of the Mohawk warriors, and they saw that they had no longer any hope except through stratagem. In apparent precipitation and panic they slunk away from the bloody field, and fled in the darkness to an island in the river. The Mohicans soon discovered their flight, and promptly yet cautiously pursuing, came at last to a place where, around smothered camp-fires, their enemies seemed to have stretched themselves to rest, without the precaution of posting sentinels. They felt almost as much of pity as of contempt for their unwary foes, but they let fly their arrows at the blanketed forms, and then leaped in with knife and tomahawk. They had made a fatal mistake! The Mohawks, foreseeing the pursuit, had made fagots of brushwood, wound these with their blankets, and disposed them around the fires in a manner to appear like sleeping Indians ; then, lying flat upon the ground in the adjacent thickets, they awaited the moment when their enemies should discover the fires and waste their arrows upon the delusive blankets. That moment had come, and now the Mohawks yelled the war-whoop and closed with their antagonists, who, ambuscaded and panic-stricken, were soon either killed, captured, or put to flight. The scene of this bloody and decisive battle was Vastrick island, now known as Rogers' island, between Hudson and Catskill.t
The result of the campaign of 1628 was the complete overthrow of the Mohicans of this section, and their flight across the Taghkanie hills. " The conquered tribe," says Wassenaer (Doc. Ilist., iii. 48), " retired towards the north
# The date of the formation of the league between the Five Na- tions is not known. The Rev. Mr. Pyrlaeus, a missionary among the Mohawks, gives as the result of his investigations that it occurred " one age, or the length of a man's life, before the white people came into the country." Gallatin says, " The time when the confederacy was formed is not knowo, but it was presumed to he of recent date."
+ Historians mention a great Indian hattle which was fought during that war, not far from where Rhinebeck now is, and that the unburied bones in great numbers still lay upon the field when the first Dutch settlers arrived in its vicinity.
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HISTORY OF COLUMBIA COUNTY, NEW YORK.
by the Fresh river, so called, where they began to cultivate the soil, and thus the war terminated." The " Fresh river" mentioned by Wassenaer was the Connecticut, that being the name then given to it by the Dutch. His meution of it as being " towards the north" is neither strange nor ma- terial, as points of compass were very vaguely and care- lessly referred to in those days. The fact was that the vanquished Mohicans took refuge in the Connecticut val- ley, where at first they were well received by their kins- men, the Pequods. Their lands within the present coun- ties of Columbia and Rensselaer were vacated, but not taken for occupation by the victorious Mohawks. After a few years the exiles came back, first as transient hunting and fishing parties, and afterwards for more permanent stay ; but never afterwards were they a numerous people, though they again inhabited Potkoke and several other villages. The " fireplace of the nation," however, was no longer at Schodack, but at Westenhok, beyond the Taghkanics.
For more than thirty years after their subjugation they lived in continnal terror of the Mohawks, and paid to their conquerors such tribute as their weakness and poverty per- mitted. But in 1663-64 another combination against their tyrants seems to have been effected, though how composed, or how brought about, does not seem wholly clear. In Kregier's " Journal of the Second Esopus War" it is re- lated that in the fall of 1663 the inhabitants of Bethlehem, in Albany county, were warned by a friendly Indian to re- move to a place of security, as " five Indian nations had assembled together, namely the Mahikanders [ Mohicans], Kutskills, the Wappingers, those of Esopns, besides another tribe that dwell half-way between Fort Orange and Hart- ford ;" that their " place of meeting was on the east side of Fort Orange river, about three [Dutch] miles inland from Claverack ;" and that they were "about five hundred strong." Also that " Hans, the Norman, arrived at the redoubt with his yacht from Fort Orange, reports that full seven thousand Indians had assembled at Claverack, on the east side, about three [Dutch] miles inland, but he knows not with what intent." These last-mentioned figures are manifestly absurd, and even the estimate of five hundred was undoubtedly much too high. It is not probable that the Mohicans then living west of the Taghkanic range could muster one-sixth that number of warriors.
In July, 1664, Brodhead says, " War now broke out again. The Mohicans attacked the Mohawks, destroyed cattle at Greenbush, burned the house of Abraham Staats, at Claverack, and ravaged the whole country on the east side of the North river ;" but these ravages could not have been committed or incited by this tribe of the Mohicans, who do not appear to have been unfriendly to the Dutch settlers.
The English took possession of the province in Septem- ber, 1664, and immediately used all exertions to prevent hostilities between these tribes, and with so much of success that but little more Indian blood was shed in the feuds be- tween Mohican and Iroquois.
King Philip's war in Massachusetts, which was closed in 1676 by the death of the chief, was the means of adding to the Indian population of this region. After the decisive conflict of the 12th of August in that year, the Pennacooks,
who formed a part of Philip's forces, retreated before the victors until they came to the Hudson river, where a part of them crossed to the old Indian village of Potick, near Catskill, but the remainder took up their residence " near Claverack ;" probably at the Mohican village of Potkoke. Notwithstanding these accessions, the total number of river Indians in the county of Albany in the year 1689 was only two hundred and fifty, and eight years later (1697) was but ninety, as returned by the high sheriff and justices of the peace, who made an official enumeration by order of the Earl of Bellamont. And when it is remembered that this number included all, children and adults, on both sides of the river, it will easily be seen to what a miserable handful the once powerful tribe of New York Mohicans had be- come reduced.
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