USA > New York > Schoharie County > History of Schoharie county, and border wars of New York > Part 11
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individuals named, being together after the event, and speaking of the Baronet's death, agreed in their opinion that his former declarations were prophetic, and that he was a man sufficiently determined to execute such design if once conceived. Col. Guy Johnson succeeded Sir William at his death,as the superintendent of Indian affairs for the colony of New York.
In 1775, Guy Johnson abandoned his situation on the Mohawk, and, with Joseph Brant and a formidable number of the Six Na- tions, went to Canada. Whether Colonel Claus accompanied Guy Johnson or Sir John to Canada, is uncertain ; but sure it is, he also left his possessions in the valley and removed thither. Sir John, violating a compact of neutrality made with General Schuyler, set out for Canada in the month of May, 1776, ac- companied by about three hundred followers, mostly Scotch settlers in and around Johnstown. After a march of nineteen days through an almost unbroken wilderness, suffering severely for the want of provisions, they reached Montreal. The wife of Guy Johnson died a short time after her removal to Canada.
NORTH VIEW OF GUY PARK.
Guy Park, which was just completed when its owner left it, was occupied during the war by Henry Kennedy; Fort Johnson by Albert Veeder ; and the Claus' house by Col. John Harper, until it accidentally took fire from a supposed defect in the chim- ney, and burned down. A tavern was afterwards erected near
9
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HISTORY OF SCHOHARIE COUNTY,
its site, and was for years known as the Simons place. These buildings, and the lands of their owners, with Johnson Hall and the lands belonging to it, were confiscated to the United States ; as was also the property of Col. John Butler, one of the King's justices for Tryon county, a man of influence and wealth, who re- moved at the beginning of the war from the same neighborhood to Canada.
The commissioners appointed March 6th, 1777, for disposing of confiscated personal property in Tryon county, were Col. Fre- derick Fisher, Col. John Harper, and Maj. John Eisenlord. The latter was, however, killed in the Oriskany battle, early in August following, and his place supplied by one Garrison.
When the personal property of Sir John Johnson was sold, which was some time before the sale of his real estate, his slaves were disposed of among the " goods and chattels." Col. Volkert Veeder bought the confidential one with whom the Knight left his plate and valuable papers, who buried them after his former master left. He kept the concealment of those valuables a secret in his own breast for four years, until Sir John visited the Mo- hawk valley in 1780, and recovered them and the slave.
The commissioners for selling real estates in Tryon county, were Henry Otthout and Jeremiah Van Rensselaer. They sold Johnson Hall, with seven hundred acres of land, to James Cald- well of Albany, for £6,600-who soon after sold it for £1,400. Caldwell paid the purchase in public securities, bought up for a song, and said he made money in the speculation, although he disposed of the property for £5,200 less, " on paper," than he gave for it. This transaction will serve to show the state of American credit at that period-probably in 1778 or '79.
Tradition says that a black ghost appeared several times dur- ing the Revolution, in a room in the north-west part of Fort Johnson, while occupied by Veeder. In one of the rooms at Guy Park, a female ghost resembling the then deceased wife of Guy Johnson is said to have appeared, to the great annoyance of the credulous Kennedy family. Even in the day time, they were more than once alarmed. About this time a German, a stranger
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to the family, called there, and inquired if the lady of its former proprietor had not been seen ; and when answered in the affirma- tive, he requested permission to tarry over night in the haunted room. It was readily granted, and he retired at an early hour. In the morning before his departure, he told the family they need be under no further apprehension, that the ghost would not again appear ; and in truth she did not. The mystery of the visits to those dwellings, which was a favorite theme on the tongue of the marvelous for many years, has never been revealed, and some of the old people living in the vicinity still believe that the visitants were supernatural beings, or real ghosts. The truth probably is, that the black ghost seen at Fort Johnson, was not the ideal, but the flesh and blood person of the confidential slave of its former proprietor ; who, by showing his ivory to some purpose, took ad- vantage of the fears of the family to bear off some valuable arti- cle secreted in some part of the building by its former occupants. Nor is it unlikely that a similar mission prompted some female to visit Guy Park-for ghosts never travel by daylight-that she could not find the article sought for, and that consequently a man, a stranger to the family, whose agent she may have been, know- ing she had failed to obtain the treasure, visited the house, and by gaining access to the room, found the object desired, and could then tell the family confidently that the ghost would not reap- pear. Many valuable articles were left behind by tories in their flight, who expected soon to return and recover them; and when they found the prospect of their return cut off, or long delayed, they then obtained them by the easiest means possible-and sure- ly none were easier than through the mystery of superstition.
From the great facility of Sir William Johnson to obtain lands, he became a most extensive land-holder. He was remarkably fond of women; and is believed to have been the father of several scores-some say an hundred children; by far the larger number of whom were part native, some by young squaws, and others by the wives of Indians who thought it an honor to have them on intimate terms with the king's agent; and would even bring them a great distance to prostitute them to his insatiable
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lust. The Five Nations, says Colden, carried their hospitali- ty to distinguished strangers so far, as to allow them their choice of a young squaw, from among the prettiest in the neighborhood, (washed clean and dressed in her best apparel) as a companion during his sojourn with them ; who performed all the duties of a fond wife. Of this custom, which was in vogue when the Baron- et settled among them, he availed himself. He had a rich scar- let blanket made, and bound with gold lace, which he wore when transacting business with the Indians, and it being a par- tial adoption of their own style of wardrobe, it pleased them very much. He often boasted of the pleasurable scenes of which that blanket was the sole witness. He erected buildings at a place called the Fish House, on the south bank of the Sacondaga river, some twelve or fifteen miles north-east of Johnstown, where he kept two white concubines, by the name of Wormwood. After the death of the mother of Sir John Johnson and his two own sisters, the Baronet took to his bosom Molly Brant, with whom he lived until his death. She was the mother of seven of his children.
Many pleasing anecdotes are related of Sir William Johnson, who perhaps exerted an unbounded influence over a greuter num- ber of Indians, than it was ever the lot of another white man to obtain in North America. His general character was rather happily elineated by Paulding in his Dutchman's Fireside. When he had trinkets and other presents to distribute among the Five Na- tions, and they assembled around Fort Johnson, and afterwards Johnson Hall, his tenants and neighbors were invited to be pre- sent. He was extravagantly fond of witnessing athletic feats, and on such occasions was gratified. On those festivals, not only young Indians and squaws, but whites, both male and female, were often seen running foot races, or wrestling for some gaudy trinket, or fancy article of wearing apparel. Men were some- times seen running foot races for a prize, with a meal-bag drawn over their legs and tied under the arms. The ludicrous figure presented by the crippled strides and frequent tumbles of those competitors, was a source of no little pleasure. Not unfrequent-
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ly a fat swine was the prize of contention. Its tail being well greased, the whole hog was given its freedom, and the individual who could seize and hold it by the tail became its lawful owner. It required a powerful gripe to win, and many a hand did such prizes usually slip through. An old woman is said to have seized on one, amid the jeers of the laughing multitude, after it had es- caped the grasp of many strong hands, and firmly held it. The secret was, she had prepared herself with a handful of sand. On one occasion, half a pound of tea was awarded to the individual who could, by contortion of feature, make the wryest face. Two old women were sometimes heard scolding most vehemently, the successful one to be rewarded with a bladder of Scotch snuff. The erection of a straight pole, after it had been peeled and well besmeared with soft-soap, with a prize upon its top worth seek- ing,-and after which the young Indians, in a state of nudity, would climb, was an oft repeated source of amusement. Children were sometimes seen searching in a mud-puddle for coppers Sir William had thrown in. His ingenuity was taxed for new sour- ces of merriment, and various were the expedients adopted to give zest to the scenes exhibited on those gala days. He was also a man of considerable taste, and discovered not a little in the culti- vation of shrubbery around Fort Johnson.
As the Johnsons were extensive land-owners, and preferred leas- ing to selling land, their disaffection to the American govern- ment, and its final confiscation, was a good thing for the country, as it became subsequently occupied by freeholders. The confis- cated lands of the Johnson family, must have yielded no in- considerable sum to an impoverished treasury.
The following anecdote is related of Sir William Johnson, who preferred retaining in himself the right of soil to his landed pos- sessions. He one day visited a tenant who was engaged in chop- ping wood for him. After some little conversation, the chopper described a certain one hundred acre lot in Albany bush, (now the eastern part of Johnstown,) and asked the Baronet what he would take for it, and execute him a deed. The latter, supposing the man had very little money, named a sum which was about the
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real value of the soil. " I will take it," was the quick and em- phatic reply of the laborer ; and he began counting out the mo- ney to his astonished landlord, upon the very stump the last fallen tree had left. " I would rather not have sold it for twice that · sum," said Sir William, " but since you have fairly bought it, you shall have a title to it ;" and taking the money, he executed a deed to him. He was the patron of many laudable enterprises, and I must suppose him to have aided in establishing Queen's College, N. J., as he was the first trustee named in the charter.
In the summer of 1764, says the Gentleman's Magazine, pub- lished soon after,
" Sir William Johnson, with a body of regular and provincial forces, to which more than one thousand friendly Indians have joined themselves, has lately marched to visit the forts of Oswego, Niagara, Detroits, Pittsburg, &c., in order to strike terror in the Western nations, and to reduce them to reason ; many of these nations are unknown to their brethren, and some have already of- fered terms of peace ; the Shawnese are the most formidable of those who stand out : And the friendly Indians express great eager- ness to attack them. Since the march of these troops, the back settlements have enjoyed perfect tranquility ; and the Senecas have sent in a great number of English prisoners, agreeable to their en- gagement."
In the May number of the same Magazine, for 1765, I find the following additional notice of the Baronet :
" Sir William Johnson at his seat at Johnson Hall, in North America, has had a visit lately paid him by upwards of a thousand Indians of different tribes, all in friendship; greatly to the satis- faction of his Excellency, as tending to promote a good understand- ing with those nations, for the good of his Majesty's subjects."
Before his death, Sir William Johnson willed to his children by Miss Brant, the valuable lands known as the Royal Grant, which he obtained so easily from the celebrated warrior Hendrick. Af- ter death, his remains were placed in a mahogany coffin, and that inclosed in a leaden one, previous to being deposited in a vault beneath the Episcopal Church; which building was erected in Johnstown about the year 1772. At some period of the Revolu- tion, lead being very scarce, the vault was opened and the leaden coffin taken by the patriots and moulded into bullets. The coffin
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containing the body having become somewhat broken, a new one was made after the war closed, and the Baronet's remains trans- ferred to it. The lid of the first coffin, which bore his name in silver nails, was afterward suspended in the church. Not many years ago, the edifice was fitted up at considerable cost, at which time the vault was filled up with sand. In a destructive fire which subsequently visited Johnstown, the church was burned down; and on its being rebuilt, the site was so altered as to leave the grave of Sir William* outside its walls .- Alexander J. Comrie.
So
FORBES. Del
HENDRICK, GREAT CHIEF OF THE MOHAWK NATION.
" The brave old Hendrick, the great SACHEM or Chief of the Mohawk Indians, one of the Six Nations now in Alliance with, and subject to the King of Great Britain."
· A portrait of Sir William Johnson was owned in Johnstown until about the year 1830, when it was purchased by a member of the Col. Claus family for a small sum, and taken to Canada .- Mrs. W. S.
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HISTORY OF SCHOHARIE COUNTY.
At the bottom of the picture is the preceding explanation. This celebrated warrior, commonly called King Hendrick, was, for a time, the most distinguished Indian in the colony of New York. For the picture from which the above was engraved, I would here acknowledge my indebtedness to John S. Walsh, Esq., of Bethlehem. This interesting relic of the Mohawk valley, around which cluster associations of classic interest, connected with the colonial history of the state, was sold in the revolution among the confiscated property of Sir John Johnson, went into the Cuyler family for a length of time, and subsequently into that of Mr. Walsh. The tradition in the latter family is, that Hendrick visit- ed England in the evening of his life, and that while there was presented, by his Majesty, with a suit of clothes richly embroid- ered with gold lace, in which he sat for his portrait. As he is represented in full court dress, it is highly probable the tradition is correct. The original picture is a spirited engraving-colored to life and executed in London, but at what date is unknown ; probably about the year 1745 or '50. He visited Philadelphia some time before his death, says the historian Dwight, at which time his likeness was taken ; from which a wax figure was made, said to have been a good imitation of his person.
King Hendrick was born about the year 1680, and generally dwelt at the Upper Castle of the Mohawk nation, although for a time he resided near the present residence of Nicholas Yost, on the north side of the Mohawk, below the Nose. He was one of the most sagacious and active sachems of his time. He stood high in the confidence of Sir William Johnson, with whom he was en- gaged in many perilous enterprises against the Canadian French ; and under whose command he fell in the battle of Lake George, September 8th, 1755, covered with glory. In the November number of the Gentleman's Magazine, for 1755, is the following notice of his death :
" The whole body of our Indians were prodigiously exasperated against the French and their Indians, occasioned by the death of the famous Hendrick, a renowned Indian warrior among the Mo- hawks, and one of their sachems, or kings, who was slain in the battle, and whose son upon being told that his father was killed,
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giving the usual Indian groan upon such occasions, and suddenly putting his hand on his left breast, swore his father was still alive in that place, and stood there in his son."
The tract of land owned by Sir William Johnson, and called the Royal Grant, which contained nearly one hundred thousand acres of choice land, now mostly situated in the county of Herki- mer, was obtained from Hendrick in the following manner. Be- ing at the Baronet's house (Fort Johnson) the sachem observed a new coat, richly embroidered with gold lace, which the former intended for his own person; and on entering his presence after a night's rest, he said to him, "Brother, me dream last night." " Indeed," responded the royal agent, " and what did my red brother dream ?" "Me dream," was the chief's reply, "that this coat be mine !" "Then," said the sagacious Irishman, "it is yours, to which you are welcome." Soon after this interview, Sir William returned his guest's visit, and on meeting him in the morning said to him, " Brother, I dreamed last night !" " What did my pale-faced brother dream ?" interrogated the Sachem. " I dreamed," said his guest, " that this tract of land," describing a square bounded on the south by the Mohawk, on the east by Canada creek, and on the north and west by objects familiar to them, " was all my own !" Old Hendrick assumed a thoughtful mood, but although he saw the enormity of the request, he would not be outdone in generosity, or forfeit the friendship of the British agent, and soon responded, " Brother, the land is yours, but you must not dream again !" The title to this land was con- firmed by the British government, on which account it was called the Royal Grant .- Henry Frey Yates, Esq.
In the summer of 1754, a plan of colonial alliance was pro- posed in the American colonies, to resist the encroachments of the Canadian French and Indians, in furtherance of which the chiefs of the Six Nations of New York met the commissioners of the several governments at Albany on the 2d of July; when those Sachems were addressed by James De Lancey, then lieu- tenant governor of the colony. Hendrick, whose speeches are said to have been correctly reported for the London Magazine, in
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which I find them, was the principal speaker; and as those speeches will compare for reasoning and pathos with those of modern statesmen, indeed, would not have disgraced a Demos- thenes, and will serve to introduce the young reader to an almost extinct race of men, I insert them.
Abraham, Sachem of the Upper Castle of the Mohawks, rose up and said-
" Brethren, You, the governor of New York, and the commis- sioners of the other governments, are you ready to hear us! The governor replied, they were all ready.
" Then Hendrick, brother to the said Abraham; and a Sachem of the same castle, rose up and spake in behalf of the Six Na- tions as follows :
" Brethren, just now you told us you were ready to hear us ; hearken unto me.
" Brother Corlaer, (a name given to the governor of New York by the Indians long ago,) and brothers of the other governments, Saturday last you told us that you came here by order of the great king our common father, and in his name to renew the antient chain of friendship between this and the other governments on the continent, and us the Six United Nations : And you said also, there were then present commissioners from Massachusett's Bay, New Hampshire, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Pensylvania, and Maryland; and that Virginia and Carolina desired to be con- sidered also as present : We rejoice that by the king's orders, we are all met here this day, and are glad to see each other face to face; we are very thankful for the same, and we look upon the governors of South Carolina and Virginia as also present. [a belt.
" Brethren, We thank you in the most hearty manner for your condolence to us; we also condole all your relations and friends who have died since our last meeting here. [gave three
strings of wampum.
" Brethren, (holding the chain belt given by his honor and the several governors in his hand,) We return you all our grateful acknowledgements for renewing and brightening the covenant- chain.
" This belt is of very great importance to our united nations and all our allies. We will therefore take it to Onondago, where our council-fire always burns, and keep it so securely, that neither thunder nor lightning shall break it. There we will consult over it, and as we have lately added two links to it, so we will use our endeavors to add as many links more as it lies in our power : And we hope when we shew you this belt again, we shall give you reason to rejoice at it, by your seeing the vacancies in it filled up (referring to his honor's explanation of it in his general speech). In the mean time we desire that you will strengthen yourselves, and bring as many into this covenant as you possibly can. We
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do now solemnly renew and brighten the covenant-chain with our brethren here present, and with all our other absent brethren on the continent.
" Brethren, As to the accounts you have heard of our living divided from each other, it is very true, we have several times attempted to draw off those of our brethren who are settled at Oswegatie, but in vain; for the governor of Canada is like a wicked deluding spirit ; however, as you desire, we shall persist in our endeavors.
" You have asked us the reason of our living in this divided manner; the reason is, your neglecting us these three years past ; (then taking a stick and throwing it behind his back) You have thus thrown us behind your backs, and disregarded us ; whereas, the French are subtle and vigilant people, ever using their utmost endeavors to seduce and bring our people over to them. [a belt.
" Brethren, The encroachments of the French, and what you have said to us on that article on behalf of the king our father ; as these matters were laid before us as of great importance, so we have made strict enquiry among all our people, if any of them have either sold or given the French leave to build the forts you mention, and we cannot find that either sale has been made or leave has been given ; but the French have gone thither without our consent or approbation, nor ever mentioned it to us.
" Brethren, The governor of Virginia and the governor of Canada are both quarrelling about lands which belong to us, and such a quarrel as this may end in our destruction. They fight who shall have the land ; the governors of Virginia and Pennsyl- rania have made paths through our country to trade, and built houses without acquainting us with it ; They should have first asked our consent to build there, as was done when Oswego was built.
[gave a belt.
" Brethren, It is very true, as you told us, that the clouds hang heavy over us, and it is not very pleasant to look up, but we give you this belt [giving a belt] to clear away all clouds, that we may all live in bright sunshine, and keep together in strict union and friendship; then we shall become strong, and nothing can hurt us.
" Brethren, This is the antient place of treaty where the fire of friendship always used to burn, and it is now three years since we have been called to any public treaty here ; 'tis true, there are commissioners here, but they have never invited us to smoke with them (by which they mean, the commissioners had never invited them to any conference), but the Indians of Canada came frequently and smoked with them, which is for the sake of their beaver, but we hate them (meaning the French Indians): We have not as yet confirmed the peace with them : 'tis your fault, brethren, we are not strengthened by conquest, for we should have gone and taken Crown Point, but you hindered us : We had concluded to go and take it ; but we were told it was too late, and
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that the ice would not bear us. Instead of this you burnt your own fort at Saraghtogee and run away from it; which was a shame and a scandal to you. Look about your country, and see you have no fortifications about you, no, not even to this city. 'Tis but one step from Canada hither, and the French may easily come and turn you out of doors.
" Brethren, You desired us to speak from the bottom of our hearts, and we shall do it. Look about you, and see all these houses full of beaver, and the money is all gone to Canada; like- wise your powder, lead, and guns, which the French make use of at the Ohio.
" Brethren, You were desirous we should open our minds and our hearts to you ; look at the French, they are men ; they are fortifying every where; but we are ashamed to say it ; you are like women, bare and open, without any fortifications."
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