USA > New York > Genesee County > History of the Genesee country (western New York) comprising the counties of Allegany, Cattaraugus, Chautauqua, Chemung, Erie, Genesee, Livingston, Monroe, Niagara, Ontario, Orleans, Schuyler, Steuben, Wayne, Wyoming and Yates, Volume I > Part 14
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The English authorities were not entirely asleep, and, when. William Burnet became, by royal appointment, Governor of New York and New Jersey, April 19, 1720, he went to New York where he found that the Niagara situation had been accepted as. so threatening that within a month after his arrival he dis- patched a message to the Lords of Trade proposing to fortify the frontier to prevent the French "from seducing the Senecas." He then entered into a lively correspondence with the Governor of Canada. The French were now spurred to build a stone fort at Niagara, and the English responded by erecting a fortification and trading post at Oswego. The French built well, and one of their structures, "The House of Peace," still stands on the old site. Its walls are thick, but it has no appearance of being a. fort, hence the name, expressing its hoped-for intentions; it was, however, surrounded by a palisade and had a guard house. Ap- parently the French had scored a great victory, but we must look toward Albany for the English counter-thrust.
Governor Burnet called a council at Albany in September, 1726, and carefully explained the situation, pointing out that the existence of a French fort was decidedly against the interests. of the Six Nations. He also wrung from the Onondaga ambassa- dors the admission that all the Niagara land belonged to the Sen- ecas, including the land across the river. So adroitly did Burnet.
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present the case, that he placed the Indians in the position of being the wronged parties, who should lodge vigorous complaints, . and then offered the help of the English authorities. He followed up this advantage by getting them to ratify the deed of 1701 and, in addition, to deed all the hunting grounds south of Lake On- tario and reaching the Niagara River to the English. The strip was sixty miles wide. The French fort on Niagara now lay on soil the right to the occupancy of which had been signed over to the English. But this did not mean that the French were going to evacuate at once; it merely meant that the English had a paper right to eject them if they could. A full generation intervened before this was accomplished. Joncaire died at Niagara June 29, 1739, the year that Chautauqua Lake was discovered. He left a large family of boys, two of whom remained in the wilder- ness to carry out their father's mission. These young men con- tinued as the principal reliance of New France, and the strongest opponents of a new figure who rose to dominate the British in- terests in New York, William Johnson.
The next move of the English authorities was to acquire a tract of land on Irondequoit Bay. This tract, twenty by thirty miles in extent, was purchased on January 10, 1740, but was not immediately settled, it being then deemed inexpedient. Governor Clarke was an important factor in developing English interests along the Ontario shores and saw the pressing need of a strong post on the Irondequoit. Later Governor Clinton pressed this same proposal, and, in 1749, Johnson, who was a trader from the Mohawk Valley, wrote Clinton urging a settlement there as a means of attracting the Indians and shutting out the French, who were trying to buy the tract. But the English and the Dutch settlers lacked the nerve and vision of the French and, more than this, the capacity for making friends with the Indians. The cowardly flight of the traders from Oswego, for fear of a massa- cre, at the very time when the Indians were coming into the bay with canoe loads of peltries, stands out in significant contrast to the courage and determination of the French in their isolated positions, under circumstances much more trying. The Indians, naturally, were disgusted with the English, especially as they had to turn back once more and trade with the French (1744).
We have mentioned William Johnson. As Joncaire the elder was to the French, William Johnson was destined to be to the
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English. Upon his ability and personality rested the fate of the English settlers west of the Mohawk. He came to America from Ireland, the son of Christopher Johnson and Anne Warren. He was educated as a barrister, but just before his examination his uncle, Admiral Sir Peter Warren, offered him an opportunity to go with him to America, where, under a royal grant, he had a tract of land on the Mohawk River. It was in 1737, and William was twenty-two years of age. The adventure appealed to him, and he accepted the post of chief steward of the Mohawk lands of Sir Peter with eagerness. Johnson landed in New York City in December, 1737, and spent the winter there, leaving in the spring when the Hudson River was open, in a sloop laden with mill sup- plies. The settlement of Warrensbush was soon laid out. Here young William showed his rare acumen. His uncle had hoped to preserve his grant intact and to rent or lease parts of it to the Dutch, German and Scotch settlers, but renting was something of which these people had had enough in the old world. Young William advised the outright sale of the property in farmstead lots. This attracted real settlers willing to risk all on the chance of success as proprietors of the land.
During his sojourn along the river, young Johnson had an abundance of opportunity to study the Indians who came to visit the settlers and to trade. He associated with the Mohawks, ac- quired their language, participated in their ceremonies, and in many ways showed a sympathy and understanding rare for a Britisher. He soon discovered that the management of the Board of Colonial Commissioners with respect to Indian affairs was lax and criminal. Indian traders of any class and character were licensed for a small fee, without a previous examination of their fitness or character. Thus the Indians were subjected to many frauds and indignities that prejudiced them against the English. William Johnson kept up a vigorous and voluminous correspond- ence on this subject with Governor George Clinton, and so com- mended himself that he was soon placed in the British service as Superintendent of Indian affairs. This was a most fortunate thing for the Six Nations, and even more so for the English colonists. These were troublous times and the French were un- ceasing in their intrigues. By 1747 it was agreed by the colonies that Canada should be invaded. Johnson was commissioned Colo- nel and second in command under Sir William Peppernell. The
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Five Nations agreed to furnish one thousand warriors, the Sen- ecas promising substantial aid. Little was done except to hold the frontier against French invasion, for the Treaty of Aix-la- Chapelle brought an armistice. It was seven years before the battle of Lake George and the defeat of Dieskau occurred. In this engagement Johnson fought with such ability that he was rewarded with a gift from Parliament of five thousand pounds sterling and the King made him a baronet. This was not alone for the reason that he had shown remarkable military skill, but because he had held the Indian nations of New York loyal to the interests of the British. The Iroquois had visible proof that it was expedient, at least, to support the British. The Senecas gave up Niagara to the English and agreed to take the field against the French. This was the result of Johnson's council at Canajoharie in April, 1759. Events followed fast. Niagara was stormed and taken, the French surrendering. While a great victory, it was the result of long and intelligent preparation, and a fulfillment of the logic of events,2 and had been predicted by Sir William the year before in his report to the Board of Trade. He was confident, he said, that he could lead against the French not only the Five Nations of the Iroquois, including the Senecas, but also many of the Indians who had been directly under the patronage of the French at La Galette. It is thus seen that, through the influence of Johnson, even the Genesee Senecas were ready to war against their old friends, whom Joncaire had ce- mented to them by many ties of allegiance and even blood, for the French in not a few instances had found wives in some of the Seneca villages.
Niagara fell, and, as Sir William entered the fort, he found a host of English captives there to rejoice with him. He also met the two sons of Joncaire, Thomas and Daniel. General Am- herst, who had planned the attack, was in the north, where Ticon- deroga and Crown Point soon fell, followed by Quebec on Sep- tember 18th. Two years later Lord Amherst, rallying his troops from Oswego, fell upon Montreal, which capitulated. It should be noted that Sir William was not in original command at the Niagara siege; his superior officer, General John Prideaux, was killed, and the command then devolved upon Colonel Johnson. If
2 The story of the siege of Niagara is nowhere better told than by Dr. Frank H. Severence in his "Old Frontier of France."
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the fall of Canada had a profound effect upon the Indians, it had a still more far reaching effect upon the destiny and direction of English civilization and control in North America. It meant that France might go no further, and that England should ex- pand in channels the nature and direction of which could scarcely be imagined.
The fall of New France did not quiet the problems of the border, though it aroused the Indians to a realization of Eng- land's power and determination. In the west the Indians were troubled with the thought that the English would extend their domain so far that the tribes of the red men would be driven into the sunset sea.
It was reserved for Pontiac, chief of the Ottawas, to bring all these fears to a head. Preaching that the Indians must regain their rights and independence and return to the ways of their fathers, he organized a conspiracy of Indian tribes between the Ottawa and the lower Mississippi, and with sudden assault took all the western forts save Detroit. Overtures had been secretly made to the Iroquois and all but a portion of the Senecas-the same troublesome Genesee dwellers-rejected participation in these hostile activities. Chippewas, Ottowas, Wyandots, Potta- watomies, Delawares, Mingoes, Shawnees and many other tribes were drawn together to execute Pontiac's scheme. No other In- dian leader had ever brought together so many tribes for a single purpose. If the Six Nations of the Iroquois had given their alle- giance to the enterprise, New York would have suffered severely. As it was, the Genesee Senecas were secretly attempting to join Pontiac, and their young warriors had sent wampum belts to the northwest tribes, inviting an attack on Niagara, and then Fort Pitt. Johnson heard of the proposal, and acted. He set out with a retinue for Detroit, stopping at Niagara, where he called a council of the Senecas. He charged them with the plot, and one of their spokesmen indignantly denied it, affecting an air of in- jured innocence. Sir William, who generally spoke so graciously, now thundered out his denunciation, and demanded that the Sen- ecas send a deputation of chiefs to Detroit, and repeat before the assembled Indian tribes their condemnation of the overtures of the Seneca messengers, who had borne their villainous pro- posals to the supporters of Pontiac, attested by wampum belts. Sir William then threw back the wampum belt that had been
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given him with the suave speech denying guilt. This meant that he would not yet believe the Seneca statement. After consulta- tion, they agreed to send delegates to Detroit, bearing belts as testimony that the nation spoke. In due season Johnson and his party reached Detroit, and with the firing of two cannon con- voked the council of tribes. From far and near they had come : to see more than to discuss, for the power of Sir William was a · marvelous thing to the nations of the west. Here was a white man whose great stone house was the council hall of a mighty · confederacy, a man who sometimes lived as an Indian and who · spoke truth fearlessly. Johnson and his officers were in full uni- form; the Indian chiefs were in their paint and feathers. Sir William made a friendly address, earnest though lengthy and explicit. The next day Indian delegates from the northwest made acceptable replies. Then arose Kaiaghshota, chief of the Genesee Senecas. With accustomed oratory and eloquence, he disclaimed all connection with the plot and absolved his nation from guilt. › To the surprise of the assemblage, Adiaraghta, the Wyandot, sprang to his feet and accused the Seneca of duplicity, and pointed out exactly how he had been one of the chief conspirators, and · one of the ambassadors who had brought the war belts and pro- : posals of Seneca participation. White Mingo, an Ohio Indian, . then arose and accused the Wyandot of being a conspirator and : a principal in inciting his own people. Excitement ran high and · a fight was imminent, but Sir William, with the details of the plot revealed, dissolved the council. He returned to his home in the Mohawk Valley and cultivated the good will of the Iroquois, · who at all cost should be kept from the evil alliance. His success was complete, to the disappointment of the Ottawas who vowed to take his life.
The Genesee Senecas, as we have observed, were unfriendly and for two principal reasons: first, they were the descendants of the broken Canadian tribes and the adopted nations of the south, and second, they had been under the domination of the French so long that their sympathies were far from being with the English. Their equivocal speeches were not without some justification, as Sir William knew. The official councils of the Senecas had never entered into any conspiracy but had always recommended peace. Thus the Senecas officially were not guilty. The guilt lay with the young warriors who, against the will of the civil chiefs, had
IROQUOIS POT
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taken the tomahawk in their own hands and gone over to the enemy. It was the guilt of individuals in concert and not the guilt of the nation as an organized entity. Johnson afterward pleaded this in a reply to Amherst.
The Senecas had yet another grievance that was gnawing at their hearts. It was the suspicion that the English had actually construed their deeds and beaver land cessions as an outright surrender of ownership. To the Indian way of thinking this was error, for it is presumable that they meant to convey only the right of dominion, in return for which they were to receive pro- tection. This must be kept in mind, for it is the explanation of a bloody event that followed. It will be remembered that the Sen- ecas believed they owned the land on the Niagara along which lay the portage road and the carrying place around the rapids and the falls. This portage road had been built by the English under Sir William and terminated at Fort Schlosser above the cataract. It followed the banks of the river above the terrifying cliffs, and three miles from the falls passed a deep ravine with high precipitous walls and jagged crags below. The place was called Devil's Hole. Here, on the 14th of September, 1763, a tragedy occurred. A convoy of twenty-four men under a ser- geant, returning from the discharge of their goods at Fort Niag- ara, marched along the road until they came to Devil's Hole. At this point they were surprised by five hundred Seneca Indians, who had lain in ambush awaiting their coming. Rushing forth they overwhelmed the party with musket fire and then scalped their victims. The militia at the fort, hearing firing, hurried out to render assistance and, though they were two companies strong, they were ambushed and killed or driven over the preci- pice. Only three escaped, one a drummer boy who was caught by the limb of a projecting tree, and one an officer who escaped on his horse while bullets rained around him. The Senecas were not after booty, and did not loot the wagon train or the dead. They simply wanted to terrify the English and cause an abandon- ment of Niagara. This stroke lent comfort to the western allies of Pontiac, but the Iroquois as a body repudiated it as an official act, and the Mohawks repledged their loyalty to Sir William, using all their influence to hold their comrades in check, and to keep the young men from taking part in the western movements of Pontiac's bands.
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Pontiac soon sued for peace and sent his pipe to Sir William in testimony of his desire to submit. His rebellion had been crushed and many of his bravest men killed in the operations of Bouquet and Amherst. Amherst was willing to forgive the Ca- nadian Indians, but was bitter against the Senecas, whom he thought should be wiped off the face of the earth. Indeed, he formulated a plan to enlist ten thousand men and add them to an army of eleven thousand British regulars, who should scour the country and kill every male Seneca, the women to be distrib- uted to the other tribes. The plan was well conceived and feasi- ble; and if Amherst could have put it into execution, the Senecas would have been completely wiped out. One thing stood in the way of its consummation : Sir William Johnson objected. He ex- plained that the Seneca Nation as such was not at fault.
Amherst's plan, however, was not without its effect. The Senecas heard of it and, seeing its possibilities, immediately began to make overtures for peace. They were humble indeed in their pleas and promises. Amherst then demanded that they surrender the chief offenders and instigators of the plots against the English. The Senecas did this with surprising alacrity. Nine- teen were turned over. Of these two were publicly hanged at Onondaga, and the rest imprisoned in New York. This was a more frightful revenge than open war to the minds of the Sen- ecas and they were deeply impressed. Pontiac surrendered in 1766 and, fortunately for the Indians, General Amherst three years before had become Governor of Virginia. This left the Senecas in the hands of Sir William, and he had little difficulty in showing them where their interests lay.
Sir William met Pontiac at Oswego, where he smoked the pipe of peace with him and renewed his oath of allegiance to the King of England. Sir William now went to Niagara, where he held a council with every Indian tribe that had anything to do with the French or with the conspiracy. The peace here secured lasted until the outbreak of another war, a war of far reaching signifi- cance. It was not to be an Indian war, but a revolt of the col- onists against their King. In the meantime the Iroquois Indians, as well as many other tribes, were linked by increasing ties of trade and contact with the English, and soon looked upon King George as their "great father over the seas." Through all of the difficulties in which Sir William found himself, he had the loyal
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aid of Joseph Brant, a war chief of the Mohawks, whose sister Molly was Johnson's housekeeper, and, after Indian custom, his wife. The combination of Johnson and Brant was a rare one and far reaching in its effective consequences. It meant that John- son could speak and that the Iroquois could understand.
It would be of great interest to follow awhile the career of Joseph Brant, for, while not a resident of the Genesee Country, he had a large part in shaping its destiny and in influencing the course of the Senecas. Though a Mohawk of the Mohawks, he was born in an Indian settlement on the Ohio in 1742. His na- tive name was Thayendaregea. After his father, a Canajoharie Mohawk, died in the Ohio country, his mother returned to her homeland, bringing with her Joseph and his sister Molly. There- after, both brother and sister were destined to a life of movement and adventure. Joseph was "discovered" by Sir William John- son and sent to an Indian mission school maintained by Doctor Wheelock. Here he studied with unusual diligence for two years, and in 1763 returned to the Mohawk Valley, where he entered the service of Sir William at an unusually good salary for the times. His ability as a leader among his people was immediately evident, and Johnson found him an invaluable aid whose loyalty and judgment could be relied upon. These qualities were, indeed, most important at a time when the Indians were feeling dissatis- fied with the attitude of the settlers. Seneca Indians and others were being murdered by border ruffians, and the Senecas were fast losing patience. They feared not only extermination by the settlers but the total loss of their lands. The apprehension was quite general. It became necessary that a boundary line be defi- nitely fixed.
The work of arranging a council by which the line should be fixed fell naturally upon Sir William, who decided that it should be held at the great portage upon which Fort Stanwix stood. An abundance of provisions was sent on from Albany, at Johnson's request. The council, which was held in October, 1768, opened with more than three thousand Indian delegates from the Six Nations and their dependent tribes, the Shawnees, Delawares and Ohio Senecas. Many important colonial officials attended the conference, among them the Governors of Pennsylvania and New Jersey. The boundary line was fixed and terms of sale agreed upon for all the land claimed by the English. For this land the
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sum of $50,000 was to be turned over to the Indians, a sum that the King of England felt was too great to give mere natives.
The boundary line started at a point on Wood Creek, not far from Fort Stanwix, and ran southeast to the forks of the Unadilla River, then along the Unadilla to its junction with the Susque- hanna; thence south to the bend of the Delaware (at the present location of Deposit) ; thence southeast along the Delaware a few miles below the site of Hancock; thence northwest to a point be- low Owego; thence along the Susquehanna to the mouth of To- wanda Creek; thence in a direct air line to a point at the con- fluence of the Monongahela and the Allegheny. All the land to the east of this line was to be ceded to the King, and the King and his subjects were to recognize all land to the west of this line as the Six Nations' domain. The exceptions were certain reser- vations about the Mohawk villages.
There were many objections on the part of the Indians and the settlers to certain portions of this line, and, though the Indians had the utmost confidence in Sir William, they had no such con- fidence in certain settlers and traders who sought at every oppor- tunity to defraud them and to kill their people. The line was designed to keep each party from encroaching upon the other, but the Senecas knew only too well that no English settler would stay on his own side of the fence if he could help it.
Scarcely six months passed before Sir William found it neces- sary to make a journey to the Onondagas, the Cayugas and the Senecas, for the purpose of getting full particulars relating to the outrages of the settlers committed upon Six Nations people. His objective was the town of Kaneadasaga (near Geneva), where he had summoned the Ohio Senecas to meet with him and their brethren. Sir William was well received by his Indian friends, who poured into his ear a long list of grievances, and showed how innumerable frauds had been practiced upon them. The sympa- thy of Sir William was all with them and he returned to his Mohawk Valley home full of indignation. Indeed, in his report to the Earl of Hillsborough, he said that even on his journey home he was overtaken with the news of the murder of an inoffensive Seneca lad, who was fired upon by some frontiersman on the Sus- quehanna. The murder was all the more inexcusable since the father of the youth and his whole family were zealous partisans of the English settlers. It was not the only murder, for many
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others were recited by Johnson in his statement. He also men- tions a murderous attack upon Callendar, a trader on his way to Fort Pitt with twenty-five horses laden with Indian trader arti- cles. The assailants were thirty white men disguised as Indians. The Earl of Hillsborough carried the complaint to the King, who, in turn, wrote to his colonial governors asking them to take steps to prevent this violence and encroachment. Despite the order of the King, trouble continued and Indians were murdered by set- tlers at every opportunity, until Indian patience was almost ex- hausted. Johnson well knew that the Indians did not begin re- prisals until all other methods had seemingly failed. He did his best to calm the Indians and to stop the settlers from murdering them, and in his letter to Earl Dartmouth he expresses his diffi- culty. "My negotiation," he wrote, "with the Senecas was inter- rupted by intelligence that a certain Mr. Cressop (Cresaps), an inhabitant of Virginia, had murdered forty Indians on the Ohio, for the most part of the Six Nations." Indeed, so savage were these border ruffians that they murdered Indian women and killed their children, and even scalped them. The old and friendly did not escape, for even the kindly old Bald Eagle, chief of the Dela- wares, a man who had mingled with the whites for many years, was murdered in his canoe while on his way down the Kanhawa. Tearing the scalp from the old man's head, his murderer set his body upright and set the canoe again adrift down the stream.3 The favorite chief of the Shawnees met a similar fate. Old Silver Heels, the chief, had undertaken in the kindest manner to guide a party of white traders through the forest from the Ohio country to Albany, and was murdered en route.
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