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 17
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Two square miles were reserved on the west side of the Gene- see at Canawaugus, opposite the town of Avon. This tract faced the river and ran back two miles from it.
The Big Tree Reservation was at Big Tree village, and also contained two square miles, running west from the river.
Little Beard's Reservation lay just south of Big Tree and also embraced two square miles. Both Big Tree and Little Beard's were opposite the present site of Geneseo, and the Senecas, in speaking of these two locations, always refer to them as Geneseo (in their sonorous language, Djoh-nes-io) .
Squawkie Hill Reservation touched the river at one corner and embraced two square miles. Within it were Squawkie Hill and Big Kettle towns.
Gardeau Reservation, upon which at one time was the home of Mary Jemison, was the largest of the Genesee River tracts and lay on both sides of the river in nearly equal tracts, and contained twenty-eight square miles, or 17,927 acres.
Caneadea, officially called Kaounadeau, was at the bend of the river in the present Allegany County. It was two miles wide and eight miles long, being a perfect parallelogram. Its southern line crossed the river at right angles and it lay to the northeast.
Oil Spring Reservation, one mile square, containing the fa- mous oil spring of the Senecas, was inadvertently omitted from the Big Tree treaty, though it was the plain intent of Morris to include it. It was subsequently given to the Senecas by court order (1856). It lies in Allegany County between the forks of Oil Creek.
Buffalo Creek Reservation was a large tract containing nearly one hundred and thirty square miles. Its strategic position against Lake Erie and upon Buffalo Creek, and upon several other pleasant streams, made it a highly desirable tract, and one which because of the evident commercial advantages of the location was to lead white men to wrest it from its Indian possessors.
Tonawanda Reservation, embracing more than seventy
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square miles, lay along Tonawanda Creek. It was an oblong with its northwest and its southeast corners indented, a symbol of the further shrinking that was to come.
The Allegheny River Reservation lay along the Allegheny River for forty miles, a half mile on each side of the stream. It was the wildest and most secluded of all the Indian domain.
Cattaraugus Reservation lay along Cattaraugus Creek from its mouth to a line running north and south some seventeen miles up-stream, containing 26,880 acres. It was a beautiful location and upon it was one of the old towns, named after the creek, Cattaraugus. This reservation also included another small tract at the mouth of the Canadaway Creek along Lake Erie, just west of Cattaraugus.
But the Senecas were again to face an insistent demand-a demand for these reserved lands; they were to discover that the term forever, employed in the treaty to describe the enduring character of their title, merely meant so long as one or both parties to the contract saw fit to adhere to their original inten- tion. The Holland Land Company began its importunities, and then the Ogden Land Company. In 1838 the latter company, aided and abetted by a United States commission, sought to secure these remaining lands of the Senecas and persuade them to emigrate to Kansas. The Seneca chiefs were besieged night and day, bribed and plied with liquor, but the consent of a major- ity to this infamous pact could not be obtained. At length, the company was reduced to the necessity of taking debauched Indians to Buffalo and sequestering them in a tavern where they were declared elected chiefs by company agents, and then forced to sign the treaty drawn up by the land commissioners, and known as the Buffalo Creek Treaty of 1838. Not a single Tonawanda chief could be kidnapped, bribed or induced to touch the rum of the treaty agents, yet their names were forged to the document, and they appeared upon it as having agreed to sell out and leave for the uncertain West.
The good Quakers and many other conscientious people of Western New York protested in vain. Notwithstanding all the revelations of missionaries as to the criminal methods used to gain their ends, the Ogden Land Company rushed the fraudu- lent treaty to Washington, where it was quickly confirmed by the Senate. The Indian delegate, Two Guns, hastened by stage coach
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to the capital with a protest signed by nearly all the voters and women of his nation, but he was followed and his satchel stolen. The Quakers headed by Philip Thomas did all in their power to expose the transactions, and their committee, "-became thor- oughly satisfied with the revolting fact that in order to drive these poor Indians from their lands deception and fraud had been practiced to an extent perhaps without parallel in the dark history of oppression and wrong to which the aborigines of our country have been subjected."
The voluminous reports of the Society of Friends printed from 1838 to 1856 afford interesting reading along these lines. The Friends did not give up the fight until an amended treaty, that of 1842, had been made by which the Senecas should receive back Allegany and Cattaraugus reservations, but must lose all other lands, including Buffalo and Tonawanda. The Tona- wandas were not parties to this treaty, found themselves expatriated, and their lands sold over their heads without hav- ing uttered a word except that of protest. Years after, in 1856, the Ogden Company having tried in vain to dispossess them, they bought back at $20.00 an acre, the land they had been forced to part with at 20 cents an acre, but their purchase was of one-tenth only of their former holdings.
It must not be thought that the law-abiding settlers of the Genesee Country took kindly to these frauds. They certainly did not, and their names are found upon numerous petitions of pro- test. The Senecas found matchless friends in Philip Thomas, the Quaker, and in Asher Wright, the American Board Mission- ary at Buffalo Creek. These men led the fight and mustered the protests of the citizen communities, but in vain. The Senecas lost. Many were so deeply embittered that they said, "If this be an act of a Christian nation, we will cling to the faith of our fathers and reject Christianity forever." The strength of the non-Christian party and the Six Nations dates from this experi- ence, and to the present day they recite the frauds of Buffalo Creek.
This extraordinary way of acquiring Indian lands was ill requital indeed for the services of the Senecas in the War of 1812. When the settlers were anxiously awaiting the action of the Seneca Nation and fearing a renewal of border hostilities,- for British agents were still active and the Senecas had provoca-
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tion enough, the latter relieved the suspense by declaring war on Great Britain, and mustered their forces to meet invasion. They were allies of the United States of America, and as such placed their forces, led by their own captains, under General Porter. So well and effectual they fought at Black Rock, Lundy's Lane, Chippewa and at Buffalo, that they received the commendation of General Scott. No longer did they scalp the dead or torture prisoners, for, though Colonel Farmers Brother was in command, his tactics of warfare had undergone a great change since the day he led his band of young warriors at Devil's Hole."
For their faithful services the Senecas had a right to expect better treatment from the country than that which was accorded them at Buffalo Creek in 1838; they had proven their unques- tioned loyalty and even fought their own kinsmen, who had gone to Canada under Joseph Brant and established anew a Canadian branch of the Six Nations confederacy on the banks of the Grand River in Ontario. It was long before the breach between the two divisions was healed, and, as late as 1876, at the dedication of the Caneadea council house in Letchworth Park, it was with diffi- culty that the Mohawk, Colonel Kerr, was persuaded to shake hands with Obail, the descendant of Cornplanter. Yet, through the kindly persuasion of William Prior Letchworth, the two did grasp hands and pledge their renewal of friendship under the shadow of Mary Jemison's monument.
After the calamity at Buffalo, the Indians began to abandon their homes, their little villages, their mission church and the graves of their fathers-the graves of Red Jacket, Farmers Brother, Little Billy and scores of others who went to their eter- nal sleep in the Buffalo Valley.
The Senecas of this period were a mixed people, and no less than a dozen broken tribes were incorporated with them, chiefly, Delaware, Mahikans or Munsees, Foxes, Cherokee, Nanticoke, Shawnees, Neutrals, Eries, Mingos and Chippewas. At first, though all were known as Senecas for official classification, tribal distinctions were kept alive. Philip Kenjockety, a venerable and influential chief, was a descendant of the Neutral Nation, Blue Eye was a Cherokee, John Armstrong was a Delaware, Silver- heels was a Shawnee, Tall Chief was a Fox.
" For a full account of the Senecas in the War of 1812, see Parker: Life of Gen. Ely S. Parker, published by the Buffalo Historical Society, 1919.
GROUP OF NOTABLES IN ATTENDANCE AT THE LAST COUNCIL OF THE GENESEE IN 1872
READING FROM LEFT TO RIGHT, JAMES SHONGO, SON OF COLONEL SHONGO, PRINCIPAL CHIEF OF CANEADEA; GEORGE JONES, A NOTED WARRIOR; WILLIAM BLACKSNAKE, GRANDSON OF THE CELEBRATED CHIEF GOVERNOR BLACKSNAKE, KATE OSBORN, GRANDDAUGHTER OF CAPT. BRANT: W. J. SIMCOE KERR, GRANDSON OF CAPT. BRANT AND GREAT GRANDSON OF SIR WM. JOHNSON; NICHOLSON H. PARKER, BROTHER OF GENERAL PARKER AND A DESCENDANT OF RED JACKET; SOLOMON OBAIL, SON OF MAJOR O'BAIL AND GRANDSON OF CORNPLANTER; JOHN JACKET, GRANDSON OF RED JACKET; THOMAS JEMISON, GRANDSON OF MARY JEMISON.
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Mixed bloods, too, were numerous. Captain Pollard was the son of an English trader of that name, though the captain was usually known by his Seneca name, Ga-on-da-wa-neh, Big Tree. He was a man of sterling character, "-one of the most honest, pure-minded, worthy men I ever knew," wrote Orlando Allen, and Horatio Jones, who knew him intimately, said of him, "Morally speaking, Pollard was as good a man as any white min- ister that ever lived." Major Jack Berry was the son of an Eng- lish trader of that name who lived near Avon, but the Major made his home at Squawkie Hill. He was a man of unusual intellect and spoke English fluently, frequently acting as inter- preter for Red Jacket, whom he ardently admired. It was Major Berry who dropped the hint that helped Horatio Jones run the gauntlet successfully.
John Montour was a son of Queen Catherine, a half blood French woman whose village at the head of Seneca Lake was a noted place, being one of the first towns destroyed by Sullivan after leaving Newtown. John Montour was one of the refugees at Fort Niagara after the raid, and, from having eaten some of the poisoned flour doled out as rations to his people, developed an ulcerated lip which in time ate away the flesh. This gave him a fierce appearance, though in reality he was a mild mannered and pleasant man.
We have already mentioned other famous leaders, and these will serve to indicate the type of men who were Senecas. Red Jacket, though an orator, was in reality the inferior of Farmers Brother in personal habits, intellect and judgment. Indeed, Red Jacket became so dissolute during his later days that he incurred the censure of the Prophet, Handsome Lake, the half- brother of Cornplanter. Handsome Lake was the religious leader of his people, and, building up a religion based upon his visions, real or fabricated, he constructed a native faith very similar in character to that of Little Turtle. With great earnest- ness he spread his "good news," or Gaiwio, as he called it. His main endeavors were directed toward a temperance reform, and he succeeded splendidly. He was able to show that many of the misfortunes of his people came from drinking "onega, the strong water of fire," and that to abandon it meant new life for his people, and with that new life the blessings of the Great Spirit. So successful was Handsome Lake that he knit together
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the good things in the older Seneca belief and excluded many of the superstitions. His work recrystallized the religious faith of his people, and from despondency they looked up to receive hope anew. There were many, however, who believed that Handsome Lake was an imposter, and that he was obstructing the spread of the Christian gospel. Naturally Red Jacket was his bitterest foe and reviled him as a charlatan. But Handsome Lake per- sisted, preaching to the Six Nations people until, by 1810, the older religion of the Senecas was overshadowed and blotted out.3
The Senecas are now in two main divisions, one on the Tona- wanda Reservation known as the Tonawanda Band of Senecas, and the other and larger group known as the Seneca Nation of New York Indians. They occupy the Allegany and Cattaraugus reservations and owned until very recently the square mile at Oil Spring, where petroleum oil was first discovered. The Seneca Nation has a population of about 3,000 souls and the Tonawanda Band about 500. In the ancient domain of the Neutrals live the Tuscaroras, situated on a small reservation in Niagara County, not far from Lewiston.
Since 1838 the Senecas have developed splendidly, and have religiously held that while they are dependent upon civilization and under the protection of the Federal Government, they are still an independent and separate people. When there is talk of new treaties they refuse to listen, and point out that they have little enough, but that is too much to hazard by another treaty or contract with the Government. The Seneca Nation is a republic and has the electoral system. The Tonawanda band prefers a government by councillors. Each is working out its own destiny, but what is that destiny, and where does it take them?
The Seneca reservations are farm lands and most of the people are farmers and mechanics. The old life is gone, and, save for the followers of Handsome Lake on festal occasions, there is no indication that anything of the Indian life remains. Scores of the men work and live in nearby towns and cities. Many are clerks, machinists and mechanics. Nearly all of them are good musicians, there being several brass bands among them. The women are not far behind in this and many have pianos. Their homes, though generally small, are neat and cozy. Books
3 For a complete exposition of "The Code of Handsome Lake," see the bulletin by that name published by the State Museum.
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and magazines and the daily paper are found in all of them. Rural delivery routes bring the daily mail, and the telephone and radio keep many of them in direct touch with the world. They still have a love for horses, though the more prosperous have automobiles. Three-quarters are professed Christians, but about one-fifth only are enrolled on the church records. Nearly six hundred Senecas are followers of Handsome Lake's religion, and regularly observe the ancient thanksgivings and festivals. These people generally live more simply than their Christian brethren, perhaps because their homes are on the most barren portions of the reservations, and possibly because the prophet told them to shun wealth and outward show.
The story of the Senecas of the Genesee Country is a long and stormy one. We have been able to sketch only briefly some of the principal events connected with it, and with reluctance have omitted many minor things more interesting than important.
Once the Senecas were a power with which nations reckoned; then they fell like grist between the millstones of two opposing divisions of contending Europeans, the French and the English. They were often confused, often deceived, often led astray by their own ill judgment. It is difficult now to understand all their actions, and it is surely not possible to judge them by present day standards. These matters are for the interpretation of the anthropologist.
We do know, however, that the Senecas possessed a vast domain, as fair and productive as any in the world. We know that they loved it with a fierce intensity and relinquished it only when pressed by forces that were beyond human endurance to withstand. We should expect to find them embittered and resentful, but this is far from the case, though they are cautious and weigh well the white man's words, as if to discern hidden meanings or unexpected results should they assent to them. Instead of seeking revenge, they are endeavoring to expend their efforts on education, agriculture and trades, that they may fit into the American scheme of life.
By declaring war on Great Britain, they supported the United States in the War of 1812; they sent three hundred of the finest soldiers known to the Union armies in the Civil war; they fur- nished their full quota for the World war, and did their bit like
-
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men. The Senecas are patriotic Americans, and loyal to the flag that waves over them, but they have never sought citizen- ship in the United States, at least not officially as a body of people.
Their attitude is that they constitute an elder nation having treaty relations with the United States of America. They are one of the high contracting parties to that treaty, and though now small as a nation are still to profit by such a status.
Numerous individuals among them do seek citizenship believ- ing absorption inevitable, but the nation as such holds its integ- rity a sacred thing, and before it will listen to the arguments of Governmental agents who urge citizenship, it asks that every treaty and other obligation of that Government be fully met.
The end of our story is not yet; it lies in the future. The red men of the Genesee Country still remain and speak of that country as the holy land of their fathers.
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CHAPTER IX. INDIAN PLACE NAMES OF THE GENESEE COUNTRY.
BY ARTHUR C. PARKER, F. A. E. S., Member N. Y. State Board of Geographic Names.
ALLEGANY COUNTY.
Allegany County has many Indian names applied to its streams and settlements, most of them names derived from the Seneca tongue, but the county name itself is not Seneca, or even Iroquoian, but from the alien tongue of their predecessors.
There have been many conjectures as to the meaning of the name, Allegany, some of them evidently wide of the mark. The best authorities consider that it is derived from an Algonkian word, perhaps from the Delaware, meaning "long river." Alli- gewi-sipu would have this meaning. Yet there are other inter- pretations of the term, and by some it is thought that Alligewi comes from the word Tallagwi, variously spelled, Talega, Alli- gewi, Tsalki, Tallike, Tallike and Cherokee. The Tallagwi or Talega are mentioned in the Red Score migration myth of the Lenni Lenape or Delaware people as a powerful nation that pre- ceded them. By some these people are regarded as the "mound builders."
To the Seneca Indians the river is known as the O-hee-yu, whence Ohio, the i originally having the long, soft continental sound, as i in machine. It means "it is beautiful."
CA-NA-SE-RA'-GA comes from the Seneca Ga-nus'-ga-goh, mean- ing "among the milkweeds." This name illustrates the changes of pronunciation and accent taking place when an Indian name is Anglicized.
CA-NE-AD-EA' is derived from the Seneca word Ga-o-ya-de-o, meaning "heavenly rest," or as Morgan defines it, "where the
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heavens rest on the earth," but this is perhaps the implied mean- ing. Ga-o-ya is sky. Yo-an-jah-goh would mean "upon the earth." The name refers perhaps to an old legend of three brothers who, weary with the chase, longed for rest. In the far distance they saw the sky's rim resting upon the earth. Dis- cussing the matter they decided to press on until they came to the precise spot. This they did and as they arrived one of the brothers "passed on before them" under the mystical rim of the sky and into the land of the Creator. Here he found his "heav- enly rest" and in this spot the heaven's rim once rested. Other forms of the name as written in colonial times are Karaghyadira and Canasder.
CA-NIS-TEO, probably originally Kanastio-geh in Seneca, mean- ing "pole in the water." The name Conestoga comes from a similar native word.
CHAU-TAU-QUA, a name adopted from the Seneca term for the lake in Chautauqua County, which see. In Allegany County it is applied to Chautauqua Valley post office in Gove Township.
CHE-NUN-DA Creek is from the Seneca Tcinunda (Chinunda), meaning by the hill. The root nunda always refers to a hill or settlement.
CUBA, a name introduced from the corruption of a West In- dian word Cubanacan.
CUS-A-QUA Creek is the corruption of a Seneca word meaning spear.
GE-NE-SEE, applied to the township and river, is from a Seneca word meaning "pleasant banks." See Genesee County.
0-SWA-YA, a creek, derives its name from osoayeh, "place of pines." Winter camps were often in pine forests where the soft forest bed made of layers of pine needles, and the protecting branches afforded a comfortable refuge for individuals and small groups.
SHON-GO is the contraction of a word meaning "blue lips." The village is named for a celebrated Seneca medicine man who lived near by.
WIG-WAM, the name of a creek above Belfast, is derived from an Algonkian word meaning house.
WIS-COY, a creek and post office, is derived from the Seneca Owaiski, meaning "under the banks."
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OLD INDIAN PLACE NAMES.
CAL-A-DI-ON is the name of a Seneca village mentioned in 1767. CA-RA-CA-DE-RA is probably a variation for Karaghyadirha, which see.
GA-NE-O-WE-H-GA-YAT, meaning "at the head of the stream," was applied to the Seneca settlement at Angelica. (Morgan.)
GA-NOS is the name given to Charlevoix in 1721 for Oil Spring. He had only an indefinite location. Morgan's name is Te-car-nos, meaning "dropping oil." The Seneca legend is that this was the original pool of oil or liquid fat into which the animals were driven to make them fat. The Good Mind caught such animals as he thought should not be fat and stripped them of the oil they absorbed. Whenever such animals do become fat it will be found that "their oil is unpleasant tasting," and the otter, mink, fisher, wolverine, wolf and skunk are cited. The bear, beaver, buffalo and deer were among the favored. The petroleum that rises to the surface of the pool was skimmed off by the Indians and called Seneca oil. It had a wide market during early settlement days as a rubbing oil for rheumatism and muscular pains and bruises.
GIS-TA-QUAT was a settlement at Wellsville. The name ap- pears on Guy Johnson's map and was also mentioned by Zeis- berger.
HIS-KHU-E was a village mentioned in Proctor's journal.
JA-GO-YO-GEH, meaning "hearing place," was a Seneca name for a location on Black Creek.
KA-RA-GH-YA-DIR-HA was a Seneca village at Belvidere. It is the Mohawk form and is similar to the Indian name for Col. Guy Johnson. It means "sun rays illuminating."
ON-ON-DAR-KA is a village marked on the 1771 map. It was somewhere north of Belvidere. The spelling with the r-sound in- dicates that it was written by someone familiar with the Mohawk tongue, which has a sibilant r where the Seneca tongue had only a soft ah. A Seneca Indian would have called this place Onon- dahga, meaning "it is upon a hill."
PA-CIH-SAH-CUNK, with the variations of Paseckackcunk, Pasighkunk, Pasekawkung, and Passiquachkunk, is the name of a Delaware Indian village on Colonel Bill's Creek. The word means "Where the stream breaks through."
PEE-ME-HAN-NINK was a settlement at the head of Cayuga
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Branch in 1757. It is also a Delaware word and perhaps means "crooked creek." It was not far from Little Genesee, or Chena- see, as it was spelled in the old days.
PE-MID-HA-NUCK, "the winding stream," was the Delaware name for Genesee Creek. Delaware words have the sounds of p, l and m, not found in Seneca.
SHA-NA-HAS-GWA-I-KON, the name of a creek, is mentioned in the Morris deed of 1793.
CATTARAUGUS COUNTY.
The name Cattaraugus is derived from an Iroquoian word, perhaps from the Erie tongue, having as a counterpart in Seneca the name Gah-da-ges'-gah-onh, meaning "foul smelling banks." This alluded to the odor of the natural gas which seeps out of crevices in the rock along the banks of the creek. J. N. B. Hewitt gives another and similar name which he translates "where oozed mud roils." The root of the word, however seems to be-dages', with the meaning of bad odor. In Livingston County we have the name Canawaugus with a similar meaning. The later Seneca Indians came into Cattaraugus County after the Revolutionary war, but there seems considerable doubt in the light of Archeol- ogy that all the Erie Indians left in 1654. More probably they continued along the Cattaraugus Creek where the town of sur- vivors was governed by Seneca over-chiefs. This may account for the use of a modified r-sound by the west-mose Seneca bands. When the white settlers came into the region about 1780-1800 they found Indians in numbers. A record of 1780 gives the spell- ing as Kadaragwas; one in 1794 gives the name Cataoraogaras and Spafford's Gazetteer of 1813 gives it Gah-ta-ra-ke-ras. The Senecas who had a village about four miles from the mouth of the creek on the south side, on the flats above "high banks" called the settlement Gah-da-ges'-ga-onh. The Cattaraugus Reservation stretches along the creek from its mouth to a point about ten miles eastward near Gowanda.
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