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 24
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The treaty of Fort Stanwix, in 1784, when Washington and Schuyler sought an understanding, by which the Iroquois might remain in New York, took from the Senecas, Cayugas and Onon- dagas, who had sided with the British in the Revolution, con- siderable parts of their ancient domain, and fixed a boundary that deprived them altogether of the lands of their western con- quests. It was the fortune of war, which the Indians understood quite well, but the New York-Massachusetts convention and the recurring treaties, by which they saw their remaining land hold -: ings decreased and their title made constantly more insecure, not unnaturally aroused a spirit of restlessness that was augmented by outbreaks of hostile feeling among the Indians in the South and West.
The people of the Six Nations, deprived of their lands by the resorts to bargaining comprised in the various treaties with land
23-Vol. 1
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MAP OF NEW YORK STATE IN 1786
Showing 13,000,000 acres of land belonging to the Six Nations in
1786, with an Indian population of about 17,000. State's white popula-
tion was then about 190,000 and occupied the shaded area on the Mohawk-Hudson and Long Island.
New York Bland
Six Nations
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Preemption
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M
Mass. Land
1786.
Onetda185 MEME 1768 Indian Boundary
B
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Saratoga"
Mohawk
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HISTORY OF THE GENESEE COUNTRY
companies and individuals who had secured the right of pre- emption from Massachusetts, realized more and more that the whites were crowding in to possess the forests through which they and their ancestors had roamed and in which they had hunted and fished and made their homes undisturbed except by their own savage rivalries. As Red Jacket, speaking for the squaws at the Kon-on-daigua Congress, expressed it, the white people had "pressed and squeezed them together until it gave them a pain at their hearts."
The agreement involved in the Buffalo Creek treaty of 1788 and attested at the time by the Rev. Samuel Kirkland as "duly executed, signed, sealed and delivered in my presence by the sachems, chiefs and warriors of the above mentioned Five Na- tions" and as "being fairly and properly understood and trans- acted by all parties of Indians concerned, and declared to be done to their universal satisfaction and content," and accepted without protest, was later disputed by a faction of the Indians. At a gathering in Canandaigua in 1790, when payments on the lands were to be made, Red Jacket and Farmer's Brother charged that they had been deceived and were entitled to receive $10,000, in- stead of $5,000, from Mr. Phelps.
Speaking at a council held at Tioga in November, the eloquent but wily and not always reliable Red Jacket declared they had been confused by treaties with the "Thirteen Fires" and "fires kindled by the Governor of New York." Speaking of the pay- ment from Mr. Phelps, the red orator said: "When we went to Canandaigua to meet Mr. Phelps, expecting to receive ten thousand dollars, we were to have but five thousand. When we discovered the fraud we had a mind to apply to Congress, to see if the matter could not be rectified. For when we took the money and shared it, every one here knows that we had but about one dollar apiece. All our lands came to was but the worth of a few hogsheads of tobacco. Gentlemen, who stand by, do not think hard of us for what has been said. At the time of the treaty, twenty broaches would not buy half a loaf of bread, so that when we returned home there was not a bright spot of silver about us."
In December of the same year, 1790, Cornplanter and other Seneca chiefs carried their grievance to President Washington at Philadelphia, charging that Mr. Phelps had defrauded them and
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HISTORY OF THE GENESEE COUNTRY
had threatened that if he could not make a bargain with them he could take their lands by force, and more to the same effect.
Soon after this, President Washington, in compliance with his promise to look into the matter and see that justice was done, received explicit denial of the charges from Judge Phelps, to- gether with confirmatory statements from Rev. Mr. Kirkland, James Dean, Judge Hallenbeck and other witnesses at the council. Later Joseph Brant, in a long letter, bore evidence that the bar- gain made by Mr. Phelps at Buffalo Creek was an honorable one, and, at the council held at Newtown, July, 1791, Colonel Pickering, the government commissioner, examined several of the Indian chiefs and he too reported that Mr. Phelps had acted fairly in the matter.
However, the restlessness of the Indians, encouraged by the successes attained by the hostiles west of the Ohio, grew to such an extent that the Federal Government, which under the con- stitution had reserved to itself the regulation of commerce with the Indian tribes as well as with foreign nations and among the several states, deemed it advisable to seek the friendship of the Six Nations, which, while living in the State of New York, were yet not a part of the state and asserted their individual sover- eignty. With the view "of attracting them to and convincing them of the justice and humanity of the United States," a delega- tion, including some of the most representative sachems and chiefs, but lacking the presence of Joseph Brant, was in 1792 taken to Philadelphia and there was given a stipulation by which President Washington and Secretary Knox, "in order to promote the happiness of the (then) Five Nations of Indians," agreed to cause to be expended annually for their benefit the amount of one thousand five hundred dollars. The implied obligation of this covenant was, that the New York Indians should continue the faithful friends of the United States and use their influence with the Miami and Wabash Indians to induce them to bury the hatchet, which they had been wielding with savage ferocity against the whites.
As a further means of ensuring peace with the western Indians, Captain Brant, who had declined to accompany what he characterized the "drove of Indians" who had been thus conducted to the seat of government, later yielded to the solicitations of Secretary Knox, Reverend Samuel Kirkland and General Israel
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HISTORY OF THE GENESEE COUNTRY
Chapin, the latter being the official agent of the government, and was escorted, in a state becoming his dignity as a great war chief, to Philadelphia and probably into the presence of the Great Father, President Washington. But Brant was not to be caught by such blandishments. He could not or at least would not choose between, his old allies, the British, and the new government, or perhaps he distrusted the latter, and he refrained for the time being from obligating himself or his people.
Matters along what was then the frontier of civilization grew. rapidly worse. The settlers felt themselves in imminent danger, provisions and rum were assembled there in the hope of preserv- ing or purchasing peace, and guns and powder as a means of defense, if worse came to worst.
Finally in the summer of 1794, at the instance of the govern- ment agent, General Israel Chapin, who had become alarmed at the continued agitation, it was deemed advisable to hold a council with the Five Nations at Canandaigua, to settle if possible the controversies and compose the growing turbulence. The council assembled on September 8, under the direction of Colonel Timothy Pickering, and was attended by a number of the Society of Friends, who, as was customary, were present to see that the Indians had fair treatment, by other witnesses, by two thousand representatives of the Five Nations, including many of their most famous orators and war chiefs, and by General Chapin, acting for Phelps and Gorham.
The proceeding of the Canandaigua council, as had been its assembling, was retarded by the desire of the Indians to learn the outcome of the contest then waging between General Wayne and the hostiles in the West, but when the news came, as it did early in October, that Wayne had been successful, the business of the council, undisturbed except by scenes of drunkenness and the desire of the red orators to air their eloquence, proceeded with reasonable speed.
The two rusty places in the chain of friendship seem to have been the claims of the whites to a four-mile path between Cayuga and Buffalo Creek and a strip along the river from Buffalo Creek to Niagara. Finally these rusty places were removed, either by filing, or by the application of "oil," or were covered up, and an agreement reached that was satisfactory to both parties. Then
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HISTORY OF THE GENESEE COUNTRY
some scrivener skilled in the use of quill and ink spread the parch- ments and prepared the treaty for signing.
Under date of the 9th of November, William Savery, one of the party of Friends present, wrote in his journal that he was informed that the council was gathered for this last function. "Two large parchments, with the articles of the treaty engrossed, being ready for signing, we were in hopes the business would now close." But to their surprise and disappointment there was dis- satisfaction apparent among the Indians, which was explained when Cornplanter, the war chief, declared in a brief but bitter speech that the warriors had decided that they would not sign the treaty, although if the sachems did so they would abide by the latter's decision as long as they thought them right.
Colonel Pickering would not consent to close the business in this indefinite manner, and after two more days' delay, on the 11th day of November, 1794, the council was reassembled. In the afternoon at 2 o'clock, wrote Savery, "we were sent for to council, where a great number were assembled. The Eel, an Onondaga chief, spoke to the Indians in a pathetic manner which we understood to be an exhortation to unanimity among the chiefs and warriors in closing the business."
"They then agreed," continued Savery, "to sign, and pointed out the two head warriors, who though they were young men, were by some custom in their nation, the persons who were to stand foremost in ratifying contracts; they signed, and then the chiefs and warriors, some of the most eminent in each nation, being in all upwards of fifty."
After the articles were signed, Savery reports that he and his associates entertained some forty of the chiefs at their lodgings, smoked with them, conversed with them freely by means of inter- preters on several subjects concerning their welfare, and dis- tributed a lot of presents they had brought from Philadelphia for the purpose. The next day the sachems and chief warriors paid the Quakers a visit of ceremony, expressing thanks for their attendance at the council, calling upon them frankly to say whether in their opinion they had made a good peace, saying, "as we cannot read, we are liable to be deceived," and asking that if they thought that peace had been established "on a good founda- tion," to come forward and sign the articles. Farmer's Brother put it in these words: "As you are a people desirous of promoting
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HISTORY OF THE GENESEE COUNTRY
peace, and these writings are for that purpose, we hope you will have no objection, but all come forward and put your names to them, and this would be a great satisfaction to us."
But the treaty does not bear the signatures of these witnesses. For some reason now unknown they refrained from complying with the Indians' request. As the address to "our brothers, the Indians of the Six Nations" prepared at the Meeting for Suffer- ings, which sent the four Friends, David Bacon, John Parrish, William Savery and James Emlen, to attend the "Kon-on-daigua" Congress set forth, the Quakers meddled not with the affairs of government. Their one desire was to do all they could "to pre- serve peace and good will among men," and perhaps it was in compliance with what they considered the inhibitions of this de- clared principle that, while they would enter the wilderness in the hope of helping adjust the grievances of their red brethren, they would not presume even in this small degree to meddle in an affair of state. They were in Canandaigua as friends of the Indians and as unofficial witnesses of the proceedings of the council, and were not in any way officially connected with the gathering. Ap- parently their failure to sign the treaty was not because of dis- approval of its provisions. At least Savery's journal as published contains no intimation to that effect. On the contrary, the infer- ence is that they considered the council to have been conducted in a fair manner and that the conclusions reached were just.
The treaty thus concluded restored to the Senecas the land west of Buffalo Creek, the government reserving the use of a strip along the Niagara River for a road between the lakes. The Senecas relinquished claim to the triangle at Presque Isle, which Cornplanter had disposed of without authority to the State of Pennsylvania, while they had their annuity increased from $1,500 to $4,500, and there was distributed among them at the conclusion of the council goods valued at $10,000.
From that time down to the present peace has continued be- tween the whites of the Genesee Country and the people of the Iroquois Confederacy. Both recognize the treaty as a sacred obligation. Its validity has been repeatedly upheld by the highest courts of state and nation and its terms have been consistently observed by the remnants of the once powerful Six Nations of Indians.
The following is the full text of the treaty concluded at the
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HISTORY OF THE GENESEE COUNTRY
council at Canandaigua, November 11, 1794, by which differences between the United States Government and the Six Nations were satisfactorily adjusted :
A TREATY BETWEEN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA AND THE TRIBES OF INDIANS CALLED THE SIX NATIONS.
The President of the United States having determined to hold a conference with the Six Nations of Indians for the purpose of removing from their minds all causes of complaint, and establishing a firm and permanent friendship with them; and Timothy Pickering being appointed sole agent for that purpose; and the agent having met and conferred with the sachems, chiefs and warriors, of the Six Nations, in a general council: Now, in order to accomplish the good design of this conference, the parties have agreed on the following articles, which, when ratified by the President, with the advice and consent of the Senate of the United States, shall be binding on them and the Six Nations:
Article 1. Peace and friendship are hereby firmly established and shall be per- petual, between the United States and the Six Nations.
Art. 2. The United States acknowledge the lands reserved to the Oneida, Onon- daga, and Cayuga nations, in their respective treaties with the State of New York, and called their reservations, to be their property; and the United States will never claim the same nor disturb them, or either of the Six Nations, nor their Indian friends, residing thereon, and united with them in the free use and enjoyment thereof; but the said reservations shall remain theirs, until they choose to sell the same to the people of the United States, who have the right to purchase.
Art. 3. The land of the Seneca nation is bounded as follows: beginning on Lake Ontario, at the northwest corner of the land they sold to Oliver Phelps; the line runs westerly along the lake, as far as Oyongwongyeh creek, at Johnston's Landing Place, about four miles eastward, from the fort of Niagara; then, southerly, up that creek to its main fork; then straight to the main fork of Stedman's creek, which empties into the river Niagara, above Fort Schlosser; and then onward, from that fork, con- tinuing the same straight course, to that river; (this line, from the mouth of Oyong- wongyeh creek, to the river Niagara, above fort Schlosser, being the eastern boundary of a strip of land, extending from the same line to Niagara river, which the Seneca nation ceded to the King of Great Britain, at a treaty held about thirty years ago, with Sir William Johnston) ; then the line runs along the Niagara river to Lake Erie; then along Lake Erie, to the northwest corner of a triangular piece of land, which the United States conveyed to the State of Pennsylvania, as by the President's patent, dated the third day of March, 1792; then due south to the northern boundary of that State; then due east to the southwest corner of the land sold by the Seneca nation to Oliver Phelps; and then north and northerly, along Phelps's line, to the place of beginning, on Lake Ontario. Now, the United States acknowledge all the land within the aforementioned boundaries, to be the property of the Seneca nation; and the United States will never claim the same, nor disturb the Seneca nation, nor any of the Six Nations, or of their Indian friends residing thereon, and united with them, in the free use and enjoyment thereof; but it shall remain theirs, until they choose to sell the same to the people of the United States, who have the right to purchase.
Art. 4. The United States having thus described and acknowledged what lands belong to the Oneidas, Onondagas, Cayugas, and Senecas, and engaged never to claim the same, nor to disturb them, or any of the Six Nations, or their Indian friends resid- ing thereon, and united with them, in the free use and enjoyment thereof; now, the Six Nations, and each of them, hereby engage that they will never claim any other lands within the boundaries of the United States, nor ever disturb the people of the United States in the free use and enjoyment thereof.
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HISTORY OF THE GENESEE COUNTRY
Art. 5. The Seneca nation, all others of the Six Nations, concurring, cede to the United States the right of making a wagon road from fort Schlosser to Lake Erie, as far south as Buffalo creek; and the people of the United States shall have the free and undisturbed use of this road, for the purposes of traveling and transportation. And the Six Nations, and each of them, will forever allow to the people of the United States, a free passage through their lands, and the free use of the harbors and rivers adjoining and within their respective tracts of land, for the passing and securing of vessels and boats, and liberty to land their cargoes, where necessary, for their safety.
Art. 6. In consideration of the peace and friendship hereby established, and of the engagements entered into by the Six Nations; and because the United States desire, with humanity and kindness, to contribute to their comfortable support; and to render the peace and friendship hereby established strong and perpetual, the United States now deliver to the Six Nations, and the Indians of the other nations residing among, and united with them, a quantity of goods, of the value of ten thousand dollars. And for the same considerations, and with a view to promote the future welfare of the Six Nations, and of their Indian friends aforesaid, the United States will add the sum of three thousand dollars to the one thousand five hundred dollars heretofore allowed them by an article ratified by the President, on the twenty-third day of April, 1792, making in the whole four thousand five hundred dollars; which shall be expended yearly, forever, in purchasing clothing, domestic animals, implements of husbandry, and other utensils, suited to their circumstances, and in compensating useful artificers, who shall reside with or near them, and be employed for their benefit. The immediate applica- tion of the whole annual allowance now stipulated, to be made by the superintendent, appointed by the President, for the affairs of the Six Nations, and their Indian friends aforesaid.
Art. 7. Lest the firm peace and friendship now established should be interrupted by the misconduct of individuals, the United States and Six Nations agree, that, for injuries done by individuals, on either side no private revenge or retaliation shall take place; but, instead thereof, complaint shall be made by the party injured, to the other; by the Six Nations, or any of them, to the President of the United States, or the super- intendent by him appointed; and by the superintendent, or other person appointed by the President, to the principal chiefs of the Six Nations, or of the nation to which the offender belongs; and such prudent measures shall then be pursued as shall be neces- sary to preserve our peace and friendship unbroken, until the Legislature (or great council) of the United States shall make other equitable provision for the purpose.
Note. It is clearly understood by the parties to this treaty, that the annuity, stipulated in the sixth article, is to be applied to the benefit of such of the Six Nations, and of their Indian Friends, united with them, as aforesaid, as do or shall reside within the boundaries of the United States; for the United States do not interfere with nations, tribes or families of Indians, elsewhere resident.
In witness whereof, the said Timothy Pickering and the sachems and war chiefs of the said Six Nations, have hereunto set their hands and seals.
Done at Canandaigua, in the State of New York, the eleventh day of November, in the year one thousand seven hundred and ninety-four.
TIMOTHY PICKERING.
(Signed by fifty-nine sachems and war chiefs of the Six Nations.) Timothy Pickering. Witnesses: Interpreters : Horatio Jones, Joseph Smith, Jasper Parrish, Henry Abeele, Israel Chapin, Wm. Shepard, Jun'r., James Smedley, John Wickham, Augustus Porter, James H. Garnsey, Wm. Ewing, Israel Chapin, Jun'r.,
O-no-ye-ah-nee, Kon-ne-at-or-tee-ooh, or Handsome Lake,
To-kenh-you-hau, Alias Capt. Key, O-nes-hau-ee,
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HISTORY OF THE GENESEE COUNTRY
Hendrich Aupaumut,
David Neesoonhuk,
Kanatsoyh, Alias Nicholas Kusik, Soh-hon-te-o-quent, Oo-duht-sa-it,
Ko-nooh-qung, Tos-song-gau-lo-luss, John Sken-en-do-a,
O-ne-at-or-lee-ooh, Handsome Lake, Kus-sau-wa-tau,
E-yoo-ten-yoo-tau-ook,
Kohn-ye-au-gong, Alias Jake Stroud, Sha-gui-ea-sa, Teer-oos, Alias Capt. Prantup,
Ti-ooh-quot-ta-kau-na, or Woods on Fire, Ta-oun-dau-deesh,
Soos-ha-oo-wau,
Henry Young Brant,
Sonh-yoo-wau-na, or Big Sky,
O-na-ah-hah,
Sauh-ta-ka-ong-yees, or Two Skies of a Length,
Hot-osh-a-henh,
Kau-kon-da-nai-ya,
Oun-na-shatta-kau,
Non-di-yau-ka,
Ka-ung-ya-neh-quee,
Kos-sish-to-wau, Oo-jau-geht-a, or Fish Carrier,
To-he-ong-go,
Oot-a-guas-so,
Joo-non-dau-wa-onch,
Ki-yau-ha-onh,
Oo-tau-je-au-genh, or Broken Axe, Tau-ho-on-dos, or Open the Way,
Twau-ke-wash-a,
Se-quid-ong-quee, Alias Little Beard,
Ko-d jeote, Alias Half Town, Ken-jau-au-gus, or Stinking Fish, Soo-noh-qua-kau,
Twen-ni-ya-na,
Jish-kaa-ga, or Green Grasshopper, Alias Little Billy, Tug-geh-shot-ta,
Teh-ong-ya-gau-na,
Teh-ong-yoo-wush,
Kon-ne-yoo-we-sot,
Ho-na-ya-wus, Alias Farmer's Brother,
Sog-goo-ya-waut-hau, Alias Red Jacket, Kon-yoo-tai-yoo,
Soo-a-yoo-wau,
Kau-je-a-ga-onh, or Heap of Dogs,
Soo-nooh-shoo-wau,
Tha-og-wau-ni-as,
Soo-nong-joo-wau,
Ki-ant-whan-ka, Alias Cornplanter, Kau-neh-shong-goo.
The two parchment originals of which the foregoing is a transcript are both still in existence, one being on file in the De- partment of State at the National Capitol and the other being preserved under lock and key in the Ontario County Historical Museum at Canandaigua, where it was deposited a few years ago, following its purchase at the auction of the DePuy collection of books and documents relating to western New York. This last, the original Indians' copy of the historic Pickering treaty of 1794, bears indisputable evidence of its great age and of the vicissitudes through which it passed from the time it left the hands to which it was intrusted at the close of the Canandaigua council, from sachem to sachem, from tepee to tepee, until it passed, in exchange perhaps for a box of trinkets, a flint-lock musket or a bottle of rum, into the hands of "some one who had dealings with the Indians," and thence to Mr. DePuy's collection and later the auction.
From the very first the purchasers of the Massachusetts tract had doubted the accuracy of the preemption line as run under the direction of Colonel Hugh Maxwell. Mr. Phelps in a letter dated
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HISTORY OF THE GENESEE COUNTRY,
September 9, 1788, to the company's agent, William Walker, who had just then settled at Canandaigua, which, on the assumption that Kanadesaga near the foot of Seneca Lake was outside the purchase, had been selected as headquarters, wrote: "I am still dissatisfied about our east line. I am sure that it cannot be right." But the error was not determined and corrected until 1792, when, at the direction of Robert Morris, a resurvey of the line was made by Benjamin Ellicott and his associates in so pains- taking a manner that its accuracy was never subsequently ques- tioned, though the determination unsettled land titles and brought within the Genesee Country a "Gore" of 85,000 acres which had been sold previously to other parties, including the Reed and Ryckman tract, the Seth Reed location and a strip off the Military tract.
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