USA > New York > Monroe County > History of the pioneer settlement of Phelps and Gorham's purchase, and Morris' reserve; embracing the counties of Monroe, Ontario, Livingston, Yates, Steuben, most of Wayne and Allegany, and parts of Orleans, Genesee, and Wyoming. To which is added, a Supplement, or Extension of the pioneer history of Monroe county > Part 9
USA > New York > Allegany County > History of the pioneer settlement of Phelps and Gorham's purchase, and Morris' reserve; embracing the counties of Monroe, Ontario, Livingston, Yates, Steuben, most of Wayne and Allegany, and parts of Orleans, Genesee, and Wyoming > Part 9
USA > New York > Livingston County > History of the pioneer settlement of Phelps and Gorham's purchase, and Morris' reserve; embracing the counties of Monroe, Ontario, Livingston, Yates, Steuben, most of Wayne and Allegany, and parts of Orleans, Genesee, and Wyoming. To which is added, a Supplement, or Extension of the pioneer history of Monroe county > Part 9
USA > New York > Yates County > History of the pioneer settlement of Phelps and Gorham's purchase, and Morris' reserve; embracing the counties of Monroe, Ontario, Livingston, Yates, Steuben, most of Wayne and Allegany, and parts of Orleans, Genesee, and Wyoming. To which is added, a Supplement, or Extension of the pioneer history of Monroe county > Part 9
USA > New York > Ontario County > History of the pioneer settlement of Phelps and Gorham's purchase, and Morris' reserve; embracing the counties of Monroe, Ontario, Livingston, Yates, Steuben, most of Wayne and Allegany, and parts of Orleans, Genesee, and Wyoming. To which is added, a Supplement, or Extension of the pioneer history of Monroe county > Part 9
USA > New York > Wyoming County > History of the pioneer settlement of Phelps and Gorham's purchase, and Morris' reserve; embracing the counties of Monroe, Ontario, Livingston, Yates, Steuben, most of Wayne and Allegany, and parts of Orleans, Genesee, and Wyoming. To which is added, a Supplement, or Extension of the pioneer history of Monroe county > Part 9
USA > New York > Steuben County > History of the pioneer settlement of Phelps and Gorham's purchase, and Morris' reserve; embracing the counties of Monroe, Ontario, Livingston, Yates, Steuben, most of Wayne and Allegany, and parts of Orleans, Genesee, and Wyoming. To which is added, a Supplement, or Extension of the pioneer history of Monroe county > Part 9
USA > New York > Genesee County > History of the pioneer settlement of Phelps and Gorham's purchase, and Morris' reserve; embracing the counties of Monroe, Ontario, Livingston, Yates, Steuben, most of Wayne and Allegany, and parts of Orleans, Genesee, and Wyoming. To which is added, a Supplement, or Extension of the pioneer history of Monroe county > Part 9
USA > New York > Wayne County > History of the pioneer settlement of Phelps and Gorham's purchase, and Morris' reserve; embracing the counties of Monroe, Ontario, Livingston, Yates, Steuben, most of Wayne and Allegany, and parts of Orleans, Genesee, and Wyoming. To which is added, a Supplement, or Extension of the pioneer history of Monroe county > Part 9
USA > New York > Orleans County > History of the pioneer settlement of Phelps and Gorham's purchase, and Morris' reserve; embracing the counties of Monroe, Ontario, Livingston, Yates, Steuben, most of Wayne and Allegany, and parts of Orleans, Genesee, and Wyoming. To which is added, a Supplement, or Extension of the pioneer history of Monroe county > Part 9
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Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67
* Assumed to be much less in the British accounts.
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PHELPS AND GORHAM'S PURCHASE.
their intrepid leader, Brant, and well maintained the unequal contest. " Both tories and Indians were entitled to the credit of fighting manfully. Every rock and tree and bush, sheltered its man, from hehind which the winged messengers of death were thickly sent, but with so little effect as to excite astonishment. The Indians yielded ground only inch by inch ; and in their retreat darted from tree to tree with the agility of a panther, often contesting each new position at the point of the bayonet - a thing very unusual even with militiamen, and still more rare among the undisciplined warriors of the woods." * The battle had been waged about two hours, when the British and Indians perceiving their forces inadequate, and that a maneuver to surround them was likely to be successful, broke and fled in great disorder.
"This " says John Salmon, of Livingston county, who belonged to the expedition and gave an account of it to the author of the Life of Mary Jemison, "was the only regular stand made by the In- dians. In their retreat they were pursued by our men to the Nar- rows, where they were attacked and killed in great numbers, so that the sides of the rocks next the River looked as if blood had been poured on them by pailfuls."
The details of all that transpired in this campaign are before the public in so many forms, that their repetition here is unnecessary. The route of the army was via "French Catherine's Town," t head of Seneca Lake, down the east shore of the Lake to the Indian village of Kanadesaga, (Old Castle,) and from thence to Canandai- gua, Honeoye, head of Conesus Lake, to Groveland. The villages destroyed, (with the apple trees and growing crops of the Indians,) were at Catherinestown, Kendai, or " Apple Town" on the east side of the Lake, eleven miles from its foot, Kanadesaga, Honeoye, Conesus, Canascraga, Little Beard's Town, Big Tree, Canawagus, and on the return of the army, Scawyace, a village between the
* Life of Brant.
t Name from Catherine Montour. She was a half blood, is said to have been the daughter of one of the French Governors of Canada. She was made a captive and adopted by the Senecas when she was ten years of age, becoming afterwards the wife of a distinguished Seneca Chief. When on several occasions she accompanied the chief to Philadelphia her extraordinary beauty, joined to a considerable polish of manners, made her the "observed of all observers; " she was invited to a private house and treated with much respect. She resided at the head of Seneca Lake previous to Sullivan's expedition, and afterwards at Fort Niagara, where she was treated with marked attention by the British officers.
1
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PHELPS AND GORHAM'S PURCHASE.
Cayuga and Seneca Lakes, and several other Cayuga villages. Captain Machin was at the head of the engineers in this expedition. The industrious gleaner of Border War reminiscences, the author of the History of Schoharie, has found among his papers the fol- lowing, which accompanied a map of Sullivan's entire route : -
" Distance of places from Easton, Pennsylvania, to Chenesee, [Gen- esee] Castle, taken in 1779, by actual survey : -
NAMES OF PLACES.
MILES.
TOTAL.
From Easton to Weomining,
-
65
65
To Lackewaneck Creek,
10
75
Quailuternunk,
7
82
Tunkhannunk Creek,
11
93
Meshohing Creek,
9
102
Vanderlips Plantation,
5
107
Wealusking Town,
8
115
Wessawkin, or Pine Creek,
1414
12916
Tioga,
1513
145
Chemung,
12
157
Newton,
81%
16516
French Catherinestown,
18
18312
Kandia or Appleton
2716
211
Outlet of Seneca Lake,
11%
22212
Kanadesaga, or Seneca Castle
312
226
Kanandaque,
1516
24115
Haunyauya,
1315
255
Adjusta,
-
1216
26713
Cossauwauloughby,
7
27415
Chenesee Castle
512
280
It is probable a better table of distances than has since been made. Among the papers of Capt. Machin, is the following certifi- cate : -
" This may certify that Kayingwaurto the Sanakee chief, has been on an expedition to Fort Stanwix and taken two scalps, one from an officer and a corporal, they were gunning near the Fort, for which I promise to pay at sight, ten dollars for each scalp. Given under my hand at Buek's Island. JOHN BUTLER, Col. and
Supt. of the Six Nations and the allies of his Majesty."
This Kayingwaurto was a principal Seneca chief at Kanadesaga. He was killed by a scouting party of Gen. Sullivan's army, and in his pocket the certificate was found. The history of those scalps is one of the most melancholy tales of that era of terrible savage war- fare. The chief in 1777, with a scouting party of Seneca warriors, was prowling about Fort Stanwix. Capt. Gregg, and a Corporal of the Fort, had ventured out to shoot pigeons, when they were fired at by the Indian scouts ; the corporal being killed and Capt. Gregg severely wounded. Both were scalped ; but after the Indians had left
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PHELPS AND GORHAM'S PURCHASE.
Capt Gregg revived. His dog ran off to some fishermen of the Fort, a mile distant, alarmed them by his moaning, attracted them in the direction of his wounded master. Capt. Gregg was thus discovered, and lived to relate the story of his preservation. It is given upon the authority of Dr. Dwight.
The march of Sullivan, the devastations committed by his army, would at this distant period seem like Vandalism, in the absence of the consideration that he was acting under strict orders; and that those orders were approved, if not dictated by Washington. The campaign was a matter of necessity; to be effectual, it was not only necessary that its acts should be retaliatory and retributive, but that the haunts, the retreats, of a foe so ruthless, must be bro- ken up. The object was to destroy all the means of subsistence of the Senecas, desolate their homes, prevent their return to them, and if possible, induce their permanent retreat beyond the Niagara River. The imprudence, the want of sagacity, which Col. Stone has imputed to Gen. Sullivan in alarming every village he approach- ed by the sound of his cannon, the author conceives, a misappre- hension of his motives. Stealthy, quiet approaches, would have found as victims in every village, the old men, the women and children - the warriors away, banded with their British allies. Humanity dictated the forewarning, that those he did not come to war against could have time to flee. It would have been a far darker feature of the campaign than those that have been complained of, and one that could not have been mitigated, if old men, women and children, had been unalarmed, and exposed to the vengeance of those who came from the valleys of the Susquehannah and the Mohawk to punish murderers of their kindred and neighbors. The march of Gen. Sullivan, after leaving the Chemung, was bloodless, except in a small degree -just as it should have been, if he could not make victims of those he was sent to punish.
The third expedition of this campaign, which has generally been lost sight of by historians, was that of Gen. Broadhead. He left Fort Pitt in August with six hundred men, and destroyed several Mingo and Muncey tribes living on the Allegany, French Creek, and other tributaries of the Ohio.
The heavy artillery that Gen. Sullivan brought as far as Newton, would indicate that Niagara was originally the destination. There the General and his officers, seeing how long it had taken to reach
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PHELPS AND GORHAM'S PURCHASE.
that point, in all probability determined that too much of the season had been wasted, to allow of executing their tasks in the Indian country, making their roads and moving the army and all its ap- pointments to Niagara before the setting in of winter. Besides, before the army had reached the valley of the Chemung, the fact was ascertained that there would be a failure in a contemplated junction with the army under Gen. Broadhead.
After the expedition of Gen. Sullivan, the Indians never had any considerable permanent re-occupancy of their villages east of the Genesee river. They settled down after a brief flight, in their villages on the west side of the river in the neighborhood of Gen- eseo, 'Mt. Morris and Avon, and at Gardeau, Canadea, Tonawanda, Tusearora, Buffalo Creek, Cattaraugus and Allegany. For retreats of the Johnsons, Butler and their troops, see narrative of William Hincher, in subsequent pages ; and for Gen. Washington's official account of Sullivan's expedition, as copied from the manuscripts of a Revolutionary officer for the History of the Holland Purchase, see Appendix, No. 3.
NOTE .- The author derives from James Otis Esq. of Perry, Wyoming County, a more satisfactory account of the retreat of the Indians upon the Genesee River, than he has seen from any other source. He became acquainted with Mary Jemison in 1810. She told him that when Sullivan's army was approaching the place of her resi- dence, Little Beard's Town, the Indians retreated upon the Silver Lake trail. When about two miles from the Lake they halted toawait expected re-inforcements from Buffalo Creek. They had a white person with them that they hung by bending down a small tree, fastening to it a bark halter they had around his neck, and letting it fly back ; thus suspending their victim in the air. The bones and the bent tree attested the truth of the relation long after white settlements commenced. Reinforcements from Buffalo arrived, a council was held which terminated in the conclusion that they were too weak to risk an attack of Sullivan. When their invaders had retreated, the great body of the Indians went back to the sites of their old villages upon the River. Mrs. Jemison, went around on the west side of Silver Lake, and then down to Gardeau fiats, where she found two negroes living that had raised some corn. She husked corn for the negroes and earned enough to supply her family with bread until the next harvest. This occupancy continued, Mrs. Jemison had the Gardeau tract granted to her at the Morris treaty.
PART SECOND.
CHAPTER I.
OUR IMMEDIATE PREDECESSORS - THE SENECAS - WITII A GLANCE AT THE IROQUOIS.
IT is not the design of this work to embrace a detailed account of the Five Nations. The Senecas, however, the Tsonnontouans of French chronicle, who guarded the western door of the Long House, looking out on the Great Lakes, demand a passing notice, as we are approaching a series of events connected with the "par- tition " of their wide and beautiful domain.
In common with the red races, they are the " autochthonoi " of the soil -"fresher from the hand that formed of earth the human face," than the present rulers of the land that was once theirs. On their hunting grounds, the pioneers of the Genesee country, preparatory to settlement, kindled their camp-fires. Our clustering cities and villages are on the sites of their ancient castles, forts and places of burial. In the vallies where they lived, and on hills where blazed their beacons, a people with the best blood of Europe in their veins, at one and the same time, are founding halls of learn- ing, and gathering in the golden harvests. The early annals of their occupation, to which the reader is soon to be introduced, are intimately blended with this once powerful and numerous branch of the Iroquois confederacy, that furnished under the totewic bond, at the era of confederation, two of the presiding law-givers and chiefs. *
An opinion prevails, that the guardians of the Eastern Door, the Mohawks ; or, as called by their brethren, "Do-de-o-gal," or
* Documentary History.
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PHELPS AND GORHAM'S PURCHASE.
"message bearers," were the most warlike; but a careful exami- nation of history and the pages of Jesuit journals, establishes the fact, that the Senecas were not their inferiors in every martial at- tribute, and were always represented at a general gathering of the clans, in time of danger, by a more formidable force. There is no foundation for the remark of Buchanan, speaking in reference to the Mohawks, that their allies neither made war or peace without their consent.
Unquestionable proof is on record, that the fierce Senecas were not always governed in their action by the general voice at Onon- daga. Sternly independent, they sometimes took up arms, when the other tribes, to use an Indian metaphor, sate smoking in quiet on their mats. After the rapid decline of French ascendancy on this continent, and many of the tribes beheld with terror the gov- ernment of Canada falling into English hands, the Senecas, un- daunted by the danger, adhered with dogged obstinacy, to the vanquished.
For a time, they were in alliance with Pontiac, and played a conspicuous part with the great "Ottawa " in his plan of surprising a cordon of posts in the Lake country, and exterminating the "dogs in red clothing," that guarded them. This statement does not rest on vague conjecture, or blind tradition. By reference to the British Annual Register, for 1764, we learn that on the 3d of April, 1763, Sir William Johnson concluded at Johnson Hall, on the Mohawk, preliminary articles of peace with eight deputies of the Seneca nation, which alone of the Iroquois league, had joined Pontiac. While the proud and conquering Mohawks imposed tribute on the Mohegans, and scoured the pine-forests of distant Maine in pursuit of flying foes, westward the track of the Senecas was literally marked in blood. The Neuter Nation, with homes on both sides of the Niagara, were "blotted from the things that be ;" and the Eries, after a brave resistance, destroyed - the prize of conquest, the loveliest portion of our trans-Genessean country. The barren coast of Superior, a thousand miles away from their great council-fire, was trodden by their warriors.
The Illinois turned pale at their approach on the shores of the Mississippi, and no hatchets were redder than theirs in the Herculean task of humbling the Lenni Lenapes, and for ever hushing into silence their boasting tongues.
87
PHELPS AND GORHAM'S PURCHASE.
The Chippewas, a valiant people, discomfitted and utterly dis- mayed by their prowess, fled like hunted deer to the remote vil- lages of the Sioux. The long and bloody wars waged by the Five Nations with the Southern tribes, owed their origin to an attack made on the Senecas in one of their distant expeditions to the south west, by a party of Cherokees. The war-post was at once struck, and the confederates joined with their injured brethren in resenting the insult, and taming the pride of their wily antagonists. Though a vast extent of territory lay between the hunting grounds of the latter and the central fire of their cantons, the dreaded war-whoop of the Iroquois was heard on the banks of the Talla- poosa and Ocmulgee. Forbidding wilds, draped in the long gray moss of milder latitudes, and swampy fastnesses, the savage haunts of the alligator and terrapin, were explored by the infuriated in- vaders.
Nature opposed no barrier to a triumphant campaign, and dis- tance was no obstacle in the fearful work of retaliation.
Hiokatoo, the renowned husband of the " White Woman," was a leader in one of these wild forays, and when a gray-haired ancient, cheered many a listening circle at his lodge fire, with a narrative of his exploits on that occasion.
Individuals of Cherokee extraction, still reside on the Tonawan- da Reservation. They trace their descent to captives, saved from torture at the stake, and adopted as tribesmen by their victors.
I must differ from many writers, misled by Heckewelder, in the opinion that compared with surrounding nations, the Iroquois were not a superior race of men. No primitive people can boast of nobler war captains, than Kan-ah-je-a-gah, Hon-ne-ya-was, Brant, Hendrick and Skenandoah ; - no abler orators and statesmen than Dekanissora, Canassetego, Logan and Red Jacket.
When the adventurous Frenchmen first set foot on Canadian soil, in 1603, he found the tribes of the League settled near Hochelaga, on the site of Montreal. Previous to this eventful period, they were said to have been a peaceful and happy people - more inclined to till the earth than follow the war-path. The unprovoked encroach- ment of the Adirondacks on their land - a powerful nation residing 300 miles above Trois-Rivieres, at length woke their latent energies, and roused their martial qualities. After their expulsion from the banks of the St. Lawrence, one of America's mighty arteries, and
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PHELPS AND GORHAM'S PURCHASE. ,
conquering the Satanas in their migrations, they laid the founda- tion of empire on the borders of our beautiful Lakes. Seasoned, like Cæsar's veterans, by hardship, long marches and victory, they bravely resisted the inroads of their old enemies, the Hurons and Adirondacks. Though inferior in physical force, they made ample amends therefor, by the exercise of greater prudence, and superior strategy. Fighting in small detached parties, and under intrepid leaders, they struck blows in remote points, at one and the same moment of time, producing a general panic and surprise.
In turn, assuming the offensive, they drove back the invaders, disheartened and discomfitted, to the neighborhood of Quebec. Then came the tug of war. Through the intervention of Jesuit influence, so puissant in the 17th century, that Kings and l'ontiffs submitted to its dictation, the French colonists formed an alliance with the vanquished tribes. Supplied with more deadly weapons - the fire-locks of civilization - the Algonquin and Huron again struggled for the mastery. By consulting Colden, we learn that previous to the conflict between Champlain and the Iroquois, on the Lake that bears his name, the latter had never heard the thunder or seen the lightning of the pale faces. Though defeated on that occasion, they were not humbled ; all fear of consequences was merged in a feeling of deep and deadly exasperation. The re- doubtable Champlain himself, was doomed a few years after to feel the heavy weight of their vengeance. * Incautiously laying siege to one of their forts on Onondaga Lake, in October, 1615, he was twice wounded by arrows, and forced to retire in disgrace with his motley array of French and Indians.
He who foils, in hard encounter, a dexterous swordsman, with an oaken staff, gives proof of matchless address and prowess - and the fact that the Five Nations, recovering from the effects of a first surprise, boldly maintained their ground, even at this period, and often played an aggressive part, proves their native superiority, and gives them indisputable right to their own haughty term of designation -" On-gui-hion-wi "- men without peers.
French interference, in behalf of their old and implacable foes, only developed the genius of their Sachems, and attested the devo- tion of their warriors.
* O. H. Marshall's able address before the Young Men's Association at Buffalo.
89
PHELPS AND GORHAM'S PURCHASE.
It was extremely impolitic on the part of the Canadian colony, far from the resources of the mother country, thus in a state of in- fancy, to provoke the hate of unconquerable tribes. The Charis- toone, or Iron Workers, as they termed their neighbors, the Dutch, and after their decline, the English, supplied the Konoshioni with ammunition and arms. Jealous of French influence, they encouraged them to wage a war that should ask no quarter, and know no end- ing, until Canada was depopulated. Then blacker grew the tem- pest : - from the pine plains of Ske-nec-ta-da to the great Lake, a gathering-cry was heard, that rang through the arches of the forest, more dreadful than the panther's scream. Towns and out- posts were burned - the Carignan was struck down. at his door- stone, and the settler scalped in the midst of his clearing. Neither age nor sex was spared.
The fur-trader found a red grave in the wilderness; even the sentinel was shot pacing his rounds, and the unwary batteauman dyed with his heart's best blood the waters of Cataracqui.
French America, through the administration of successive Vice- roys of Louis XIV., atoned for her folly in the dispersion of her Abenaqui - the sack of Montreal-the defeat of her faithful Hurons under the guns of Quebec, and humiliating irruptions of a foe that overran the province, to use the strong figure of her annal- ists, " as a torrent does the low-lands, when it overflows its banks, and there is no withstanding it."
Compare for a moment the Atahualpas and Huan Capacs of Peruvian history, with the dreaded founders and rulers of this Aboriginal League. Though mighty armies came at their call, resplendant with gold and blazing with jewels, they were routed by Pizarro, with a few horsemen at his back. Charging steed and shouting rider - deemed by the silly natives one animal, like the Centaur of fable -rattling gun and the blast of the trumpet subdued them with a terror that no appeal to patriotism could overcome. In sight of their homes and altars, thousands were slain like unresisting sheep, the survivors bowing their necks to the yoke, and looking tamely on, while their heart-broken Incas suffer- ed ignominious death. The mighty empire of the Aztecs had ex- perienced a few years before, the same disastrous fate ; it crumbled away, as it were, in a night ; the splendor of its adorning more ef- fe ctually insuring its destruction.
6
·
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PHELPS AND GORHAM'S PURCHASE.
The romantic valor of a few Castilian adventurers, outweighed in the scale of conflict, the countless multitudes that opposed them.
Montezuma and Guatimozin, after all, were nothing more than royal shadows, notwithstanding their patient martyrdom.
The sceptred phantoms invoked by the weird sisters were less frail and unsubstantial, for they inspired fear - extorting this shud- dering cry from a tyrant and regicide, bloody and false like Cortez --
"Let this pernicious hour
Stand, aye, accursed in the calendar."
Of different mould and mettle, were the Sachems and Attotarhos of the Five Nations. They were endowed with the will to dare --- the hand to execute. Their Garangulas and Decanissoras - their Oundiagas and Karistageas united to indomitable courage, talents for negotiation, and resistless eloquence.
Less brilliant than banded states that paid submissive tribute to the Aztec emperor, there was more stability and strength in their unwritten compact of union. Though a mere handful, compared with the swarming and priest-ridden slaves of Mexico, they posses- sed an inherent valor and spirit of independence, that submitted to no wrong, and brooked no rivalry. Seldom in the field with more than a thousand warriors, they went forth conquering and to con- quer - bound by an heraldic tie that evoked a deeply-rooted senti- ment of regard and national pride.
Less formidable by far was Spanish inroad at the extreme south than French military power on this continent so vainly exerted, under De Nonville and Frontenac, to overawe and subdue them, " and it can scarcely be deemed fanciful to assert," says a dis- tinguished writer, * " that had Hernando Cortez entered the Mohawk valley instead of that of Mexico, with the force he actually had, his ranks would have gone down under the skilfulness of the Iroquois ambuscades, and himself perished ingloriously at the stake."
Wherever they were urged onward by a martial impulse and ardor that no difficulties could lessen or abate - whether traversing the Appalachian chain or western prairie -the fame of their ex- ploits preceeding them, created panic, and paralized resistance. Though thinned in number by long and bloody wars, they were fear- fully formidable in modern times : foes in our revolutionary struggle,
* Schoolcraft.
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PHELPS AND GORHAM'S PURCHASE.
they proved their devotion to their British Father at Wyoming, Minnisink and mournful Oriskany - friends at a later epoch, of our Union, they followed Oundiaka and Honneyawas to the red field of Chippewa. At all periods of their history - flushed with triumph, or clouded by disaster -- there has been no decay of hereditary valor.
Whether known as 'Massawomekes' to the southern, or 'Na- dowa' to the western Tribes, they were alike terrible and invinci- ble. A more splendid race of savages never launched their war- canoes on our streams, or drew bow in our forests ; and a wild mag- namity throws light on their darker traits, in their practical applica- tion of the motto, "pareere subjectos, et extirpare superbos." Hu- manity blushes to recall the scenes of rape and hellish licence that have followed the storming of towns, and saek of cities in the old world, but an Iroquois warrior was never known to violate the chastity of a female prisoner.
Often a chivalric spirit gave an air of romance to their native daring. After a successful foray into an enemy's country, pursu- ers on the trail, finding their gage of mortal defiance, would move with greater circumspection. Like the generous reptile whose dread rattle arrests the step of the hunter, significant tokens dropped by the way, warned foemen to retire, or expect no mercy at their hands. Thus in 1696, when Frontenac's army was on the Oswego, two bundles of cut rushes, in their line of march, a numerical sign, conveyed the startling intelligence that more than fourteen hundred warriors were on the watch for their coming.
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