History of Addison county Vermont, with illustrations and biographical sketches of some of its prominent men and pioneers, Part 6

Author: Smith, H. P. (Henry Perry), 1839-1925. 1n
Publication date: 1886
Publisher: Syracuse, N.Y., D. Mason & co.
Number of Pages: 988

USA > Vermont > Addison County > History of Addison county Vermont, with illustrations and biographical sketches of some of its prominent men and pioneers > Part 6

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Evidences of an Indian occupation are occasionally met with in the county even at this late day, as the plow sometimes turns up relics in the form of spear and arrow-heads, stone axes, etc. These relics have been found in large quantities along the borders of the lake, Otter Creek, Lemon Fair and other streams, and among them specimens of pottery and domestic implements. Upon the Cutts farm, on the lake shore in Orwell, there is a place where they manufactured their arrow-heads from a kind of flinty stone obtained in the

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DISCOVERY AND OCCUPATION.

vicinity. Large piles of the fragments produced in working out these arrow- heads are yet to be seen. Another manufactory of these implements may be seen on Mount Independence.1 An interesting specimen of their pottery was unearthed in Middlebury in 1820. It is an urn or pot capable of holding about twenty quarts, and appears to have been made from pulverized granite and clay, baked but unglazed.

Some of the tribes composing the confederacy of the Iroquois emigrated to Canada at an early day, allying with the French in their war against the British. These Indians have repeatedly, even up to a comparatively recent date, presented claims against Vermont for lands lying along the eastern shore of the lake. In 1798 the Legislature met at Vergennes, and during its session was waited upon by a committee of Indians bearing a petition signed by twenty chiefs, representing, as they said, " the seven nations of Lower Canada Indians." This petition, setting forth their grievances, asked for $89,600 in restitution for " all that tract of land lying northerly of a straight line from Ticonderoga to the great falls of Otter Creek [Sutherland Falls], from thence to be continued to the top of the Green Mountains, thence along said mountains which divide the water that runs into the Connecticut River and the water that flows into Lake Champlain and Mississquoi River, to the latitude of forty-five degrees." Among the tribes represented were the Abenaquis and Cognahwaghahs. The latter originally formed a part of the Mohawks, but revolted from that tribe, joined the French, and settled at the Sault St. Louis, above Montreal. If they had any claim it must have been under the Iroquois title ; while the Abenaquis "claimed under the title of that nation who once inhabited the whole country east of Lake Champlain, south of the St. Lawrence, and em- bracing the northern part of New England. This would seem to favor the idea that the Iroquois - as Champlain represents when he discovered the lake - might then have occupied the country on its eastern border. If so, the Abe- naquis must have gained possession of it, and occupied it afterwards, until they joined their brethren at St. Francis."2 The subject of the petition was referred to a committee, who reported that the lands claimed had, in their opinion, for- merly belonged to said Indians, but whether their title had ever been extin- guished by purchase, conquest, dereliction of occupancy, or in any other way, they could not ascertain. The Legislature supported the Indian agents during their attendance, gave them a hundred dollars in token of friendship, and they returned to their tribes well pleased with their success, and hoping to succeed still better another season.

It is like a pathetic page from a romance to read, in Champlain's journal, that " the Iroquois were greatly astonished, seeing two men killed so instan- taneously," one of whom was their noble chief; while the ingenuous acknowl-

1 History of Orwell, by Hon. Roswell Bottum.

2 See Williams's History of Vermont, II, 282, 290.

HISTORY OF ADDISON COUNTY.

edgment of Champlain, "I had put four balls in my arquebus," is a vivid testi- mony of how little mercy the Iroquois nations were to expect thenceforth from their northern enemies and the pale-faced race who were eventually to drive them from their domain. Still, however, if the Indians were dumbfounded when they witnessed for the first time the deadly effect of firearms, Champlain and his two companions were equally surprised by the fiendish cruelties inflicted by the Indian warriors upon their prisoners. "After proceeding about eight leagues down the lake," says Dr. Fitch in his history of Washington county, N. Y., " they landed after nightfall, and taking one of the prisoners, made a speech to him, upbraiding him with the barbarities which he and his people had perpetrated in the war, without showing mercy in any instance, and informing him that it would now devolve on him to submit to the same destiny. They then told him to sing if he had any courage; this he commenced doing, but in the most sad and dolorous tones. A fire had been previously kindled, and was now burning briskly. Each Indian took from it a brand, and commenced burning the skin of the poor creature, a little at a time, to make him suffer longer torment. Remitting this at times, they would then throw him on his back in the water. Afterward pulling off his finger-nails, they put hot ashes on the ends of his fingers. Next they tore the scalp from the top of his head and then dropped melted pitch upon the naked skull. They then pierced holes through his arms near the wrists, and with sticks drew out therefrom the sinews and nerves, forcibly pulling on them until they were rent asunder. Strange cries at times were uttered by this miserable creature; yet, during the whole of the horrid performance, he was so firm and unshaken that one would have said he did not feel any pain. The Indians urged Champlain to take a fire- brand and join them in their employment. But he remonstrated with them, telling them he was unused to such cruelties-that his people only shot at their enemies with their guns, and if they would only permit him to have one shot at the captive with his arquebus it was all he would ask. They would not consent to this, and, unable to longer endure the sight, he turned away with disgust. Perceiving his disquietude they called him back, telling him to do as he had desired. He thereupon discharged his arquebus at the sufferer with such effect that, as Charlevoix intimates in describing this scene, he had no occasion for desiring a second shot. Even now that their victim was dead they were not satisfied, but, ripping him open, they threw his entrails into the lake, and then cut off his head, arms and legs, preserving only his scalp, which they added to the number they had taken from those who had been killed in the battle. More atrocious still, they took his heart, and cutting it into a number of slices, gave a piece to one of his own brothers, and to each of the other prisoners, ordering them to eat it. These put it into their mouths, but were unable to swallow it; whereupon some of the Algonquin Indians who guarded the prisoners allowed them to spit out the whole and throw it into the water."

DISCOVERY AND OCCUPATION.

During the time of these occurrences under the leadership of Champlain, who was thus pushing southward from his embryo settlement on the St. Law- rence, other explorations were being made from the sea coast northward, the actors in which were undoubtedly impelled by the same spirit of enterprise, but exemplified in a less belligerent manner. Prominent among these, and particularly noteworthy as opening the pathway of civilization leading to the same territory towards which Champlain's expedition tended, was the explora- tion of the noble river that now bears the name of its discoverer, Henry Hud- son. Possibly, at the time Champlain was performing these feats near the head waters of the Hudson, the English navigator was encamped less than one hun- dred miles below. Strange that two adventurers, in the service of different sovereigns ruling three thousand miles away, and approaching from different points of the compass, should so nearly meet in the vast forests of wild Amer- ica, each exploring a part of the continent never before traversed by Euro- peans. Strange, too, that the vicinity where these adventurers so nearly met should, for a hundred and fifty years, be the boundary between the nations re- spectively represented by them, and the scene of their frequent and bloody conflicts for supremacy.

Captain Henry Hudson, though an Englishman, sailed in the interest of the Dutch East India Company. After having, in returning from a quest for the coveted northeastern passage to India, sailed along the coast of the continent from Maine to Chesapeake Bay, and, as we have intimated, ascended the river which bears his name to a point within a hundred miles of that attained by Champlain, he returned to Europe. "The unworthy monarch on England's throne, jealous of the advantage which the Dutch might derive from Hudson's discoveries, detained him in England as an English subject; but the navigator outwitted his sovereign, for he sent an account of his voyage to his Amster- dam employers by a trusty hand."1 Through the information thus furnished was established a Dutch colony on the island of Manhattan, for which a char- ter was granted by the States-General of Holland, bearing date October II, 1614, in which the country was named New Netherland. Meanwhile, in 1607, the English had made their first permanent settlement at Jamestown, Va., and in 1620 planted a second colony at Plymouth Rock. These two colonies be- came the successful rivals of all others, of whatever nationality, in the strife that finally left them (the English) masters of the country.

On the discoveries and the colonization efforts we have briefly noted, three European powers based claims to the territory of which Addison county now forms a part. England, by reason of the discovery of Cabot, who sailed under letters patent from Henry VII, and on the 24th of June, 1497, struck the ster- ile coast of Labrador, and that made in the following year by his son Sebas- tian, who explored the coast from Newfoundland to Florida, claiming a terri-

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HISTORY OF ADDISON COUNTY.

tory eleven degrees in width and extending westward indefinitely. France, by reason of the discoveries of Verrazzani, claimed a portion of the Atlantic coast ; and Holland, by reason of the discovery of Hudson, claimed the coun- try from Cape Cod to the southern shore of Delaware Bay.

From the date of the death of Champlain1 until the end of French domi- nation in New France, the friendship established by that great explorer between the northern Indians and the French was unbroken, while at the same time it led to the unyielding hostility of the Iroquois, and especially of the Mohawks. If truces and informal peace treaties were formed between these antagonistic elements, they were both brief in tenure and of little general effect. As a con- sequence of this and the fact that Lakes Champlain and George were the nat- ural highway between the hostile Indians, they became the scene of prolonged conflict and deeds of savage atrocity, which retarded settlement and devastated their borders. The feuds of the people of Europe and the malignant passions of European sovereigns arrayed the colonies of England against the provinces of France in conflicts where the ordinary ferocity of border warfare was aggra- vated by the relentless atrocities of savage barbarism. Each power emulated the other in the consummation of its schemes of blood and rapine. Hostile In- dian tribes, panting for slaughter, were let loose along the frontier upon feeble settlements, struggling amid the dense forest with a rigorous climate and re- luctant soil for a precarious existence. Unprotected mothers, helpless infancy and decrepit age were equally the victims of the torch, the tomahawk and scalping-knife. The two lakes formed portions of the great pathway (equally accessible and useful to both parties) of these bloody and devastating forays. In the season of navigation they glided over the placid waters of the lake, with ease and celerity, in the bark canoes of the Indians. The ice of winter afforded them a broad, crystal highway, with no obstruction of forest or mountain, of ravine or river. If deep and impassable snows rested upon its bosom, snow- shoes were readily constructed, and secured and facilitated their march.

1 Champlain, who is commemorated in the annals of the country he served so ably and with such fidelity as "The Father of New France," died at Quebec in December, 1635.

ADVANCING SETTLEMENTS.

CHAPTER IV.

ADVANCING SETTLEMENTS.

Progress of Civilized Occupation -- Settlements and Thrift of the Dutch - Interference by the English -- Charles II Charters to the Duke of York-Incursions of the French Against the Mohawks - The Peace of Breda -- De Frontenac's Reign in New France-English Expeditions - First Civilized Occupation of the Territory of Addison County -- Further Contests Between the French and English -- The Treaty of Ryswick -- Queen Anne's War -- The Treaty of Utrecht -Resettlement at Chimney Point-The French Fortify Crown Point-Progress of English Set- tlements-Building of Fort Dummer-The Struggle Between England and France Renewed - Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle-Another Declaration of War-Abercrombie's Defeat by Montcalm -Amherst's Successful Operations-The Treaty of Paris-End of the French Regime -- French Seigniories.

I IN the mean time the distant line of civilization was gradually approaching

the territory of which we write. The Dutch had ventured north from their early occupation of Manhattan Island and commenced a settlement at Albany in 1613 ; in 1636 the English took a stride nearer when William Pynchon came down the old bay-path from Plymouth with his little band to found the city of Springfield, Mass .; while less than five years later, in 1640, the French had be- gun the settlement of Montreal.

In 1621 the Dutch West India Company was formed and, under their charter of 1614, took possession of New Amsterdam, as the fort with its sur- roundings on Manhattan Island was called. For fifteen years the most amica- ble relations existed between the Dutch and the Indians; but the harsh and unwise administration of William Kieft, who was appointed director-general in September, 1637, provoked the beginning of hostilities with the natives, which were kept up with more or less vindictiveness during the period of his admin- istration. In May, 1647, Peter Stuyvesant succeeded Kieft as director-general or governor. He was the last of the Dutch officials in that capacity, and the firm and just course followed by him harmonized the difficulties with the In- dians, and also with the Swedes, who had colonized in the region of the Dela- ware.

The New Amsterdam of the Dutch was fast developing in resources, for the missionary work of trading guns and rum to the Indians proved very profit- able. But this thrift and prosperity of their cousins, the English could not quietly brook. Accordingly, on the 12th of March, 1664, Charles II con- veyed by royal patent to his brother James, duke of York, all the country from the river St. Croix to the Kennebec, in Maine; also Nantucket, Martha's Vine- yard and Long Island, together with all the land from the west side of the Con- necticut River to the east side of Delaware Bay. The duke sent an English squadron, under Admiral Richard Nicholls, to secure the gift, and on the 8th of September following Governor Stuyvesant capitulated, being constrained to

HISTORY OF ADDISON COUNTY.

that course by the Dutch colonists, who preferred peace with the same privi- leges and liberties accorded to the English colonists, to a prolonged and per- haps fruitless contest. Thus ended the Dutch régime. The English changed the name of New Amsterdam to New York.

About this time the French, who based their right to the country of the Iroquois on the established maxim existing among European nations, that the discoverers who planted the arms of their government upon aboriginal soil ac- quired thereby the property of that country for their respective nations, became possessed of a desire to control the Hudson River and the port of New York. To carry out this purpose meetings of the cabinet council discussed plans, and measures were inaugurated. Also, in the hope of avenging past injuries and to put an end to future incursions, the government of New France resolved, in 1665, to send against the Mohawks a force that would not return until their enemies were wiped from the face of the earth.

On the 23d of March of that year Daniel de Runy, knight, Lord de Cour- celles, was appointed governor of Canada. On the 9th of January of the fol- lowing year this gentleman started, with less than six hundred men, upon the long-contemplated incursion to the heart of the Iroquois country, a weary march of three hundred miles in mid-winter, when the snow was four feet deep. On the 21st they started up the lake, and upon arriving at Bulwagga Bay, op- posite the present town of Addison, took the route across to the head waters of the Hudson. Following the Hudson down as far as Glens Falls, they struck across to the Mohawk River, coming out near the Dutch settlement at Sche- nectady on the 9th of February. Here, in their half-famished and deplorable condition, they fell into an ambush of the Mohawks; and but for the interces- sion of Arant Van Corlear, a prominent citizen of Schenectady, the whole party would have fallen a prey to the vengeance of the exasperated Mohawks. They returned by the same route they came, "stopping two days at Chimney Point, for stragglers to come in."

Notwithstanding the inglorious termination of this expedition, its magni- tude prompted the Iroquois to sue for peace, and a treaty was concluded in May, June and July, 1666, by the Senecas, Oneidas and Mohawks, respectively. Pending the negotiations, however, the Mohawks committed an outrage on the garrison of Fort St. Anne,1 which convinced its commander, M. de Tracy, that the stability of the treaty would be enhanced by visiting a chastisement upon them. Accordingly, at the head of six hundred troops and seven hundred In- dians, he made an incursion into the Mohawk country in September, only to find it deserted by the wily savages ; after destroying their villages and crops, he returned.

In July of the following year (1667) the peace of Breda was concluded be-

1 This was the first structure erected in the vicinity of Lake Champlain. It was built in 1642 by Captain de la Motte, or Mothe, upon what is now known as Sandy Point, on the west shore and about a mile south of the northern extremity of Isle la Motte.

ADVANCING SETTLEMENTS.

tween Holland, England and France, by which the New Netherlands was given to the English, and Acadia (Nova Scotia), with fixed boundaries, to the French. The interval of quiet was short, however, for in 1669 the troubles with the Iro- quois were recommenced. Suffering and consternation prevailed among the Canadian settlements, and many of the settlers prepared to return to France ; but in 1672 Count de Frontenac was appointed governor and lieutenant-gen- eral of the province, under whose efficient administration peace was again es- tablished in 1673. In 1684 this peace treaty was violated, M. de la Barre having in the mean time been appointed as De Frontenac's successor. Several years of bloodshed followed, reducing the French colony to a pitiable condition.

The accession of William of Orange to the throne of England, in 1689, however, gave a new aspect to affairs. Count de Frontenac was again ap- pointed governor of New France, arriving here in October of that year. He immediately began earnest efforts to effect a peace negotiation with the Iro- quois ; but failing, he determined to terrify them into submission. For this purpose he fitted out three expeditions - one against New York, one against Connecticut, and the third against New England. The first was directed against Schenectady, which was sacked and burned on the night of February 9, 1690.

These repeated incursions by the French and Indians at last awakened the English colonists to the conviction that they must harmoniously unite in their efforts against their enemies if they would succeed. A convention was ac- cordingly held in New York in May, 1690, constituted of delegates from Massa- chusetts, Connecticut and New York, at which it was resolved to combine their strength for the subjugation of Canada. Massachusetts engaged to equip a fleet and attack the French possessions by sea, while the other two States should assault Montreal and the forts upon the Sorel. The land forces, mustered at Lake George in formidable numbers, embarked in canoes and sailed for Ticon- deroga. Embarking again on Lake Champlain, but little progress was made when the expedition was abandoned through failure in supplies and dissensions in the force. The failure of these efforts and the heavy expenses incurred left the colonies in a more defenseless situation than before. But in the same year John Schuyler (grandfather of Philip Schuyler, of Revolutionary fame) organ- ized a band of about one hundred and twenty " Christians and Indians " for an incursion into the French possessions. He cautiously passed down Lake Champlain and landed in the vicinity of Chambly. Leaving his canoes in safety, he penetrated to La Prairie, far within the line of the French fortresses. They fell upon the French colonists, who were unsuspectingly engaged in their harvest, and, in the savage spirit that then controlled such movements, com- mitted young and old alike to slaughter.

This year (1690) was an important one in the annals of the territory im- mediately under consideration. On the 26th of March " The mayor, aldermen

HISTORY OF ADDISON COUNTY.

and justices of the city and county of Albany, gave Captain Jacobus de Narm orders to take seventeen men and pass by way of 'Schuytook,' and take from thence twenty savages," and proceed to the "pass " in Lake Champlain, there to build a fort ; a project which had long been contemplated by Governor Don- gan, of New York. This was accordingly done, and in the early summer a small stone fort was built on Chimney Point, in the present town of Addison. This was the first civilized occupation of the county's territory.

In the summer of the following year (1691) Major Peter Schuyler, with a force of about two hundred and fifty whites and Indians, passed down the lake to fall upon the ill-fated settlement of La Prairie, which he reached at dawn on the morning of August I. A sharp battle ensued, in which the loss of the French was severe, though Schuyler was obliged to retreat with a loss of twenty-one killed and twenty-five wounded.

The result of these forays, while they were not decisive in themselves, was. to keep the French settlers in a constant state of terror, and oblige them, in their impoverished condition, to support the large number of soldiers quar- tered upon them. In the mean time the Five Nations had nearly ruined the French fur trade by taking possession of the passes between the French and their western allies. In 1693, exasperated to the last extremity, Count de Frontenac secretly passed up the lake on the ice with a force of between six and seven hundred French and Indians, and descended into the Mohawk country. Here he destroyed three of their castles, meeting with but little re- sistance ; but on his retreat he was sorely pressed by Major Peter Schuyler, who had hastily gathered a party of five hundred Albany militia and Indians, and started in pursuit. The French escaped, however, with a loss of eighty killed and thirty-three wounded In July, 1696, also, De Frontenac, after vainly re- peated efforts to establish peace, set out for a destructive incursion against the Onondagas. But like the others, except in the destruction of villages and crops, this formidable invasion proved fruitless. Finally, in September of the following year (1697), the treaty of Ryswick was concluded, establishing peace between the French and English, a condition ultimately shared in by their re- spective allies.

With the signing of this treaty there followed five or six years of quiet in the region of Lake Champlain, during which interval, August 4, 1701, the Five Nations signed a treaty of neutrality with Canada. In the following year (1702) Queen Anne ascended the throne of England, and soon afterward found cause to declare hostilities against France. Then followed the war of the Spanish succession, or, as it was called in America, Queen Anne's war, at- tended with a decade of bloodshed and ferocious forays in New England and elsewhere. The Iroquois treaty of neutrality, however, turned this series of hostilities in other directions and to other localities than that under considera- tion. Suffice it to say, then, that on April 11, 1713, the treaty of Utrecht be-

ADVANCING SETTLEMENTS.

tween England and France was signed, securing an interval of peace continu- ing over a period of thirty years.

During this interval, in 1730, a small French colony came up Lake Cham- plain and established themselves upon Chimney Point,1 the site occupied by De Narm in 1690. Here they built a small fort and probably repaired the stone fort built by De Narm. The little village which thus sprung up was subse- quently given the name of Hocquart. In the following year (1731) M. de Beauharnois, the French governor of the Canadian colony, by the authority of Louis XV, though in direct violation of the treaties of Ryswick and Utrecht, proceeded up the lake and began fortifying Crown Point, directly opposite Chim- ney Point. To protect Canada from incursions by the Iroquois was the osten- sible reason advanced by France for building this fortress; but that there was a deeper purpose is too palpable to need demonstration. While the English colonies were at first startled by this encroachment and awakened to a sense of the great advantage an enemy would gain by the control of this point, the en- ervation of peace (we can assign no other reasonable cause) had rendered them too apathetic to make any decided opposition to the invasion. As the work was first erected, it was a small wooden fort, scarcely strong enough to resist the weakest artillery ; but it was added to and strengthened during the successive years until, in 1755, it contained space for five or six hundred men. It was called by the French Fort St. Frederic. Thirty men only formed the first French garrison at this point.

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History of Addison county Vermont, with illustrations and biographical sketches of some of its prominent men and pioneers, Part 6

Author: Smith, H. P. (Henry Perry), 1839-1925. 1n Publication date: 1886 Publisher: Syracuse, N.Y., D. Mason & co. Number of Pages: 988

Author: Smith, H. P. (Henry Perry), 1839-1925. 1n
Publication date: 1886
Publisher: Syracuse, N.Y., D. Mason & co.
Number of Pages: 988