Part 15

Louis Hennepin, who was a Recollect, remarks in the original Amsterdam edition of his travels of 1698, that Canada was first discovered by the Spanish, alluding doubtless to the voyage of Corte-Real and that it received its first missionaries under the French, from the order of Recollects. These pioneers of the cross, according to this author, made themselves very acceptable to the Hurons or Wyandots, who occupied the banks of the St. Lawrence, and who informed them that the Iroquois pushed their war parties beyond Virginia and New-Sweden, and other parts remote from their cantons. They went, he says, in these wars, near to a lake, which they called Erige or Erie.[88] Now, if they went “beyond Virginia and New-Sweden,” they were very remote from Lake Erie, and the assertion implies a contradiction or some ignorance of the geography of the country. This name in the Huron language, he informs us, signifies the Cat, or Nation of the Cat—a name, he says, which it derived from the fact that the Iroquois in returning to their cantons, brought the Erige or Erike, captives through it. The Canadians softened this word to ERIE. It would appear then, that the Eries either did not occupy the immediate banks of the lake, or else they lived on the upper or more remote parts of it. To be brought captives through it, they must have been embarked at some distance from its lower extremity. This vague mode of expression leaves a doubt as to the actual place of residence of this conquered and, so called, extinct tribe. Whether extinct or not, is not certain. The name is only a Wyandot name. They had others.

[88] Vide Appendix.

From inquiries made among the Senecas, they are, some believe, the same people whom this nation call KAH-KWAHS. But we do not advance much by changing one term for another. The inquiry returns, who were the Kah-Kwahs? Seneca tradition affirms that they lived on the banks of Lake Erie, extending eastward towards the Genesee river, and westward indefinitely; and that they were finally conquered in a war, which was closed by a disastrous battle, the locality of which is not fixed; after which they were chased west, and the remnant driven down the Allegheny river. [See the subsequent paper _d_.]

Cusick, the Tuscarora archæologist, who writes the word “Squawkihows,” intimates that these were an affiliated people, and that the remnant after their defeat, were incorporated with the Senecas. [D.]

Colden states that after the war with the Adirondacks broke out, say at the end of the 16th century, the Iroquois, to try their courage, went to war against a nation called Satanas,[89] who lived on the banks of the lakes, whom they defeated and conquered, which raised their spirits so much, that they afterwards renewed the war against the Adirondacks and Hurons[90] on the St. Lawrence, and finally prevailed against them. [Hist. Five Nations, p. 23, Lond. ed. 1767.]

[89] This word appears to be an English _soubriquet_, derived from the Dutch language, and is from Satan, a synonyme for Duivel. [See Jansen’s new Pocket Dictionary, Dortracht 1831.] The plural inflection in _a_, if this derivation be correct, is duplicated in its meaning, by the corresponding English inflection in _s_, a practice quite conformable to English orthœpy, which puts its vernacular plural to foreign plurals, as Cherubims for Cherubim, &c.

[90] Called Quatoghies by the Iroquois.

Satanas, it appears from the same author, is a name for the Shaouanons, Shawanoes, or Shawnees, as the term is variously written; a tribe, it may be further remarked, who are called _Chât_ by the modern Canadian French.

A letter of the missionary Le Moyne, published in the Missionary “Relacions,” and hereto appended, proves that the war with the Eries, whatever may have been its origin or former state, had newly broken out in 1653, and there are references of a subsequent date to denote that by the year 1655, this war had terminated in the disastrous overthrow of this people. They appear to have been then located where the existing traditions of the Senecas place them, namely, west of Genesee river, and at or near Buffalo. We may suppose that up to this period, the Senecas were limited to the eastern banks of the Genesee. And it was probably the results of this war that transferred their council fire from the present site of Geneva or Canandaigua to the Genesee valley.

When La Salle reached the Niagara river in 1679, but twenty-four years after the close of this Erie war, he found the entire country on its eastern or American banks in the possession of the Senecas. [J.] The history and fate of the Eries was then a tradition.

We may here drop the inquiry to be resumed at a future period.

[_b._] Building of the first vessel on the upper lakes.

The enterprise of La Salle, in constructing a vessel above the falls of Niagara, in 1679, to facilitate his voyage to the Illinois and the Mississippi, is well known; but while the fact of his having thus been the pioneer of naval architecture on the upper lakes, is familiar to historical readers, the particular _place_ of its construction, has been a matter of various opinions. Gen. Cass in his historical discourse, places it at Erie; Mr. Bancroft in his history, designates the mouth of the Tonawanda. Mr. Sparks in the biography of Marquette, decides to place it on the Canadian side of the Niagara. These variances result in a measure from the vague and jarring accounts of the narrators, whose works had been consulted in some instances in abridged or mutilated translations, and not from doubt or ambiguity in the missionary “Letters.”

Literary associations in America, who aimed to increase the means of reference to standard works, began their labors in feebleness. The New-York Historical Society, which dates its origin in 1804, and has vindicated its claims to be the pioneer of historical letters in America, published Tonti’s account of the Chevalier La Salle’s enterprise, in one of the volumes of its first series. It is since known, however, that this account was a bookseller’s compilation from, it is believed generally correct sources, but it was disclaimed by Tonti. It is at least but an abbreviation, and cannot be regarded as an original work.

In 1820, the American Antiquarian Society published in their first volume of collections, an account of Hennepin discoveries, which is known to bibliographers to be a translation of a mere abridgment of the original work, reduced to less than half its volume of matter. There was also an edition of this author, published in London in 1698; but still clipped of some of its matter, or otherwise defective; the tastes and wants of an English public being constantly consulted in the admission of continental books of this cast. The original work of Hennepin was published in French, at Amsterdam in 1698. Being of the order of Recollects, and not a Jesuit, there was much feeling and prejudice against him in France, of which Charlevoix, the accomplished historian of New-France, partook in no small degree. Yet whatever may have been the justice or injustice of these impeachments of the missionary’s veracity, there could be no motive for disagreement in a fact of this kind.

Hennepin was the camp missionary of the party on the way to Illinois, and the companion of La Salle and Tonti on the occasion. By adverting to his narrative, in the appendix, the most satisfactory and circumstantial details on this subject will be found. The vessel, according to him, was built “two leagues above the falls,” that is, about three miles above the present site of fort Schlosser, on Cayuga creek. There is no stream, at this distance, on the Canadian side. They reached the spot on the 22d of January, set up the keel on the 26th, and, after laboring all winter, amidst discouragements, during which the Senecas threatened to burn it, at one time, and refused to sell corn to support the workmen, at another, it was launched in the spring, and named the Griffin, “in allusion to the arms of the Count de Frontenac, which was supported by two griffins.” The figure of a griffin adorned the prow, surmounted by an eagle, the symbolic type of the embryo power, which was destined, in due time, to sway the political destinies of the continent. There were seven small cannon, and thirty persons, including the crew. With great difficulty, and by the use of the _cordelle_, they ascended the rapids, the present site of Black-Rock, and finally, after many delays, they set sail, freighted with merchandize, on the 7th of August, 1679, just six months and twelve days after they had laid the keel. Thus the honor of furnishing the first vessel on our great chain of inland lakes, above the falls, is due to the present area of Niagara county, New-York. How this initiatory step has been followed up, in the course of one hundred and sixty-seven years, until these lakes are whitened by the canvass of the republic, and decorated with its self-moving palaces of wood and iron, under the guise of steamboats, it would be interesting to note. But we have no statistics of this kind to turn to. As an increment in such an inquiry, I subjoin, in the appendix, lists kept at my office, in the west, of the various species of vessels, which entered and departed from the remote little harbor of Michilimackinac, during the sailing seasons of 1839 and 1840, respectively.

[_c._] Who were the Alleghans?

This is an inquiry in our aboriginal archæology, which assumes a deeper interest, the more it is discussed. All the republic is concerned in the antiquarian knowledge and true etymology and history of an ancient race, to whom tradition attaches valor and power, and who have consecrated their name in American geography upon the most important range of mountains between the valley of the Mississippi, and the Atlantic. But the inquiry comes home to us with a local and redoubled interest, from the fact, that they occupied a large portion of the western area of the State, comprising the valley of the Alleghany river to its utmost source, and extending eastwardly an undefined distance. Even so late as 1727, Colden, in his history of the Five Nations, places them under the name of “Alleghens,” on his map of this river. It is not certain that they did not anciently, occupy the country as far east and south as the junction of Allen’s creek, with the Genesee. A series of old forts, anterior in age to the Iroquois power, extends along the shores of lake Erie, up to the system of water communication which has its outlet into the Alleghany through the Conewongo. There are some striking points of identity between the character of these antique military works, and those of the Ohio valley, and this coincidence is still more complete in the remains of ancient art found in the old Indian cemeteries, barrows and small mounds of western New-York, extending even as far east as the ancient Osco, now Auburn.

The subject is one worthy of full examination, who this ancient race were? whence they came? and whither they went? are inquiries fraught with interest. We should not be led astray, or thrown off the track of investigation by the name. All the tribes, ancient and modern, have multiform names. This one of the Alleghans, probably fell upon the ears of the first settlers, but it is far from certain that it was their own term, while it is quite certain that it was not of the vocabulary of the bold northern race, the Iroquois, who impinged upon them. It has the character of an Algonquin word. Their descendants, whoever their ancestors were, may yet exist, under their own proper name, in the far west. The Iroquois, who pushed their conquests down the Alleghany and Ohio rivers after them, did not found a claim to territory further south on the Ohio river, than the mouth of the Kentucky. They pushed their war parties to the Catawba and Cherokee territories across the Alleghanies, and as far west as the Illinois. They swept over the whole region included between lakes Ontario, Erie and Huron, north. In the latter case we know it was a war against the tribes of the Algonquin stock, including one branch of another, and that their own generic stock, namely, the Quatoghies or Hurons.

The following communication on this subject, addressed to the Secretary of the Maryland Historical Society, is added in this connection. Although written to vindicate a question of antiquarian research, in a sister society, and partaking perhaps a little of a polemic cast, the facts are of permanent interest, and are thrown together in a brief and concentrated form.

_New-York, May 28th, 1845._

GENTLEMEN:[91]

[91] Addressed to the Editors of the New-York Evening Post and National Intelligencer.

My attention has been called by a literary friend, to your notice of Mr. Brantz Mayer’s report on the subject of a national name, or distinctive synonyme for our country. Mr. Mayer having chosen to reflect upon the antiquarian value of the historical research involved in the inquiry, I feel called upon, as a member of the committee of the New-York Historical Society, before whom this question was discussed, to say a few words in reply.

“The following quotation from my ‘Glossary of Anglo-Indian Words,' will best set forth my personal connection with the subject as a member of the society, and a humble laborer in the field of aboriginal antiquities, who is ready at all suitable times, to give authority for the use of whatever Indian terms he may employ.

”_Alleghan_, an obsolete aboriginal noun proper, applied adjectively both in French and English, to an ancient and long extinct people in North America, and likewise to the most prominent chain of mountains within the regions over which they are supposed to have borne sway.”

Our authorities respecting the ancient Alleghans, are not confined to the very late period, _i. e._ 1819,[92] which is alone quoted, and exclusively relied on by the learned secretary of the Maryland Historical Society. Nor do they leave us in doubt, that this ancient people, who occupy the foreground of our remote aboriginal history, were a valiant, noble and populous race, who were advanced in arts and the policy of government, and raised fortifications for their defence. (N. Y. Hist. Col. vol. 2, p. 89, 91.) While they held a high reputation as hunters, they cultivated maize extensively, which enabled them to live in large towns; (Davies’ Hist. Car. Isds.) and erected those antique fortifications which are extended over the entire Mississippi valley, as high as latitude 43°, and the lake country, reaching from Lake St. Clair (Am. Phil. Trans.) to the south side of the Niagara ridge (the old shore of Lake Ontario) and the country of the Onondagas and Oneidas (Clinton’s Dis. N. Y. Hist. Soc. vol. 2.) Towards the south, they extended as far as the borders of the Cherokees and Muscogees.[93] From the traditions of Father Raymond, they were worshippers of the sun, had an order of priesthood, and exercised a sovereignty over a very wide area of country. (His. Carib. Isds. Paris, 1658. London ed. of 1666, p. 204, et seq.)

[92] Trans. Hist. and Lit. Com. Am. Phil. Soc. Vol. 1, Philadelphia, 1819.

[93] Seneca tradition, N. Y. Hist. Col. vol. 2.

At what era the Alleghan confederacy, thus shadowed forth, existed and fell in North America, we do not know. Our Indian nations have no certain chronology, and we must establish data by contemporaneous tradition of the Mexican nations, or by internal antiquarian evidence.

The “Old Fort” discovered by Dr. Locke in Highland Co. Ohio in 1838, denoted a period of 600 years from its abandonment,[94] that is, 284 years before Christopher Columbus first sailed boldly into the Western ocean. The trees on Grave Creek mound denote the abandonment of the trenches and stone look-outs in that vicinity to have been in 1338. (Trans. Am. Ethnological Society, vol. 1, N. Y. 1845.) The ramparts at Marietta had a tree decayed in the heart, but the concentric outer circles, which could be counted, were 463. (Clinton’s Dis.) The live oaks on the low mounds of Florida, where one of the Algonquin tribes, namely, the Shawnees, aver that they once lived and had been preceded by a people more advanced in arts (Vide Arch. Am. vol. 1.) denote their abandonment about 1145. But even these data do not, probably reach back sufficiently far, to denote the true period.

[94] Cincinnati Gazette.

If we fix upon the twelfth century as the era of the fall of the Alleghan race, we shall not probably over estimate the event. They had probably reached the Mississippi valley, a century or two before, having felt, in their original position, west and south of that stream, the great revolutionary movements which preceded the overthrow of the Toltec and the establishment of the Aztec empire in Mexican America.

There are but two words left in our geography, supposed to be of the ancient Alleghan language. These are Alleghany, and Yioghiogany, the latter, being the name of a stream which falls into the Monongahela, on its right bank, about twenty miles above Pittsburgh.

Tradition, not of the highest character, gives us the words Talligeu, or Talligwee, as the name of this ancient nation, although it is nearly identical in sounds with the existing and true name of the Cherokees, which, according to the late Elias Boudinot, (a Cherokee,) is TSALLAKEE. Col. Gibson, a plain man, an Indian trader and no philologist, who furnished Mr. Jefferson with Indian vocabularies of the dialects of his day, to be used in answer to the inquiries of Catherine the Great, (vide Trans. Royal Academy, Petersburgh,) expressed an opinion that this ancient people did not use a T before the epithet, but were called Allegewee. Tradition has, however, strictly speaking, preserved neither of these terms, although both appear to have strong affinities with them. The word Alleghany has come down to us, from the earliest times, as the name of the great right-hand fork of the Ohio, and also as the name, from the same remote period of antiquity, of the chain of mountains of which the stream itself may be said to be the most remote northeasterly tributary. In this form it is evidently a local term, applied geographically, according to the general principles of the Indian languages, like _hanna_ in the Susquehanna, and _hannock_ in the Rappahannock, which appear to denote, in each case, a river, or torrent of water. By removing this local inflection, we have Alleghan as the proper term for the people, and I have felt sustained, by this inductive process, in regarding Alleghan as the original cognomen of the “_mound builders_” of North America.

Having thus given my views with respect to the particular word which awakened this discussion, permit me now to turn to the other matters, so confidently brought forward by the secretary of the Maryland Historical Society.

The Iroquois affirm that they formerly lived in the area of the Cherokee country. (Clin. Dis. N. Y. H. Soc., vol.) Captain Smith met a war party of this nation, in exploring one of the rivers of Virginia in 1608. So late as the era of the settlement of North Carolina, they brought off to the north the last of their cantons, in the tribe of the Tuscaroras. They sold the lands as far south as Kentucky river. (Imlay’s Hist. Kent.) They _quitclaimed_ the soil in northern Virginia and Maryland, and they quite forbid all sales of land by the Delawares. All authorities, indeed, concur in showing the track of their migration, prior to 1600, to have been from the south to the north and northeast. Affiliation of language is also thought to denote their origin in the south. (Vide Gallatin, 2 vol. Archa. Amer.) The Hurons, who are of the same stock, affirm that they were originally the first of all the nations, and call the Lenapees, who have assumed the same distinction, _nephews_, denoting inferiority in the chronological and ethnological chain. In this term of nephews, so applied to the Delawares, all the Iroquois tribes concur. (Vide Oneota.)

Algonquin tradition, recorded by Mr. Heckewelder in the Am. Phi. Trans. in 1819, on the part of the Lenapees, denotes that a confederation of these two stocks, namely, the political uncles and nephews, defeated the Alleghans, and drove them from the country. This tradition is referred to a time when the Delawares or Lenapees, were shorn of all power and consequence, “having been degraded,” according to their phrase, to assume the petticoat, and found a refuge in a new country, to them, on the Muskingum, where they were taken under the care, as they had previously been east of the mountains, of the Moravian brethren. In their reminiscences they would consequently be prone to give prominence to such events as would reflect the most favorable lights on their history. They are speaking of events which we see by the preceding references, must have transpired 500 or 600 years before, and in a very distant quarter of the Union. Yet they add some particulars which written history alone could preserve; and they ascribe to themselves such a degree of foresight, prudence, wisdom, valor and sense of Christian justice, as no Indian tribe in America ever evinced. These traditions are recorded by Mr. Heckewelder in a spirit of Christian kindness on his part, but he does not vouch for them; they are to be judged, like other traditions, by their probabilities and their conformity to other and known traditions. It is on this account that I have adduced the preceding data. Every Indian nation is prone to exalt itself, and if we would admit fully the claims of each, the rest would be sorry persons indeed.

The first thing to be borne in mind is, that the tradition is a very ancient one, and must have come down shorn of many particulars, which there appears to have been great carefulness to re-state. The scene also is remote from the place of narration. No such fact as the principal one of the crossing, on which great stress is laid by Mr. Mayer, on the part of the Maryland Historical Society, could have taken place in the Ohio valley, or within one thousand miles of Pittsburgh, where alone, it must be remembered, we have any evidence in the existing names of the country of the residence of the Alleghans.

The Algonquins, (we include the Lenapees in their proper groupe,) attempting to cross the Mississippi, into the territories of a foreign nation, with a large body of men, are defeated and driven back. They show themselves pacifically, in a moderate number, and the foreigners say, come! but turning out a multitude, are assailed. Whether this was an original stratagem, or an after thought, we are left to infer, but in either case, it would be quite conformable to Indian policy. For the sake of clearness, we will locate this event in the section of this great river, between the Chickasaw bluffs and Natchez, its probable site. On this defeat they form an alliance with their uncles, the Iroquois, who were already east of the Mississippi, and were located north of the Alleghans. A long war begins, in the course of which the latter erect the fortifications which have excited so much curiosity in the Mississippi and Ohio valleys, and after proving themselves valiant men, are finally overpowered and driven off. The Lenapees are in 1819 the historians of their enemies, and berate them as faithless. The Maryland Historical Society, twenty-six years later, endorse the whole story, and pronounce the Alleghans pusillanimous, not so much it would seem for their heroic struggle and defence, as for the cause of it, namely, not letting the Algonquin hordes march into or through their country, as the superior forecast and judgment of the latter might, on further progress, dictate.