Brandt was the chief of that band of Mohawk warriors which served on the
British side during the American War of Independence. After the
termination of the contest, the "Six Nations" left their ancient seats
to the south of Lake Ontario, and having received from the English
Government a grant of land along the banks of the Grand River, and the
adjacent shore of Lake Erie, they settled here under their chief,
Brandt, in 1783. Great part of this land, some of the finest in the
province, has lately been purchased back from them by the Government
and settled by thriving English farmers.
Brandt, who had intelligence enough to perceive and acknowledge the
superiority of the whites in all the arts of life, was at first anxious
for the conversion and civilisation of his nation; but I was told by a
gentleman who had known him, that after a visit he paid to England, this
wish no longer existed. He returned to his own people with no very
sublime idea either of our morals or manners, and died in 1807.
He is the Brandt whom Campbell has handed down to most undeserved
execration as the leader in the massacre at Wyoming. The poet indeed
tells us, in the notes to Gertrude of Wyoming, that all he has said
against Brandt must be considered as pure fiction, "for that he was
remarkable for his humanity, and not even present at the massacre;" but
the name stands in the text as heretofore, apostrophised as the
"accursed Brandt," the "monster Brandt;" and is not this most unfair, to
be hitched into elegant and popular rhyme as an assassin by wholesale,
and justice done in a little fag-end of prose?
His son, John Brandt, received a good education, and was member of the
house of assembly for his district. He too died in a short time before
my arrival in this country; and the son of his sister, Mrs. Kerr, is at
present the hereditary chief of the Six Nations.
They consist at present of two thousand five hundred, out of the seven
or eight thousand who first settled here. Here, as everywhere else, the
decrease of the Indian population settled on the reserved lands is
uniform. The white population throughout America is supposed to double
itself on an average in twenty-three years; in about the same proportion
do the Indians perish before them.
The interests and property of these Indians are at present managed by
the Government. The revenue arising from the sale of their lands is in
the hands of commissioners, and much is done for their conversion and
civilisation. It will, however, be the affair of two, or three, or more
generations; and by that time not many, I am afraid, will be left.
Consumption makes dreadful havoc among them. At present they have
churches, schools, and an able missionary who has studied their
language, besides several resident Methodist preachers. Of the two
thousand five hundred already mentioned, the far greater part retain
their old faith and customs, having borrowed from the whites only those
habits which certainly "were more honoured in the breach than in the
observance." I saw many of these people, and spoke to some, who replied
with a quiet, self-possessed courtesy, and in very intelligible English.
One group which I met outside the town, consisting of two young men in
blanket coats and leggings, one haggard old woman, with a man's hat on
her head, a blue blanket and deer-skin moccasins, and a very beautiful
girl, apparently not more than fifteen, similarly dressed, with long
black hair hanging loose over her face and shoulders, and a little baby,
many shades fairer than herself, peeping from the folds of her blanket
behind,--altogether reminded me of a group of gipsies, such as I have
seen on the borders of Sherwood Forest many years ago.