THE WAYS DIVIDE
The happy ending, in 1763, of the war with France left
the English colonies in America with little to disturb
them, except the discontented red men beyond the Alleghany
Mountains. The colonies grew larger; they did more business
and they gathered more wealth. But as they prospered they
became self-confident and with scarce an enemy at home
they became involved in a quarrel with the motherland
across the sea. England, they said, was taxing them
unjustly and posting soldiers in their chief cities to
carry out her will. They were by no means disposed to
submit. As early as 1770 a mob in Boston attacked an
English guard and drew upon themselves its fire, which
caused bloodshed in the city's streets. This was the
prelude of the American Revolution. A brief lull came in
the storm. But as Britain still insisted on the right to
tax the colonies and made an impost on tea the test of
her right, rebels in Boston accepted the challenge and
were inflamed to violence; they swarmed on a tea-ship
which had entered the bay, dragged the packets from the
hold, and cast them into the waters of the harbour. When
news of this act of violence reached England, parliament
passed a bill providing for the shutting up of the port
of Boston and removing the seat of government to Salem.
In 1774 General Gage, the recently appointed governor of
Massachusetts, placed the colony under military rule,
and it was cut off from the rest of the country. The
signal for revolt was thus given, and a general revolution
soon followed.
The colonists immediately divided into two parties; on
the one side were those who felt that they must obey what
they thought to be the call of liberty; on the other were
those who had no desire, and felt no need, to follow a
summons to insurrection against His Majesty the King.
The red man began to see clearly that the whites, the
'Long Knives,' brethren of the same race, would soon be
at one another's throats, and that they, the natives,
could not remain neutral when the war broke out.
During these alarming days Sir William Johnson died, when
scarcely sixty years of age. He had seen that the break
with the motherland was coming, and the prospect was
almost more than he could bear. On the very day of his
death he had received dispatches from England that probably
hastened his end. He was told, under the royal seal, of
the great peril that lay in store for all the king's
people, and he was urged to keep the Six Nations firm in
their allegiance to the crown. On that morning, July
11, 1774, the dying man called the Indians to council,
and spoke what were to be his parting words to the tribes.
They must, he said, stand by the king, undaunted and
unmoved under every trial. A few hours later the gallant
Sir William Johnson, the friend of all the sons of the
forest, the guide and helper of Joseph Brant, had breathed
his last. His estates and titles were inherited by his
son John Johnson, who was also promoted to the rank of
major-general in the army. The control of Indian Affairs
passed into the hands of his son-in-law, Colonel Guy
Johnson, an able man, but less popular and wanting the
broad sympathies of the great superintendent. Brant was
at once made secretary to Guy Johnson, and to these two
men Sir William's work of dealing with the Indians now
fell. Their task, laid on them by their king, was to keep
the Six Nations true to his cause in the hour when the
tomahawk should leave its girdle and the war fires should
again gleam sullenly in the depths of the forest.
Joseph Brant set about this work with restless energy.
He was no longer the stripling who had gone away to the
West that he might aid in bending the pride of Pontiac.
Ten years had passed, and now he was a mature man with
an ever-broadening vision. Some time during these years
he had reached the position among his tribesmen which he
long had coveted. He had been recognized by the Mohawks
as one of their chieftains. This honour he had won by
right not of birth but of merit, and for this reason he
was known as a 'Pine-tree Chief.' Like the pine-tree,
tall and strong and conspicuous among the trees of the
forest, he had achieved a commanding place in the Mohawk
nation. True, he was a chief merely by gift of his tribe,
but he seems, nevertheless, to have been treated with
the same respect and confidence as the hereditary chiefs.
He rejoiced in his new distinction. Evil days were ahead,
and he was now in a position to do effective work on
behalf of his people and of the British when the inevitable
war should break out. A still greater honour was in store
for him. When war was declared he at once became recognized
as the war leader of the Six Nations--the War Chief. The
hereditary successor of King Hendrick, who was slain at
Lake George in 1755, was Little Abraham; but Little
Abraham, it appears, desired to remain neutral in the
impending struggle, and by common consent Brant assumed
the leadership of the Iroquois in war.
Two things favoured Brant in any appeal he might make in
the interests of the British to the loyalty of the Six
Nations. For over a hundred years they had taken from
the colonial agents who represented the crown wampum
belts as a sign of treaty obligations. Treaties had been
made with the king; the word of the red man had been
given to the king. Promises made to them by the king's
agents had always been performed. Why, therefore, should
they now plight their faith to any other than their Great
Father the King, who dwelt far over the waters? Besides,
by recent actions of the colonists, the resentment of
the Indians had been fanned to a fury. In 1774 some
colonial land-hunters were scouring the country of the
Shawnees. Without any real cause they fell upon some
redskins and butchered several in an inhuman way. Not
satisfied with this act of cruelty, they seized two brave
chiefs, Bald Eagle and Silver Heels, and killed them in
cold blood. The anger of the Indians was aroused and they
rallied under the banner of the noble Logan, 'Mingo Chief'
of the Shawnees. Against him the Virginians sent a large
force of more than two thousand men. A fierce battle took
place at the Great Kanawha river, at the point where that
stream flows into the Ohio. For a time Logan and his
Indian ally Cornstalk and their followers fought
desperately, but in the end they were forced to flee
across the Ohio. This war was short, indeed, but it had
no just warrant, and the Indians could not forget the
outrage that had been committed. The memory of it rankled
with the Six Nations, especially among the Cayugas, to
whom Logan was bound by ties of blood.
While Joseph was doing his utmost to keep the Indians
loyal and was keeping watch upon those who were plotting
to win them from their allegiance to the crown, Sir John
Johnson was growing anxious for his own life. So great
was his, fear of being killed or abducted that he increased
his body-guard to five hundred men. At the same time,
he placed swivel-guns about his house, in order to
withstand a sudden attack. He energetically organized
the settlers on his domains into a protecting force. In
particular the Highland loyalists in his district rallied
to his aid, and soon a hundred and fifty brawny clansmen
were ready to take the field at the shortest notice.
But the Six Nations were by no means united in their
loyalty to the crown. Brant saw that the tribe most
wavering in its support was the Oneidas. He found that
their missionary, Samuel Kirkland, was in league with
the rebels, and sought to have this clergyman removed.
Failing in this, he wrote to the Oneida chiefs, urging
them to remain loyal to the king. A letter that an Oneida
runner let fall at this time on an Indian path is the
earliest bit of handwriting that we have from Joseph
Brant's pen. In it he warns the Oneidas against the subtle
work which the colonists were carrying on. 'Guy Johnson
is in great fear of being taken prisoner by the Bostonians,'
he says. 'We Mohawks are obliged to watch him constantly.
Guy Johnson assures himself, and depends upon your coming
to his assistance... He believes not that you will assent
to let him suffer.' The appeal thus made seems, however,
to have met with little response from the Oneidas, and
Brant was rebuffed. Even before this they had sent a
letter to the governor of Connecticut expressing in,
plain terms their desire to remain neutral when hostilities
should commence. 'We cannot intermeddle in this dispute
between two brothers,' was their decision. 'The quarrel
seems to be unnatural.' The Oneidas had the right to
their opinion, but their conduct must have stung the
heart of the chief of the Mohawks. Yet never for a moment
did his courage fail. He knew that the bulk of the Six
Nations were willing to give their life's blood in the
service of the king. He and they would be true to the
old and binding covenant which their forefathers had made
as allies of the crown. 'It will not do for us to break
it,' said Brant, 'let what will become of us.'
Civil war was now impending in the colonies. The battle
of Lexington had been fought, and the whole country was
taking breath before the plunge into the conflict. Guy
Johnson and Brant were waiting to declare themselves and
the time was nearly ripe. The first move was made just
after the Mohawk chiefs had been summoned to a council
at Guy Park, [Footnote: 'A beautiful situation immediately
on the bank of the Mohawk. The elegant stone mansion is
yet [1865] upon the premises giving the best evidence of
substantial building.'--William L. Stone, _Life of Joseph
Brant_, vol. i. p. 71.] about the end of May. Secret
orders had come from General Gage, and Johnson knew
precisely what course he was expected to follow. Leaving
his house to what fate might befall it, he started westward
with Brant and a force of Indians and white men. At their
first important stopping-place, Cosby's Manor, a letter
was sent back to throw a blind across their trail. Then,
with their faces still towards the setting sun, the loyal
band wended their way through the dark mazes of the forest.
After a weary journey the loyalist party emerged among
the populous western villages of the Iroquois confederacy.
There, at Ontario, south of the lake of that name, was
held a great assembly, and fifteen hundred warriors
listened to the messengers of the king. In reply the
chiefs of the assembled throng expressed their willingness
to 'assist his Majesty's troops in their operations.'
Johnson and Brant then went on to Oswego, on the margin
of the lake, where an even larger body heard their plea.
Johnson prepared for the redskins a typical repast, and
'invited them to feast on a Bostonian.' The Indians avowed
their willingness to fight for the king. Then, while the
summer days were long, a flotilla of canoes, in which
were many of the most renowned chiefs of the Six Nations,
set out eastward for Montreal over the sparkling waters
of Lake Ontario. In one of the slender craft knelt Joseph
Brant, paddle in hand, thoughtful and yet rejoicing. He
was but thirty-three years old, and yet, by shrewdness
in council and by courage on the field of battle, he
already occupied a prominent place among the chiefs of
the confederacy. Moreover, great days were ahead. Soon
the canoes entered the broad St Lawrence and were gliding
swiftly among its islets. With steady motion they followed
its majestic course as it moved towards the sea.