INDIAN MAGNANIMITY ILLUSTRATED BY THE LIFE OF CORNPLANTER.
Wars develop warriors, and give an opportunity to the brave to display
their heroism. Had there been no American Revolution, Washington would
probably have remained a quiet farmer on his estates, unknown to fame;
and had not war been the most glorious occupation in which men could
engage, thousands of others would have gone down to the grave unhonored
and unsung.
With the Iroquois, war and oratory being the only fields of
distinction, it is only the lives of orators and warriors that we have
to record, in writing Indian history.
Cornplanter was scarcely less famous than Brandt, as his feet were, all
his life, upon the war-path. The year of his birth cannot be
ascertained with accuracy, but must have been as early as 1735. Like
Farmer’s Brother, he was in the battle which ended so disastrously for
the British in Braddock’s defeat, in 1755; and to the Indians alone the
French owed all their victories, in the “old French war,” as in an
Indian country, with the primitive inhabitants so numerous as they were
then, he who secured their alliance, must be morally certain of
securing victory. Allowing Cornplanter to have been twenty years old at
that time, and he could scarcely have been younger, his birthday was
three years later than that of Washington. His father was a white man,
and his mother an Indian of the Seneca nation, and his birthplace
Conewango, in the valley of the Genesee River. There is very little for
me to relate of him, though he lived more than a hundred years, and was
ever on the alert, because I cannot follow him to the battle ground,
and he lived in a time when it was thought little else was worth
relating concerning a great man, except his great deeds.
In a speech which he once wrote to the Governor of Pennsylvania, he
says of himself:
“When I was a child, I played with the butterfly, the grasshopper, and
the frogs; and as I grew up, I began to pay some attention, and play
with the Indian boys in the neighborhood; they took notice of my skin
being a different color from theirs, and spoke about it. I inquired of
my mother the cause, and she told me that my father was a resident in
Albany. I still ate my food out of a bark dish. I grew up to be a young
man, and married me a wife, and I had no kettle or gun. I then knew
where my father lived, and went to see him, and found he was a white
man, and spoke the English language. He gave me food while I was at his
house, but when I started to return home, he gave me no provisions to
eat on the way. He gave me neither kettle nor gun.”
It was the fate of all those who had as much white as red blood in
their veins, to be rejected by the white parent; and they therefore had
no alternative but to wed themselves to Indian customs, and be Indians
in name, if not in reality. This sometimes infused a bitterness into
their spirits, and made them doubly ferocious, when called to defend
themselves against white enemies.
During all the revolutionary war, Cornplanter was the ally of the
British; but when the hatchet was buried, and especially when the
Indian was deserted by those for whom he had so faithfully fought, he
became the friend of the United States, and never after wavered in his
loyalty to the Republic. In one of his war excursions, he sought his
father’s dwelling, and surprising him, made him a prisoner. The old man
was in terror at falling into the hands of an Indian; and, perhaps,
would have feared more, if he had known that his captor was his son.
But he did not recognize him till Cornplanter, after obliging him to
march ten or twelve miles into the forest, leaving him all the while to
imagine his fate, stepped up before him and said:
“My name is John O. Bail—commonly called Cornplanter. I am your son!
You are my father! You are now my prisoner, and subject to the customs
of Indian warfare. But you shall not be harmed—you need not fear. I am
a warrior! Many are the scalps I have taken! many prisoners I have
tortured to death! I am your son! I was anxious to see you, and greet
you in friendship. I went to your cabin and took you by force. But your
life shall be spared. Indians love their friends and their kindred, and
treat them with kindness. If now you choose to follow the fortunes of
your red son, and to live with our people, I will cherish your old age
with plenty of venison, and you shall live easy. But if it is your
choice to return to your fields, and live with your white children, I
will send a party of my trusty young men to conduct you back in safety.
I respect you, my father; you have been friendly to Indians, and they
are your friends.”
The father, of course, preferred his home and his white children; and
the promise was faithfully fulfilled, of escorting him in safety back
to his cabin. One can easily imagine that the young Cornplanter
intended to “heap coals of fire on his head,” though he had never heard
the Scripture injunction; and in this instance, certainly acted
according to the golden rule, of doing as he would be done by. His
father had rejected him; had never performed the parent’s duty of
sheltering him, or giving him food or clothes, or bestowed upon him a
word of affection, or manifested in him any interest. That he had a son
among them, may have softened his feelings towards Indians, and
prompted him to befriend them; but our impressions concerning the
promptings of Indian blood, would lead us to expect retaliation for
such neglect. We might expect him to ask, Why should the father love
and cherish his white children, and leave him to run wild in the
forest? Very likely these thoughts passed through his mind, but no
Christian mother ever more thoroughly inculcated the precept, “Honor
thy father and thy mother, that thy days may be long in the land which
the Lord thy God giveth thee,” than the untaught Indian woman in the
wilderness. If Cornplanter had fallen upon his white brethren and
sisters in anger, and meted out to them vengeance, on account of their
being the Benjamins of their father’s household, we should have called
it consistent with Indian character. But though he had it in his power
at any time to cause them to be slain, or taken captive, he left them
by their firesides in safety and peace. That he sometimes thought of
the injustice he was experiencing, is evident from the ironical
allusions he made to the peculiar embarrassment of neglected children,
in his speeches.
At one time, he, with several other Chiefs, was at a great dinner,
given upon the ratification of a long-pending treaty. Wine being part
of the entertainment, Cornplanter took his glass and said:
“I thank the Great Spirit for this opportunity of smoking the pipe of
friendship and love. May we plant our own vines, be the fathers of our
own children, and maintain them!”
The Indian name of Cornplanter was Ga-ne-o-di-yo, or Handsome Lake; and
he had a half-brother, who became distinguished among the Iroquois as
the founder of a new religion. Having spent his youth in dissipation,
he suddenly reformed, and announced that he had been commissioned by
the Great Spirit as an apostle, endowed with supernatural gifts, and
having a new revelation. At the time of his conversion—if such it may
be termed—he resided with Cornplanter, in a little village on the
Alleghany River, in the State of Pennsylvania.
During a severe illness, he pretended to have had a vision, and to have
visited the world of spirits, where he was shown tortures inflicted
upon the wicked, and also the happiness of the good. He was successful
in obtaining the credence, not only of the people, but of the Chiefs;
and through his new doctrines, operated upon the superstitious
tendencies in the minds of those whom it was his office to reform, and
was really the means of great good. He rejected some of the ancient
Pagan ceremonies, and adopted new ones in their stead, and promulgated
a code of morality, suited to their new condition and temptations.
The Indians had a superstitious fear of conforming to the customs of
white people—believing it would not be right for them to build similar
houses, or wear similar clothes, or eat the same food.
The new teacher convinced them that it would be impossible for them to
live longer in their old way, and that the Great Spirit had
commissioned him to tell them they might now adopt the customs of
pale-faces. But he threatened them with all the tortures which the
evil-minded could inflict, if they did not cease to drink the
fire-water; and so thoroughly did he inspire them with respect for
himself, and faith in his divine mission, that there was soon visible a
great change in the moral condition of the people.
Among his inventions for working upon their fears, were the particular
torments designed for offenders of various classes.
He saw in the House of Torment a drunkard, obliged to drink a red-hot
liquid, as this was an article he had always loved. After drinking,
there issued from his mouth a stream of blaze. He was slowly consuming
with his tortures.
A man, who was in the habit of beating his wife, was led to the red-hot
statue of a female, and requested to treat it as he had done his wife.
He commenced beating it, and the sparks flew out and were continually
burning him, but yet he would not consume. Thus would it be done to all
who beat their wives.
Those who sold fire-water to the Indians, would have their flesh eaten
from their arms.
Those who sold land to white people, would be for ever employed in
removing heaps of sand, grain by grain.
In a large field of corn, overrun with weeds, women were at work
pulling them up; but as fast as they were removed, they grew again—thus
their work was never done. These were women who had been lazy, and thus
all indolent women would be punished.
There was an appropriate punishment for those who were unkind to the
aged and to children; and he who instituted this new order of things,
went from village to village, “preaching and exhorting;” and among all
the unchristianized Indians, he was favorably received, few doubting
his divine authority.
By many, the scheme is thought to have originated with Cornplanter, and
is certainly worthy his sagacious mind. But he who executed the plan,
must have been a man of no ordinary genius. They probably saw their
race running to swift destruction, and thought to devise a way to
arrest the destroyer. There was little hope of bringing them so
speedily under the influence of Christianity, as to produce the desired
effect; and in no way would there be much hope, but by appealing to
their superstitious fears.
The successor of the apostle is So-se-ha-wa, who is a sincere believer
in the divine nature of the mission of Ga-ne-o-di-yo. At the convening
of the mourning and religious councils, he repeats the message first
delivered to the author of the new religion, and earnestly entreats all
the people to heed his instructions. He is a man eminent for his
virtues, and full of zeal in the performance of what he believes to be
the duties of his holy office. He is a grandson of Ga-ne-o-di-yo, and
nephew of Red Jacket. His birthplace was Ga-no-wau-ges, near the town
of Avon, in 1774; and his present residence, Tonawanda, in the county
of Genesee.
Cornplanter had for many years the enmity of a large portion of his
people, on account of the course he took in selling lands and making
treaties. His superior sagacity led him to see, that unless by formal
treaty they parted with a portion, and secured to themselves another
portion by the same means, they would again be involved in war, and be
deprived of the whole. His motives were afterwards appreciated; but
during the trial he was often in danger of losing his life, so
exasperated were the Indians at seeing their beloved country thus
readily yielded up to their enemies. Cornplanter mourned as sincerely
as they, but a wise policy dictated the course he pursued. In one of
his appeals concerning a small territory, bordering upon Pennsylvania,
occupied by Halftown and his people, which had been ceded by the treaty
of Fort Stanwix, and which they wished restored, he used the following
language:
“They grew out of the land, and their fathers grew out of it, and they
cannot be persuaded to part with it. It is a very little piece. We,
therefore, entreat you to restore to us this little piece of land.”
It reminds one of the prayer of Lot: “Is it not a little city?” but it
was not successful. Halftown and his people were obliged to move, and
again fell trees and till new fields. It is not strange they were
discouraged, and retrograded, instead of advancing in civilization.
In 1790 Cornplanter visited Philadelphia in company with Rev. Mr.
Kirkland, the celebrated missionary among the Iroquois, and Bigtree and
Halftown. During the frequent interviews of the missionary with the
great chief, the Christian religion was the theme of conversation, and
Mr. Kirkland inclined to the opinion that Cornplanter became a believer
in its doctrines, and also experienced the faith and indulged the hopes
of the Christian.
In Sparks’ American Biography, I find the following extract from his
journal concerning the event.
“I do not now regret my journey. I think I never enjoyed more agreeable
society with any Indian than Cornplanter has afforded me. He seems
raised up by Providence for the good of his nation. He exhibits
uncommon genius, possesses a very strong and distinguishing mind, and
will bear the most mental application of any Indian I was ever
acquainted with. When the business he came upon did not require his
immediate attention, he would be incessantly engaged in conversation
upon the subject of divine revelation. He appeared anxious as well as
curious, in his inquiries for the evidences of the Scripture account of
creation, the Christian scheme of doctrine, and the effects
Christianity would produce upon the various nations of the earth, under
the administration of the Son of God. No subject seemed to animate his
mind, and excite his inquiries more, than the universal peace and
harmony which should take place in the latter day. He would many times
not leave the subject short of three or four hours’ conversation. For
the last week I was with them, he would not allow the Sachems and
warriors to sit down at meal-time, without having me ask the divine
blessing upon the food, and has never been intoxicated once during the
whole course of his life. At our parting he observed to me, that his
business with Congress was settled to his entire satisfaction, and he
believed it would gratify every wish of his nation, and he should
return home well stored with provisions by the way; but through the
wonderful good providence of God, he had a richer store of spiritual
food, out of which he could take a portion for his mind to feed upon,
and digest every day through his long journey; and that he could not
sufficiently thank the Great Spirit for giving him this opportunity of
being so long with me.”
The Indians were accustomed to call Washington “The Town Destroyer,” on
account of the destruction his armies caused wherever they went; but
after he became President, his patient attention to their appeals, and
promptness in redressing their grievances, acquired for him the title
of Father, and gained for him the love of the Indians, that was like
the love of children.
The following extracts are from a long appeal, made to Washington by
Cornplanter and other chiefs, setting forth their wrongs, and asking
justice.
The speech of Cornplanter, Halftown, and Bigtree, chiefs and
councillors of the Seneca Nation, to the Great Councillor of the
Thirteen Fires.
“Father:—The voice of the Seneca nation speaks to you, the great
councillor, in whose heart the wise men of all the Thirteen Fires have
placed their wisdom. It may be very small in your ears, and we
therefore entreat you to hearken with attention; for we speak of things
which are to us very great. When your army entered the country of the
Six Nations, we called you the Town Destroyer; and to this day when
that name is heard, our women look behind them and turn pale, and our
children cling to the necks of their mothers. Our councillors and
warriors are men, and cannot be afraid; but their hearts are grieved
with the fears of our women and children, and desire that it may be
buried so deep as to be heard no more. When you gave us peace we called
you Father, because you promised to secure us in the possession of our
lands. Do this, and so long as the lands shall remain, that beloved
name shall live in the heart of every Seneca.”
Then follows a long and particular account of the treaty by which the
Indians had given up their land; how they had been deceived, and were
threatened with war if they did not comply with all that was
demanded—and proceeds:
“Upon this threat, our chiefs held a council, and they agreed that no
event of war could be worse than to be driven with our wives and
children from the only country which we had any right to.
“Astonished at what we heard from every quarter, with hearts aching
with compassion for our women and children, we were compelled to give
up all our country north of the line of Pennsylvania, &c.
“Father:—You have said that we were in your hand, and that by closing
it you could crush us to nothing. Are you determined to crush us? If
you are, tell us so; that those of our nation who have become your
children, and have determined to die so, may know what to do.
“In this case, one chief has said he would ask you to put him out of
pain. Another, who will not think of dying by the hand of his father or
his brother, has said he will retire to the Chateaugay, eat of the
fatal root, and sleep with his fathers in peace.
“Before you determine on a measure so unjust, look up to God, who has
made us as well as you. We hope he will not permit you to destroy the
whole of our nations.
“The Chippewas and all the nations westward, call us and ask
us,—‘Brothers of our Fathers, where is the place you have preserved for
us to lie down upon?’ You have compelled us to do that which has made
us ashamed. We have nothing to answer to the children of the brothers
of our fathers.
“Father:—We will not conceal from you that the Great God, and not man,
has preserved the Cornplanter from the hands of his own nation. For
they ask continually, ‘Where is the land which our children and their
children after them, are to lie down upon?’ He is silent, for he has
nothing to answer. When the sun goes down he opens his heart before
God, and earlier than the sun appears upon the hills, he gives thanks
for his protection during the night; for he feels that among men,
become desperate by their danger, it is God only who can preserve them.
He loves peace, and all that he had in store, he has given to those who
have been robbed by your people, lest they should slander the innocent
to repay themselves. The whole season which others have employed in
providing for their families, he has spent in his endeavors to preserve
peace; and at this moment his wife and children are lying on the
ground, and in want of food; his heart is in pain for them, but he
perceives that the Great God will try his firmness in doing what is
right.
“Father:—The game which the Great Spirit sent into our country for us
to eat, is going from among us; we thought that He intended that we
should till the land with the plough, as the white people do, and we
talked to one another about it. But before we speak to you concerning
this, we must know from you whether you mean to leave us and our
children any land to till.
“Father:—Innocent men of our nation are killed one after another, and
our best families; but none of your people who committed the murders
have been punished.
“Father:—These are to us very great things. We know that you are very
strong, and we have heard that you are wise, and we wait to hear your
answer to what we have said, that we may know that you are just.”
It was not in the power of Washington to perform all the Chiefs asked,
but he promised that all he could do should be done, and expressed the
kindest sympathy in their sufferings, saying:—
“The merits of Cornplanter, and his friendship for the United States,
are well known to me, and shall not be forgotten; and, as a mark of
esteem of the United States, I have directed the Secretary of War to
make him a present of two hundred and fifty dollars, either in money or
goods, as the Cornplanter shall like best.”
So they returned home soothed and comforted. In the answer which
Cornplanter made he said:—
“Father:—Your speech written on the great paper, is to us like the
morning to the sick man, whose pulse beats too strongly in his temples,
and prevents him from sleep. He sees it and rejoices, but is not cured.
“Father:—You give us leave to speak our minds concerning the tilling of
the ground. We ask you to teach us to plough and to grind corn; to
assist us in building saw-mills, and to supply us with broadaxes, saws,
augers, and other tools, so as that we make our houses more comfortable
and more durable; that you will send smiths among us, and, above all,
that you will teach our children to read and write, and our women to
spin and weave.”
Whilst Cornplanter was absent several murders were committed among his
people by white men, and some, of the best families, were destroyed. He
then made another appeal for protection, and did all in his power to
quiet the revengeful feelings of those who had been injured; thus
proving that he was sincere in his professions of friendship and love
of peace.
At the very time that he was about to depart as an ambassador of peace
to the Western Indians, “three of his people were travelling through a
settlement upon the Genesee, and stopped at a house to light their
pipes. There happened to be several white men within, one of whom, as
the foremost Indian stooped down to light his pipe, killed him with an
axe, another of the party was badly wounded with the same weapon whilst
escaping from the house.”
When Cornplanter heard of this, he did not plan revenge, and instigate
his men to slay the first white men they met in return; but commanded
his warriors to let their tomahawks remain sheathed, and only said, “It
is hard, when I and my people are trying to make peace for the white
people, that we should be thus rewarded. I can govern my young men and
warriors better than the Thirteen Fires can theirs.”
This was a magnanimity worthy of a Christian, and had it originated
with a Grecian or Roman conqueror, or in any other than an Indian
bosom, would have been written in letters of gold, and presented by
every mother to her son as a worthy example. But how few are there yet
that ever heard of an Indian who thought of any thing but revenge for
injuries.
When Washington was about to retire from the Presidency, Cornplanter
made a special visit to the seat of government to bid him farewell, and
again ask his attention to the condition of his people. After stating
the several points which he wished him to consider, he concludes:
“Father, I congratulate you on your intended repose from the fatigues
and anxiety of mind, which are constant attendants on high public
stations, and hope that the same good Spirit which has so long guided
your steps as a father to a great nation, will still continue to
protect you, and make your private reflections as pleasant to yourself
as your public measures have been useful to your people.”
This was the last interview between the two chiefs of a widely
different people, both richly endowed by nature, to be so variously
favored by fortune. Washington lived but a little while longer, and
went down to the grave amid the lamentations of a nation, with a name
on which has been bestowed the homage of a world; and Cornplanter
retired to his secluded cabin in the forest, to live forty years,
devoted to humble efforts for the elevation of his people; to die
alone, with a name which has been almost forgotten.
The remainder of his life Cornplanter lived very quietly, always on
friendly terms with white people, and earnestly engaged in promoting
agriculture, and all the arts of civilization among his people. He was
a professing Christian, and always welcomed the clergymen and teachers
to his humble abode. In 1816 he was visited by Rev. Mr. Alden,
President of Alleghany College, who speaks with delight of the
improvements which had been made under the fostering care of the old
chief,—of the large fields of buckwheat, corn, and oats; the great
number of sheep, oxen, and horses that seemed at home, and perfectly
domesticated on Indian lands. Cornplanter testified his joy at seeing
Christian friends, by performing the offices of servant himself, and
going into the field and mowing the grass for their horses. He was the
owner at that time of thirteen hundred acres of land on the banks of
the Alleghany, and six hundred were occupied by Indians, whose
comfortable dwellings and cultivated fields formed a thriving village.
The following is an appeal to the Society of Friends by Cornplanter,
imploring their aid in promoting agriculture and education among his
people.
“Brothers:—The Seneca nation see that the Great Spirit intends they
should not continue to live by hunting, and they look around on every
side, and inquire who it is that shall teach them what is best for them
to do. Your fathers dealt honestly by our fathers. They have engaged us
to remember it, and we wish our children to be taught the same
principles by which our fathers were guided.
“Brothers:—We cannot teach our children what we perceive their
situation requires them to know. We have too little wisdom among us. We
wish them to be instructed to read and write, and such other things as
you teach your children—especially the love of peace.”
He died March 7th, 1836, and was buried beneath a spreading tree in his
own field, but no stone or monument marks his grave. A century hence,
when it is too late, a proud and peerless nation will wake up to their
guilt, and their duty to a peculiar, if not a chosen people:
“But they will all have passed away,
The noble race and brave;”
and then will commence the lamentations, that those who had it in their
power should have looked so indifferently on whilst they wasted away.
Cornplanter had a son, “a boy of fine spirit and promise,” who was sent
to Philadelphia for the benefit of an English education, under the care
of the Quakers, who placed him in a suitable school and directed his
studies.
He was not only received into good society, but caressed. On one
occasion, being at a ball, while dancing with a beautiful girl, the
jealousy of one of the young gentlemen present was excited, and he gave
vent to his vexation by muttering the dislike he felt at seeing the
young lady “dance with a damned Indian.” The quick ear of young Henry
caught the sound, and after the figure was ended, having invited the
young swain to the head of the stairs, he thrust him out, and gave him
a push which sent him headlong down. “There,” said he, “you may now
boast that you have been kicked down stairs by a damned Indian.”
But Henry had been too long the wild boy of the mountains, to be
pleased with confinement, or bear patiently his monotonous exercises.
He wasted and pined till he became pale and emaciated. He was very
courteous in manners, and had the suavity peculiar to the forest
Chieftain. “My sister,” he would say,—“my sister is not here, and there
is another who is not with me.” He thirsted for the bright waters of
his native valley, and longed to breathe once more the pure air of the
Alleghanies. The crowded streets of the city had no charms for him. He
stayed but a few months, and bursting from his confinement, bounded
back with the alacrity of a wounded deer, to the green mountain haunts
of his boyhood, the sweet tones of his sister, and the gentle cooings
of his forest dove.
The following year Mr. N——, a gentleman from Philadelphia, who had
known the Chief there, came on an errand of agency to our country,
where he has since resided. Having no acquaintance here, and feeling a
deep interest in his young friend, he penetrated through the dark wilds
of Potts and McKean, and soon found himself at the village of the
Cornplanter. Henry welcomed him cordially, presenting him to his
father, his sister, and his friends; but there was a sadness visible in
his countenance, a quick restlessness in his movements, which betrayed
how deep were the workings within. Mr. N—— then asked him for the
gentle dove he had described to him in days gone by. “She is gone,”
said he, and led him to her grave. Here, Harry, after the custom of
white people, had planted flowers, not the forget-me-not, nor the rose,
nor the myrtle, but pale spring violets, refreshing them with his
tears, and breathing from this hallowed spot his invocations to the
Great Spirit.
He was in the war of 1812, and a gallant soldier under General Porter,
but very sorrowful is the story of his after life, and dark indeed was
the day of his death; but I will not relate it, to become an instrument
of universal accusation against his people, who have been too long and
too often judged by individual instances of degeneracy.