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A
Mohawk Chief (Hendrick)
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Although some of the Dutch
settlers at Fort Orange ( now
Albany, N.Y.), such as Arent van
Curler and Jeremiah van Rensselaer
had an understanding of Mohawk
aims and aspirations, most of them
regarded the Indians as "wilden"
or savages. This did not, however,
preclude sexual relations. Dominie
Megapolensis complained that "our
Dutchmen run after the Indian
girls very much." Another
official, Van der Donck claimed
that this was so because Indian
women were so similar to Dutch
women: "seldom very handsome and
rarely very ugly." (vdZ: 106-107)
One result of such a relationship
between a Dutch man and a Mohawk
woman was Jan Smits, who became
the respected Mohawk chief
Canaqueese. He appears first in
history in one of the many letters
Marie Guyart, known as Marie de
l'Incarnation, wrote to her son in
France. In such a letter she
describes how on July 1650,
Canaqueese led a band of 25 to 30
Mohawks in an attack on
Trois-Rivières.
Early in 1654 he brought letters
to Quebec from the Dutch at Fort
Orange. [JR 35: 21 1-13] In those
letters the Dutch assured the
French "that they now really saw a
disposition for Peace on the part
of the savages allied to them."[JR
41: 87] Johannes Dyckman, the
"commissary" of Fort Orange and
Beverwyck, wrote to Lauzon in
Quebec: "Canaqueese, the bearer
hereof, a savage who is much loved
by the Maquas (Mohawks), has
requested of us a letter of
recommendation to your honor, in
order that he may be well treated
there and be allowed to go and
come freely, which we request
hereby." (CM 1: 90-92).
Later, in July 1654, again at
Quebec, he delivered two French
hostages and complained because
the Jesuit Father Simon LeMoyne,
was sent on an embassy to the
Onondagas instead of to the
Mohawks. Canaqueese asked, "Ought
not one... to enter a house by the
door, and not by the chimney or
roof of the cabin, unless he be a
thief, and wish to take the
inmates by surprise? We, the five
Iroquois Nations, compose but one
cabin; we maintain but one fire;
and we have, from time immemorial,
dwelt under one and the same
roof... will you not enter the
cabin by the door, which is at the
ground floor of the house? It is
with us Anniehronnons, that you
should begin; whereas you, by
beginning with the
Onnontaehronnons, try to enter by
the roof and through the chimney.
Have you no fear that the smoke
may blind you, our fire not being
extinguished, and that you may
fall from the top to the bottom,
having nothing solid on which to
plant your feet?" (JR {Thwaites},
XLI, 87-89)
Canaqueese was not much in favour
of a peace settlement with the
French. The main Mohawk aim in the
negotiations was to create a split
between the French and their
Indian allies (JR 41: 55, 57-61 )
It was the French aim to make sure
that the Mohawks toed the line
proposed by the other members of
the Confederacy who were better
inclined to the French. (JR 41:
61-65) In his speech Canaqueese
made it clear that he considered
the Mohawks to be the most
important members of the
Confederacy, the nearest to the
French and that their views should
therefore be paramount. (JR 41: 85
). The French ignored this, and as
a result the Mohawks did not send
envoys to later peace talks at
Onondaga. (JM: 402) It is not
surprising that the Jesuits did
not like Canaqueese and referred
to him as a "Hollander - or
rather, an execrable issue of sin,
the monstrous offspring of a Dutch
Heretic father and a Pagan woman."
Canaqueese again appears on 30
August 1656, when he led an attack
on a group of Ottawas and Hurons
at the Lac des Deux-Montagnes in
an effort to blockade the fur
trade along the Ottawa river. In
the battle, the Jesuit, Father
Leonard Garreau, was shot with a
musket, which broke his spine. The
Mohawks carried the priest to
Montreal, where he died 2
September 1656. According to
Nicolas Perrot, who gives a
different version of the affair,
Canaqueese delivered the body of
Father Garreau, stating that he
had been murdered by a French
deserter in the Mohawk party. (JR
42: 229-239)
Canaqueese was reported at Pointe
Sainte-Croix ( now Point Platon,
N.Y. ), with a party of 40
Mohawks, intent upon war. Perrot
claims that he was at Corlaer (now
Schenectady, N.Y.), when Remy de
Courcelle arrived there in
February 1666, on his punitive
expedition against the Mohawks.
The governor, however, returned to
Quebec on 17 March, without having
accomplished his mission.
On 24 July 1666, M. de Saurel, a
captain in the Carignan-Salieres
regiment, led a force of 300 men,
which he had organized in May of
that year, against the Mohawks to
avenge the deaths of two officers
of the regiment, Capt. de Traversy
and M. de Chazy and the capture of
other Frenchmen, including M.
Canchy de Lerole, all of whom had
been stationed at Fort Sainte-Anne
on Lake Champlain. But before de
Saurel reached the Mohawk
villages, he met a peace embassy,
headed by Canaqueese, who was
bringing back Lerole and the other
French captives. M. de Saurel,
therefore, abandoned his march and
all returned to Quebec, where
Canaqueese was held in a sort of
open arrest.
On 14 September 1666, Prouville
de Tracy and M. de Courcelle sent
out for the third and actual
invasion of the Mohawk country,
from which they and their troops
returned to Quebec on 5 November
1666. Marie de l'Incarnation
writes about the departure in
September: " They ( the Mohawks
held captive at Quebec) weep like
children at the knowledge that the
French have gone to destroy their
nation. What causes them even more
vexation is that they are obliged
to make a great many snowshoes to
go against their own people - that
is to say, they are making weapons
to fight them. Although they are
working against their will and are
forced to obey, they are not
otherwise molested, which makes
them wonder at the goodness of the
French. The Flemish Bastard, who
is a famous Iroquois, is treated
at Monsieur the Intendant's (Jean
Talon) table like a great lord; to
honour him, Monsieur de Tracy gave
him a fine suit of clothing for
his sue and promised him his life
before he set out with the army.
He is not in irons like the others
and he has freedom to walk about,
but he is guarded by several
soldiers who never leave him. He
is treated with courtesy because,
having captured a close kinsman of
Monsieur de Tracy, along with a
few other gentlemen, he did not
ill-treat them but brought them
back with complete goodwill. When
the army was drawn up ready to
depart, Monsieur de Tracy had it
pass before him and said to him,
"Now that we are going to your
country, what do you say?' Tears
fell from the Flemish Bastard's
eyes, "Onontio' - (that is to say,
'great chief') - 'I clearly see
that we are lost, but our
destruction will cost you dear.
Our nation will be no more, but I
warn you that many fine young men
will remain behind, for ours will
fight till the end. I beg you only
to save my wife and children who
are in such and such a place.'
Monsieur de Tracy promised to do
so if they could be found and to
bring his wife and all his family
to him .... (319-320) After de
Tracy returned, he had one of the
Mohawks hanged for the strange
reason that the Indians "Had
broken the peace and caused the
misfortune of the Agnerorons (
Mohawks). Marie de l'Incarnation
writes that Canaqueese "feared it
more than the others because he
was most famous among the
Iroquois." Canaqueese was sent
back to his country on the 8th of
November 1666 with an elder of the
Mohawks and was instructed by the
French to return within four moons
with Huron and Algonkin captives.
Marie de l'Incarnation comments
that Canaqueese was sent back "in
search of his fugitive people,
with the mandate to tell them that
if they stirred again he (de
Tracy) would go back to see them
and that this time they would not
get off so lightly (327, JR
50:205, 209) The French commander
was boasting because his military
campaign had been only partially
successful. The French had met few
Indians, except for some old men.
They had burned Mohawk villages to
the ground, including granaries.
The French lost eight men by
drowning. It is believed that four
hundred Mohawk died of starvation
that winter, a considerably larger
number than the total of white
victims of the Mohawk raid on
Lachine.
In 1667 Canaqueese was the bearer
of letters from Col. Richard
Nicholls, the first English
governor of New York (1664-68).
Nicholls insisted that only "Smits
Jan" should transmit certain
communications which he, the
commissaries at Albany, and Arent
van Curler had addressed to the
governor of New France. Tracy, in
turn, acknowledged receipt of the
letters through Canaqueese.
In the 1670's Canaqueese and
several of his tribesmen settled
at Khanawage near Montreal.
A final reference to this Mohawk
chief (as "Smiths John") mentions
him as being among some 150
Christian Indians during the
expedition of Brisay de Denonville
against the Senecas in 1687
("Examination of Adandidaghko, an
Indian prisoner," dated at New
York, 1 September 1687 (o.s.) NYCD
(O'Callaghan and Fernow),111,
433-36).
In the context of Canaqueese it
is of interest to note what Nash
writes in reference to Indian
leaders in other parts of North
America. Often these men were the
offspring of Indian mothers and
white fathers who remained in
almost all cases within the Indian
society and were the most
alienated of all Indians of white
society. The white fathers left
their offspring like bulls or
bears to be provided for at random
by their mothers. Writes a
Virginia settler in 1757: "some of
these bastards have been the
leading men or war captains that
have done us so much mischief. "
(283)
Bibliography
Grassmann, Thomas. The
Mohawk Indians and Their
Valley, being a chronological
documentary record to the end
of 1693. Schenectady,
N.Y.: 1969.
Nash, Gary B. Red, White
and Black: the peoples of
early America.
Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall,
Inc.,1974
O'Callaghan, E.B. The
Documentary History of the
State of New York.
Albany: Weed, Parsons, 1856.
Perrot, "Memoir," in Indian
Tribes (Blair)
Thwaites, R.G., Editor. The
Jesuit Relations and Allied
Documents, Travels and
Explorations of the Jesuit
Missionaries in New France,
1610- 1791. Cleveland:
The Burrows Brothers Company,
Publisher, 1869.
