Racial Identity Among the New York Indians - Chris Geherin Looks at "New Guinea"

The issue of African American blood running through the veins of the Stockbridge and Brothertown Indians has been a controversial one and I have avoided it for that very reason.  But today I surfed onto an award-winning journal article that is clearly part of Algonkian Church History.

Above: "Brothertown Descendant Greg Wilson, of Union Grove, Wisconsin, on a tour of Brothertown Indian Cemeteries" as noted in the blog "At Home in the Huddle 2."



The New York State Historical Association awarded its Kerr History Prize to Christopher Geherin for the best article in New York History in 2010.  The title itself says a lot:



New Guinea: Racial Identity and Inclusion in the Stockbridge and Brothertown Indian Communities of New York


The full text of the article - along with old photos and maps -  is found in the e-Journal, New York History.

Blogger's note:  Hey, I'm sorry, everybody.  It seems that the New York History e-journal is now a subscription site.  Here's their address: http://www.fenimoreartmuseum.org/digital_subscription_nyh




Here are a few things that Geherin addresses:

1. William Gardner's status is something I addressed in an earlier post, but Geherin has more to say:

In 1824 the Stockbridge tribal council formally adopted William Gardner, identifying him as Narragansett. But in 1826 the legislature of New York defined Gardner as "coloured," and by the 1870s the tribe sought to exclude the Gardners by characterizing the family as "negro."

2. Rev. John Sergeant [Jr.] "mentioned preaching to a small nearby settlement of mulattoes."

3. Names of those (apparently only "heads of families") who lived in the so-called "New Guinea" settlement: Nathaniel, Joshua, and Peter Pendleton; John Baldwin; Henry and George Cook; and Margaret Reid


It should go without saying that Geherin did careful research and documented his sources.  Please refer to his article if you would like to check them.


Citation:

Christopher Geherin, "New Guinea: Racial Identity and Inclusion in the Stockbridge and Brothertown Indian Communities of New York," New York History; Summer 2009 (2 Aug. 2012).

What was Captain Hendrick's Role in the Western Expansion of the United States?

In researching the life of Captain Hendrick Aupaumut, chief of the Stockbridge Mohicans and also an official of the United States government, I've had to accept that there are a lot of grey areas and a lot of blanks that will never be filled in. I have no doubt that he was "a man of integrity," fighting for what he believed in.  The historians that called him "befuddled" or a "stooge" for the United States must have been missing something.

Then again, Captain Hendrick helped facilitate treaties in Ohio and Indiana that turned Indian land over to the US government.  My thinking is that he knew that there would be white expansion and believed that tribes would continue to lose their land and suffer until they adopted Christianity and "civilization."  This is pretty much the same as what you will read in the three scholarly articles written about him (see below for citation), so I thank James and Jeanne Ronda, Alan Taylor, and Rachel Wheeler for their work on this topic.

My recent posts about the White River Delawares and Tenskawatawa, the Shawnee Prophet, are the context in which Captain Hendrick worked.  President Jefferson's administration hired Captain Hendrick to serve as the Delawares' "Civilizing Agent" from 1809 until the War of 1812 temporarily forced them to a safer location.  During that time he did what he could to stop the Shawnee Prophet's movement and John Sergeant (Jr.), the Stockbridges' missionary, gave him credit for doing exactly that:

“through the judicious arrangements of Capt. Hendrick, the influence of the Prophet is nearly at an end.” 

That statement was preserved for us in a book written by Electa Jones of Stockbridge, Massachusetts, printed in 1854.  Unfortunately, Jones doesn't say when John Sergeant made that statement, making it more difficult to prove its relevance in the course of American history.

We do know that Tenskwatawa, the Prophet, became less important between 1809 and 1813.  Until recently the showdown over western expansion of the United States that was going on was seen as a battle personified by the conflict between William Henry Harrison and Tecumseh.  But current historians recognize that Tecumseh didn't become important in his brother's movement until it became political. 

Will Captain Hendrick someday also be recognized in the same way that historians remember Harrison and the Shawnee brothers?  I think that is unlikely.  There are just too many grey areas and too many blanks that will never be filled in.





Sources:

Ronda, James and Jeanne. "'As They Were Faithful': Chief Hendrick Aupaumut and the Struggle for Stockbridge Survival, 1757-1830," American Indian Culture and Research Journal, 3, 1979: 43-55.

Taylor, Alan. Captain Hendrick Auapaumut: The Dilemmas of an Intercultural Broker,"  Ethnohistory, Summer, 1996.

Wheeler, Rachel.  "Hendrick Aupaumut, Christian-Mahican Prophet,"

Journal of the Early Republic; Summer 2005, Vol. 25 Issue 2, p187

Samson Occom's Last Days

While they lived in the Massachusetts mission town, all the Stockbridge Indians were members of a single congregation. Soon after their move to New York State, the falling out between their two legitimate ministers resulted in the tribe being split into two congregations.

After a few years of having two congregations, the Stockbridges held a council to discuss the situation. They decided that having their tribal church divided into two parties was a "stumbling block." Some felt that Rev. Occom (a Brothertown Indian) was "meddling too much with [their] civil government," and noted he had recently "fallen into the sin of intemperance[or drinking]" several times. They also felt he was "superannuated" or past his prime.

At that council, the Stockbridge Indians voted first to have one minister for the whole tribe and then chose John Sergeant [Jr.] to be that one minister by a twenty-two to eight margin. A committee was then formed to

inform Mr. Occom that it was not out of any ill will to him, that if he would leave us as minister of the Town...and as he had no support, if he would comply with our reasonable request and make us happy - we would unitedly do all we could to help him. But we are sorry to say he paid no regard to us. (Quoted from a letter from the Stockbridge Indians to Rev. Samuel Kirkland, June 22, 1792 in the Kirkland Papers at Hamilton College.)

Rev. Occom and his family had only moved to New Stockbridge a few months earlier. Politics may have been their reason for leaving Brothertown and the Stockbridges' letter suggests that politics had made the Occoms unwelcome at New Stockbridge. But they didn't leave.

Only a few weeks after the Stockbridge Indians wrote the letter referred to above, on July 14, 1792, Samson Occom suddenly died.

The Split Between Occom and Sergeant

You may remember that both Samson Occom and John Sergeant [Jr.] received calls to minister to the Stockbridge Mohicans towards the end of 1787. In the short run, their plan was to engage in cooperative ministry. That plan seems to have worked for a little while, at least. Eventually, however, the two ministers came into conflict. Neither one of the ministers ever fully recorded what their falling out was about, but Occom did leave some clues.

In Samson Occom (1935), Harold Blodgett stated the conflict was over "doctrinal differences." In order to understand what he was getting at, we'll have to address the Calvinist context. One of the central tenets of Calvinism was the "depravity of man." In other words, sin and damnation were central aspects of American religion back then. It was believed that while everyone deserved to go to hell, Christ's atonement predestined some to be saved and enter heaven. It was also believed that outward manifestations (including a conversion experience), would somehow indicate who was predestined to receive God's grace. According to The Encyclopedia of Religion (page 103), it then became common for Puritan preachers to develop some kind of "complex morphology of conversion." As a result, there were controversies over who should be baptized and over what made a person worthy of church membership and communion. (Such a controversy over communion got Jonathan Edwards thrown out of the white congregation he served before ministering to the Indians at Stockbridge, Massachusetts.)

The question of who should be baptized is the only disagreement with John Sergeant that can be found in Samson Occom's journals. I would imagine they also had other disagreements in the months that they worked together, but no other disagreements were recorded.

On July 26, 1788, Occom wrote in his journal that he expected to have a debate with Sergeant, but instead Sergeant

"declin'd and finally Concluded that everyone should have full Liberty to Choose to act according to the Light and understanding he has in religious concerns, and so we parted in Friendship, Concluded to agree and disagree."

And so I believe that the falling out was over religious ideology and not over personality or race or cultural issues. Of course there really isn't enough evidence to know that for sure. But I've put what I know on the table and if anybody can add to that, you're welcome to do so.

Occom and Sergeant: Was their Conflict About Race?

We're up to the point where both Samson Occom and John Sergeant [Jr.] had received legitimate calls to minister to the Stockbridge Mohicans at New Stockbridge, New York. It is rather well known that the two ministers eventually clashed. For that reason, I made it a point in my previous post to emphasize that they got along well for many years. It should also be noted that the two men of the cloth co-led a number of worship services together when the Stockbridges were getting settled in New York State.

Some have said that Occom and Sergeant came into conflict over racial issues. It is possible that Occom resented Sergeant for the advantages he had. It is true that Sergeant was a white minister and was paid like a white minister and Occom was an Indian minister that was seldom paid at all by church bodies. Nowadays we wouldn't blame a minority for raising Cain over that kind of inequality.

But in my mind Samson Occom was too "big" a person to get dragged into the kind of jealousy that would hurt his ministry. I think that Occom was wise enough to choose his battles. And, given what I know about John Sergeant compared to the other white people of his time, I just don't buy the argument that the two ministers had a falling out over the issue of race.

Samson Occom and John Sergeant Jr

A photo of present-day Madison County, New York (courtesy of Carleen Vandezande).
While it could be said that the white Calvinist establishment was responsible for the betrayal of Samson Occom, I don't think of John Sergeant [Jr.] as being part of the Calvinist establishment. In fact, I read somewhere that he was not even ordained as a minister until late in his career. Sergeant just didn't have enough Calvinist orthodoxy in him to be an insider. On the other hand, Samson Occom, despite being an orthodox Presbyterian, was discriminated against for being an Indian.

For quite a few years, Rev. Occom was on good terms with John Sergeant. In his journal, Occom noted a number of times in which he ate with Sergeant, or stayed at Sergeant's house while traveling [see entries from July 15, 1774 to August 30, 1786]. In one 1774 entry, Occom even referred to the son of the first missionary on the Housatonic River as "good Mr. Sergeant." The Revolutionary War would later force Occom's people, the Brothertown Indians, to retreat to Stockbridge, Massachusetts, which likely brought the two men into more frequent contact. They must have known each other quite well.

John Sergeant and his family didn't make the New York migration with the tribe. In the wake of the Revolutionary War, the philanthropists in London would no longer pay his salary and he knew the Indians couldn't pay it themselves. He just kept in touch with them well enough to make reports to other ministers in Boston. Some of those ministers eventually put together a mission society of their own. Meanwhile, beginning in 1785, Rev. Occom's Sunday worship services alternated in location between Brothertown and New Stockbridge, which were about six miles apart (Love, pages 279-280). On August 29, 1787, some Stockbridge leaders wrote to Rev. Samson Occom asking him to "settle with" them and minister to them on a more formal basis. They offered only twenty shillings, but it was something, at least. (A letter Occom wrote to clergy residing near Albany on December 26, 1791 tells us, however, that more than three years went by before he actually moved his family to New Stockbridge.)

Back in Massachusetts, the Society for Propagating the Gospel Among the Indians and Others in North America was incorporated, and on October 25, 1787 - just two months after Occom's call. They appointed John Sergeant to work and live among the Indians at New Stockbridge and to receive a salary of fifty pounds sterling.

John Sergeant III: Indian Agent

The Old Capitol Building in Albany, NY. Built in 1806-08. (Photograph from the Division of Visual Instruction Lanern [Lantern?] Slides, State Education Department, New York State Archives.)
In this blog I use the abbreviations "Sr." (for Senior), and "Jr." (for Junior), after the name "John Sergeant," to keep readers from getting confused. But in all the documents that I've ever looked at, I've never found any evidence to suggest that those abbreviations were used to distinguish between those two men during their lifetimes. The first John Sergeant died before the age of forty and his son John was too young to have any memory of his father.

But there is a third John Sergeant in Algonkian Church History. When Captain Hendrick Aupaumut refers to a "Mr. John M. Sergeant, Jr.," he is clearly referring to the grandson and not the son of the Stockbridge Mohicans first missionary.

Transcripts of a series of documents that were recently sent to me by the Harvard University Library system are about the man who we'll call John Sergeant III. Of this series of documents, the one which best explains the controversy at hand was written by "the undersigned chiefs and principal men of the Stockbridge tribe of Indians," [specifically "Chief HENDRICK AUPAUMUT, ELIJAH PYE, SAMPSON MARQUIS, THOMAS S. HENDRICK, AARON RONKJOOT [Konkapot?], ABRAM M'KOWN [Metoxen?], JOHN M. BALDWIN, JACOB JEHOIAKIM, [and] JOHN W. NEWCOMB"] and addressed to the legislature of the State of New York.

The Indians' letter is consistent with the other documents sent to me (including a letter written by a John Sergeant dated 1829, proving that he was the son of the Sergeant who died in 1824). Allow me to summarize the Stockbridge Indians' letter to the New York legislature.

The tribe needed the assistance of a white man to move west. They asked John Sergeant III to serve as their agent and he resisted, fearing he might impoverish himself as a result. (Apparently only whites could apply for loans at that time, plus there were travel and other expenses.) However, Sergeant was encouraged by state officials. Sergeant was appointed by Governor De Witt Clinton and worked on the tribe's behalf for four years. It was agreed that 500 acres was a fair payment, but by no fault of the Stockbridge Indians, the land designated for him went to somebody else. The papers sent to me, then, are all documents that vouch for Sergeant's honesty and advocate that the state pay him the money he was owed.

The Grave of John Sergeant Jr.

A few weeks ago I received an e-mail from a woman from Arizona who asked where she could read more about her ancestor, John Sergeant, Jr. I replied that there are no books on him and I don't know of any chapters devoted to him either. But there are lots of anecdotes about him scattered around, and sometime down the road I'm planning to have a series of posts about his relationship and falling out with Samson Occom.

More recently, I heard from Carleen Vandezande, another reader of Algonkian Church History. After reading this blog for some time, Carleen remembered back to her school days and a summer job back home in New York State. It turns out that Carleen had worked in historic preservation at the place once called home by the Stockbridge Mohicans.

Carleen gave me a disk of several photos (including the one you see above) and I was somewhat surprised at how similar the rural New York landscape looks to Calumet County, Wisconsin (especially Stockbridge and Brothertown, Wisconsin). Anyway, more photos and descriptions will be forthcoming.

Marsh's Opinion of Sergeant's Ministry

Right: A modern road map of east-central Wisconsin. The Stockbridge Mohicans lived at modern-day Kaukauna (known then as Statesburg or Grand Kawkawlin) in the 1820's and at Stockbridge in the 1830's and 1840's. Note that Brothertown is south of Stockbridge.



In my February 8 post, I shared with you a long quote from a letter by John Sergeant [Jr.] in which he promoted the preservation of Native languages. Sergeant felt that bi-lingual literacy and the use of "white" agricultural technology was best for the Indians' welfare. He doesn't come across as a stubborn or pushy type, his belief that Indians would choose the appropriate level of "civilization" was based on his own experience, almost his entire life was lived among the Stockbridge Indians.

Things were different with Rev. Cutting Marsh. His life experience was different and his thinking was different. His efforts to push "civilization" amongst Indians who had already adopted as many white ways as they wanted, caused him some frustration. He discussed this issue with John Metoxen and later shared the conversation with the ABCFM in a letter to David Greene (10/19/1842).

...He [Metoxen] furthermore said that 'Mr. Sergeant was with them 50 years and never got discouraged in all of that time.' ....from all I have learnt of the result of his labors and of all the instruction in schools during that half century, no advances whatever were made in the Nation in knowledge and civilization, all remained precisely in status quo. But I put this question to the old man. If, the Lord when he gives the gospel to a people and expects and requires improvement, is it wrong for his servants [missionaries] to expect the same?

....Metoxen has often made [the] foolish expression that 'speaking the English language is what has made so many of the Brothertown people infidels.' Some, I know not how many, have never been pleased with me because I have not learnt their language so as to speak it. But this I have done from principle. This was one thing on account of which they liked Mr. Sergeant so well.

If They Lose Their Language

<---The Natick Bible, the first book printed in the United States, an Algonquian-language translation by John Eliot (he must certainly have had lots of help from Native ministers/translators).

Not long after John Eliot's Natick Bible came out, missionaries gave up on translating the Bible and instead put more of their efforts behind teaching English. Learning a second language isn't a bad thing. The bad thing was that it reflected a common prejudice that the Indians' languages were "barbaric."

In the Appendix of his Report to the Secretary of War, Rev. Jedidiah Morse includes copies of a number of letters, one written by John Sergeant [Jr.] in which he reveals to Morse (and to us) his "ideas...concerning Missionary Establishments among the Natives of America"(Appendix, 113).

1. With regard to the Missionary: he ought to be a man of good abilities and extensive learning; a man of prudence, and with all, of common sense.
2. He ought to be instructed to learn the language of the natives. It is not so barren, but that every doctrine of the gospel can be communicated to them in their own language.
3. Some books ought to be printed in their language, and children ought to read them. This plan is now in operation among the Oneidas.
4. My people, I find, can read their own language very fluently, when they pronounce English very indifferently. This will always be the case, so long as they speak their own language in their families.
5. If they lose their own langugae, they will lose with it their national pride and respectability. This is the case with the Brothertown Indians. They have lost their language; and are now, perhaps, more corrupt than any Indians in the country.
6. Their reservations ought to be large, and at least twenty miles from white or black inhabitants.
7. Civilization and religion must go hand in hand, as I have read, with regard to Africa. "The plough and the Bible go together." As soon as they can feel and taste the sweets of a civilized life, their disposition to hunt and wander will cease. (pages 113-114 in Morse's Appendix)

Some people seem to think that missionaries could not have been in favor of both "civilization" and a healthy amount of what we might call "cultural preservation," but the impression I get of John Sergeant [Jr.] is that he was tolerant and probably ahead of his time.

Conspiracy of Interests

New York Indian Removal, Part IV: Conspiracy of Interests

This series of posts on the removal of the New York Indians is not close to being over yet. Lots of material is out there on the subject, and the vast majority of it is about the Iroquois Six Nations. Some of this Iroquois-focused material can be helpful for us in understanding Algonkian church history.
***********************

Industrial projects like the Erie Canal and powerful organizations like the Ogden Land Company were major forces that pushed the New York Natives westward. But of course, those projects and organizations didn't do it by themselves, they were aided by corrupt federal and state officials. If you want to know just how it happened, I recommend that you read Laurence Hauptman's book, Conspiracy of Interests: Iroquois Dispossession and the Rise of New York State (1999, Syracuse University Press). As the title suggests, Hauptman has little to say about the Stockbridges and the Brothertowners, but I don't mind that. He gave me just enough to tell you about in this post.

On page 72, Hauptman says John Sergeant [Jr.] was a good advocate not only for the Stockbridge Mohicans, but for their neighbors too. He reports that Sergeant questioned the motives of state officials, warned people about the dangers facing the the New York Indians, and insisted that "state and federal negotiations with the Oneidas violated federal laws." The thing that surprised me, however, was that at one point, Sergeant dared to criticize Samuel Kirkland, one of his counterparts among the Oneidas.

On page 176, Hauptman describes the Treaty of Buffalo Creek of 1838, as a "fraudulent treaty consummated as a result of bribery, forgery, the use of alcohol, and other nefarious methods." Hauptman noted that the 1838 treaty required not only the Iroquois, but also the Stockbridge and Munsee Indians to remove to a roughly 1.8 million-acre reservation in what is now Kansas. I look forward to explaining how the Stockbridge and some of the Munsee Indians (and, of course, the Brothertowners) managed to remain in what is now Wisconsin, despite the Treaty of Buffalo Creek.

New York Indian Removal: "Why did they Leave?"

New York Indian Removal, Part III: "Why did they Leave?"

Some of the Oneidas remain in New York to this day. [They are an Iroquois-speaking nation, not the Algonkian-speaking people that this blog ususally focuses on.]

Recent historians don't put much weight on Eleazar Williams' influence in the removal of the New York Indians. Nor do those same historians view the removal as being about doing Indians a favor by keeping them away from the white frontier. That may sound like a ridiculous rationalization to some people now, but it was based on real reports from well-meaning people like missionary John Sergeant [Jr.], who, in 1821 wrote that the Stockbridge Mohicans were

[S]urrounded by a white population many of whom are greedy after [the Indians'] money and property, and in a secret way contrary to the Laws of the state are constantly supplying them with a liquor called whiskey which is a great grief to the serious people, on which account many of the Indians are willing to remove to some distant country, if they can get away from the white heathen, as the whiskey traders are commonly called (quoted in a 2/1/2006 Mohican News article by Lion Miles).

According to Laurence Hauptman and L. Gordon McLester III, authors of Chief Daniel Bread and the Oneida Nation of Indians in Wisconsin, federal officials used "religious rhetoric," sometimes borrowed from accurate reports, such as the one you just read, to cover up what really pushed many, but not all of the New York Indians westward. As we will see, the real reasons were "land interests" and "national defense concerns"(page 32).

Hauptman and McLester tell us that by February of 1817, at least one federal Indian agent (Charles Jouett) felt that removing the New York Indians to the upper Midwest would "destroy British influence with the Indians north and west of the settlements," and also "free up rich agricultural lands in New York for white settlement."

Hauptman and McLester believe that the thought of being forced to leave their homeland was hurtful to all the New York Indians. Furthermore, they remind us that the Oneidas and the Stockbridges had fought for the colonies in the Revolutionary War (and again for the United States in the War of 1812). It appears that loyalty to the United States made no difference to the Monroe administration. They presented their policy of removal to the chiefs of New York's Native nations as inevitable.

The Stockbridge Mohicans, of course, had already been pushed out of their town in Massachusetts by the 1780's. I am of the impression that their leaders never intended to permanently reside among the Oneidas in New York. In the case of the Stockbridge Mohicans, the hurtful thing seems to have been that they were not allowed to make their long-anticipated move to live among the Delawares and other Algonkians at Indiana's White River.

The Stockbridges Attempt a Move to Indiana

Author's note: This is the first of a series about the removal of the New York Indians.

Part I: The Stockbridges Attempt a Move to Indiana

The John C. Adams Papers at the State Historical Society in Madison, Wisconsin, includes a hand-copied letter from President Thomas Jefferson to "Whom it may Concern," dated December 21, 1808. Captain Hendrick Aupaumut had asked the President to acknowledge a longstanding oral agreement between tribes. The letter was Jefferson's approval of the Stockbridge Mohicans' plan to move from New Stockbridge, New York, to live amongst the Delawares and other tribes at Indiana's White River. If the Stockbridges had moved when Jefferson was still president, I believe he would have kept his promise.
However, the Stockbridge Mohicans remained at New Stockbridge, New York, until the presidency of James Monroe. Monroe's administration included men like Andrew Jackson, and John C. Calhoun, who were in favor of "vigorous measures" when it came to Indian policy.

About 70 Stockbridges left New York State for Indiana's White River in August, 1818. Along the way, they learned from a Boston newspaper of a treaty being negotiated for the lands that were referred to in Jefferson's letter. The traveling Indians immediately wrote the Delawares for confirmation or denial of the report. The Delawares replied that the Stockbridges should continue on their way. But, tragically, the treaty of St. Mary's was signed on October 6th. John Sergeant [Jr], the Stockbridge missionary, wrote to Rev. Jedidiah Morse (on 12/15/1818) of the sad news:

We have had direct information of the Treaty with the Indians, and it is reported that 'the Delawares were forced to sell, and to sign the Treaty;' and that 'the poor Delawares had not a friend to support their cause!!'

Captain Hendrick Aupaumut sent his son, Solomon U. Hendricks, to Washington over the winter to make their grievance to Congress. Rev. Morse had worked with the older Captain Hendrick and now he supported the son. However, as you may have guessed, Congress made no efforts to alter the Treaty of St. Mary's - no matter that it broke the promise of a former President.

It was clear that the Stockbridge Indians, some remaining in New York State, and others temporarily in the Midwest, would have to find a homeland somewhere else.

Meanwhile, Rev. Morse managed to pass in and out of the fuzzy line that didn't really divide church and state when it came to U.S. Indian policy. He made a personal appeal to President Monroe, "urging that a tract in the Northwest Territory [now Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, and part of Minnesota] be given to the Stockbridges, in compensation for the one they had lost"(Abel, pages 310-311).
Source:

The story of the removal of the New York Indians has been called a conspiracy of interests. One thread of interest began with Morse's collaboration with Captain Hendrick, Solomon U. Hendricks, and John Sergeant [Jr.]. In upcoming posts, I'll be writing about them, but also about other major players, including Eleazar Williams, John Schermerhorn, and others.

The State of Christianity at New Stockbridge: Fall, 1787

It is well known that a split in the Stockbridge tribal church occurred as a result of a falling out between Samson Occom and John Sergeant Jr. But it is seldom said that the two men were allies, if not friends, for a long time before their falling out. They both had a legitimate claim to being the minister to the Stockbridge Mohicans and although we can't know for sure what their disagreement was about, I think Harold Blodgett was correct in saying it had something to do with "doctrinal differences." I'll explain why I think so in another post. On the other hand, Sergeant did have some advantages on account of being a white man. As I said, both men had legitimate claim to ministering to the Stockbridges, but I don't think the brand new Society for Propagating the Gospel Among the Indians and Others in North America (SPGAIONA?) even considered appointing Samson Occom. In an October 25th, 1787 letter, John Sergeant was appointed to live and work among the Indians at New Stockbridge and to receive 50 Pounds Sterling as salary.

In another letter, written by a Mr. Wigglesworth to a Mr. McFarlan on November 13, 1787, the following account of the state of Christianity at New Stockbridge, New York is given:

More than twelve families regularly maintain the worship of God morning and evening; and catechize their Children with as much Propriety as is done by more civilized People among them. On Lord's days, when they have no Preacher among them they assemble together for Religious Worship. Besides Singing, praying and [illegible] together on religious subjects, some portion of the scriptures and other books of piety are read by those who can understand the English language and translated into Indian. Some of them are so fully appraised of the importance of religious Instruction that they [illegible] and their Future prosperity will greatly depend on the Continuance of a Missionary among them.

Maybe Wigglesworth didn't know that some of the tribal leaders had recently invited Rev. Occom to be their minister. Over the next nine months, Rev. Sergeant and Rev. Occom carried on a cooperative ministry. Their falling out is something that I'll save for a later post.

Stockbridge Mohican Church History Timeline: Part II

This timeline is based on a multitude of sources. Ask me if you want documentation for anything:

1773: John Sergeant [Jr.] takes on the mission work in Stockbridge, Massachusetts.

1782: Ninety innocent Christian Indians are massacred in Gnadenhutten, Ohio by a renegade frontier militia.

August, 1787: Tribal leaders call an old friend, Rev. Samson Occom, a Mohegan Indian, to be their minister in New Stockbridge, New York.

October, 1787: John "Sergeant [Jr.] - also an old friend - is appointed by a new mission society to live and work at New Stockbridge.

July, 1788: A dispute between Rv. Occom and Rev. Sergeant splits the Stockbridge Mohicans into two churches.

July 1792: The result of Rev. Occom's unexpected death is a reunited church.

August, 1805: Having traveled across the Atlantic, Dorothy Ripley, an Englishwoman not connected with any church body, preaches to the New York Indians. She is especially well received by the women of New Stockbridge.

1818 to 1829: A period of western migration. Deacon John Metoxen is the leader of a new church organized with Rev. Sergeant's help. The Stockbridge Mohicans conduct their own worship services when no missionaries are around.

1824: John Sergeant [Jr.] dies at New Stockbridge, NY.

Circa 1826: Tribal leaders write a letter asking that a missionary be sent to their new location.

1828: Having already replaced Sergeant in NY and visited the tribe on the Fox River (what is now Kaukauna, WI), Jesse Miner moves his ministry to what is now Wisconsin.

1830: Calvin Colton, a Presbyterian minister, observes that the Stockbridge Mohicans treat their tribal Bible with reverence.

1830 - 1848: Cutting Marsh replaces Miner as missionary. After a honeymoon period of a few years, the Indians find Marsh to be rather stern and stubborn. Marsh found it difficult to stay out of tribal politics which became very contentious in the last 11 years of his tenure.

1833: John Metoxen, John N. Chicks, two other Stockbridges and Cutting Marsh conduct a mission trip to the Sauk Indians in and around Davenport, Iowa.

1833-1834: Tribe moves to what is now Calumet County [WI].

1837-1839: A faction of the tribe breaks away from Marsh's church and holds their own Baptist services. Eventually this group emigrates to what is now Kansas under the treaty of 1939.

1844: Wesson Miller, a Methodist circuit rider, holds a revival meeting in Jacob Chicks' barn. Some members of the Citizen Party leave Marsh's church to become Methodists.

1845: Jeremiah Slingerland - a Stockbridge Mohican - graduates from Bangor Theological Seminary. He moves back to Stockbridge, Wisconsin Territory, and takes on the work of schoolteacher and assistant to Rev. Marsh.

1848: The Indian Party makes a treaty to move west of the Mississippi, Citizen Party members are on their own. After much conflict between Marsh and Slingerland, Marsh leaves his post and dissuades the mission society from supporting Slingerland's ministry.

1850 - 1857: The Indian Party stays put and pays Slingerland and two white ministers to preach.

1856: A treaty brings the Indian Party and the Citizen Party, plus remnants of other tribes - especially Munsees - together on a new reservation in Shawano County [WI].

1857: Jeremiah Slingerland and his wife move to the new reservation. Worship services ae held in their home.

1859 - 1863: Jeremiah Slingerland preaches in the town of Shawano before the first white minister comes to town.

1866: More than twenty years after graduating from the seminary, Jeremiah Slingerland is finally ordained as a Presbyterian minister.

1867: After conducting their worship either informally, or in cooperation with the Methodists, the Stockbridge Mohicans finally have their own Presbyterian church again.

1881: Stephen Gardner and others attend Roman Catholic midnight mass on Christmas Eve on the Menominee Reservation. Under Gardner;s leadership, Roman Catholicism gains a foothold among the Stockbridge Mohicans for the fist time.

1884: Rev. Slingerland dies and the Presbyterian church fades without his leadership.