EASTERN NEW YORK STATE TIMELINE - 1740 - 1749

1740

Feb 9                       

Mohawk Valley landowner William Johnson writes to his uncle Peter Warren, using the address Mount Johnson instead of Warrensburg, at the top.

Jun 8                       

A daughter, Ann, is born to William Johnson and his current mistress Catherine Weisenberg.

Jul 18                       

The 12,000-acre third Schuyler Patent, in Washington County, is granted to John Schuyler and others.

State

George Herkimer builds a church in the village named after his family. ** The approximate date Mohawk chief Atiatoharongwen(Thiathoharongouan, meaning his body is taken down from hanging or one who pulls down the people; also known as Louis Atayataghronghta, Louis Cook, and Colonel Louis) is born in Schuylerville to a black man and a Saint-Francois Abenaki woman.   
  

1741

Aug 18           

The 13,000-acre Ootboudt’s Patent, in Otsego County, is granted to Volkert Ootboudt and others.

Oct 6                       

The 2,000-acre Winne’s Patent, in Herkimer County, is granted to Peter Winne.

Oct 7                       

John Lindsay (and others) receive their third Lindlsey’s Patent - 2,000  acres - in Otsego County.

Oct 10                       

The 4,000-acre Winne’s Patent, in Montgomery County, is granted to Peter Winne and others.

Oct 17                       

The 6,000-acre Northampton Patent, in Fulton County, is granted to Jacob Mase and others.

Nov 4                       

The 17,000-acre Springfield Patent, in Otsego County, is granted to John Groesbeck and others.

Dec 2                       

The 28,000-acre Sacondaga Patent, in Fulton and Hamilton counties, is granted to Fredrick Morris and others.

State

The Montauk Indian population has dwindled to 32 families, about 160 people.

Northeast New York State

The 1741-1742 winter is a severe one.    **    The Reverend James Davenport begins two years of itinerant preaching through Connecticut, Massachusetts and eastern Long Island.

1742

Feb 7

A son, John, is born to William Johnson and Catherine Weisenberg.

Sep 29                       

Iroquois representatives begin arriving at Upper Mohawk Castle (Canajoharie) to meet with William Johnson.

Oct 2                       

Johnson is adopted into the tribe and given the name Warraghiyagey, The Man Who Undertakes Great Things.

State

Future governor John Taylor is born in New York City.

Ohio

New York Mohawk chief Joseph Brant, or Thayendanega (“he places two bets”) is born on the banks of the Ohio River near today’s Akron, as his parents – Nickus (Nicholas) of the Wolfe family and Owandah or Sagetageatat, are on a hunting expedition.

1743

Jul 13                       

The Stony Point Tract, in Rockland County, is granted to Richard Bradley and others.

Aug 4                       

The 4,380-acre Wawieghnunck Patent, in Columbia County, is granted to William and Stephen Bayard. The Mawighhunk Patent in the same county is granted to Stephen and others.

Dec 17                       

Mamakating, named for an Indian chief, is made a precinct by the General Assembly, encompassing Sullivan County and a portion of Orange.

State

Governor George Clinton takes office.

1744

May                       

The New York council orders an overhaul of the city's sanitary laws, going after tanners, hogs owners and starchmakers, and moving them outside of the city. Waste dumping on public property is prohibited.

Oct 14                       

Mary Johnson is born to trader and superintendent of Indian affairs William Johnson and his mistress Catherine Weisenberg, their third child.

1745

Apr 30                       

The 9,400-acre Burnetsfield Patent, in Herkimer County, is
granted to John Joost Petrie and others, It will become known
as German Flats.

May

Esopus Indian sachems complain to colonial officials in

Kingston that they are paying too much for commodities and 

receiving too little in exchange.

Aug 25                       

Hudson Valley colonel Ann (male) Hawks/Hawkes Hay is 

born in Kingston Jamaica.   

Nov 28                       

French military forces out of Canada, accompanied by 220 Caughnawaga Mohawk and Abenaki Indians, attack and burn the English settlement at Saratoga. The 101 inhabitants are either killed or taken prisoner. Albany will be thrown into a panic.  

State

The French raid Fort Edward.    **    Frederick Philipse adds a brick north wing to the Philipse Manor Hall in Yonkers.

Indians

At Lancaster, Pennsylvania, the Six Nations cede their land in the Ohio Valley north of the river to commissioners from New York, Virginia, Maryland and Pennsylvania. The Iroquois are given £800 in Pennsylvania cuurency, £300 in gold and control of several southern tribes and passage through the colony to attack the Catawba and the Cherokee.

1746

July

Mohawks gather in war council near Mount Johnson. William Johnson gains their allegiance to the British cause.

Aug 11                       

Johnson, along with Iroquois chiefs Tiyanoga and Wascaugh, at the head a large party of Indians, marches into Albany, the warriors saluting governor George Clinton as they pass the fort.

Aug 15           

A small patrol of Captain Daniel Ladd’s New Hampshire militia is surprised by a war party of pro-French Indians and Canadian voyageurs, in New York near Lake Champlain’s Crown Point. Another patrol arrives to find five mutilated bodies and one survivor, learn that two others were carried off. Ladd heads to his base in Rumford for replacements. He encounters 14-year-old Robert Rogers there.

Aug 19                       

The Albany Indian Congress convenes, with over 700 Indians in attendance. Johnson is dressed in Indian regalia.

Aug 31                       

Tiyanoga returns to Johnson Hall from a journey to Montreal, were he was entertained by French governor Galissonière, who he told what the official wanted to hear, then went on to visit Caughnawaga chiefs, who expressed dissatisfaction with the French. On the way back he and his party killed one French soldier near Crown Point and captured another. Tiyanoga tells Johnson is story then leaves for Canajoharie. 

Nov 25                       

Ten of Johnsons’ scouts and 12 Mohawks arrive at Albany with the scalps of a man, two women and a boy, and eight white prisoners, a French militia captain, two Canadians, two women and three French girls - the Vitry sisters. Johnson will leave on a sloop for New York City with the prisoners later in the day.

December           

William Johnson takes Angélique Vitry as his mistress.

State

Mohawk Indians, stirred up by Governor Clinton, raid into Canada.    **    Lutheran clergyman John Christopher Hartwick emigrates to the U. S. from Germany to serve as a missionary to his countrymen in Rhinebeck.    **    The Iroquois League makes George Croghan a counselor.   **    Over the past 26 years Dutchess County has recorded twenty payments to 14 named Wappinger and other Indians, as bounties on wolves.

1747

Aug 28                       

Indian agent William Johnson leads a force of 650, 350 of them white, the remainder Iroquois, on an expedition against the French at Lac St. Sacrement (Lake George). They will arrive to find the enemy gone.

Sep 30                       

Big Flats pioneer Christian Myneer (Minier) is born in Heidelberg, Pennsylvania, to Johann Georg Myneer and Marie Elizabeth Strunk Myneer.

Oct 10                       

William Johnson learns the Albany militia refuses to serve under him, writes governor George Clinton, warning that their Indians allies will be disappointed if he is not provided with supplies for them.

State

Governor George Clinton promises Mohawk chief Tiyanoga he will put William Johnson in charge of Indian affairs for the colony and terminate the Assembly position of Indian Commissioner.    **   Mohawk Indians, stirred up by Governor Clinton, raid into Canada for a second year. Nichus Brant is captured along with other Mohawks and some British soldiers, and imprisoned by the French.

1748

March           

William Johnson confers with governor George Clinton in New York.    **    Six Mohawks scouting north of Mount Johnson are surprised by a party of Caughnawaga and Abnaki Indians, and French rangers. Two Mohawks (including Gingego) are killed and three captured, including Chief Nichus (father of Molly and Joseph  Brant). The sixth escapes to Teantontalogo but finds an insufficient force to give chase. When they return two days later with William Johnson they find the mutilated remains of the two dead. They later learn the three who were captured were taken to Montreal.

Apr 11                       

William Johnson, Mississaugi chief Tiyanoga, fifty volunteers and 13 Mohawks leave Mount Johnson on a 200-mile swing through Iroquois country.

Apr 23                       

Johnson and Tiyanoga arrive at Onondaga. In council Johnson hears Chief Red Hand’s concern that the British show  no signs of an attack on Canada and that the tribes have neglected their own interests for two years while waiting for action. He promises to reply in the morning.  

Apr 24                       

Johnson tries to convince the chiefs to not travel to Montreal to retrieve their captives, but to let the English government exchange them for French prisoners, even though he has no authorization for such an offer. They promise him an answer the following day.

Apr 25                       

The reply comes from Chief Canassatego. The Iroquois will let Johnson try to exchange French prisoners for their fellow tribesmen.

Apr 26                       

Johnson and Tiyanoga leave Onondaga for Mount Johnson.

Aug 10                       

Johnson writes to governor Clinton, reports the Indians have all left Mount Johnson with the exception of the Seneca Grota Younga, who stayed behind to have an ulcerous leg tended to.

Aug 20

James Dean, missionary to the Oneida Indians, is born in Groton, Connecticut.

State

William Johnson begins building a new Mount Johnson residence along the Mohawk, a mile from the old Mount Johnson, in the autumn.    **   Mohawk Indians, stirred up by Governor Clinton, raid into Canada for the third straight year in a row.    **    French priest Abbé Francois Picquet first visits the mouth of the Oswegatchie River on the St. Lawrence, realizes its strategic possibilities.

Albany

Finnish-Swedish scientist Peter Kalm visits the city, comments adversely on the water supply. He remains in the area into next year.

Indians

The French found a Suplican Mission in the Ogdensburg to woo the Iroquois.

1749

Jan 1                       

Hampshire Grant (Vermont) governor Benning Wentworth creates the township of Bennington, first settlement in the grant, claimed by New York State.

Apr 28                       

William Johnson returns to Mount Johnson after a five-week tour of Iroquois villages, where he found the more western tribes wary of English promises. He dispatches a report to Governor George Clinton.

Jun 2                       

Antoine-Louis Rouillé, Comte de Jouy, French colonial minister, writes to Canadian governor, the Marquis de Galissonière from Versailles, backing his plan to use the natives to destroy Fort Oswego. He then writes to Galissonière’s upcoming successor Jacques Pierre de Taffanel, the Marquis de Jonquière, still in France, encouraging the future use of the Iroquois.

Jun 25                       

Céloron emerges from the rapids of the St. Lawrence, arrives at the mouth of the Oswegathchie River, and visits Fort (La) Presentation (Ogdensburg).

Jun 26                       

Céloron’s forces leave the Oswegathchie, continuing up the St. Lawrence. Two hours after they leave Presentation the fort is burnt in an Iroquois attack.

Jul 31                       

Johnson writes to governor Clinton threatening to resign if held accountable to the New York Assembly. He then sends messengers to Indian villages warning of French incursions into the region.

Oct 21                       

Land agent and politician Oliver Phelps is born in Poquonock, Connecticut, to Thomas and Ann Brown Phelps.

Nov 4                       

Johnson throws a feast for Sacanghtradeya, Tiyanoga, Wascaugh, Nichus and close to 300 other angry warriors. He successfully counters claims that the English and French have made an alliance against the Iroquouis.    **    Céloron’s forces reach La Présentation (Ogdensburg).

State

Suplican father Francis Picquet establishes Fort (La) Présentation (later Ogdensburg), an Indian mission, at the mouth of the Oswegatchie River in the northwestern Adirondacks.

©  2012    David Minor / Eagles Byte