 Preface an Introduction of a Narrative of the Life of Mrs. Mary Jemisin That to biographical writings we are indebted for the greatest and best field in which to study mankind, or human nature, is a fact duly appreciated by a well-informed community. In them we can trace the effects of mental operations to their proper sources, and by comparing our own composition with that of those who have excelled in virtue, or with that of those who have sunk in the lowest depths of folly and vice, we are enabled to select a plan of life that will at least afford self-satisfaction and guide us through the world in paths of morality. Without a knowledge of the lives of the vile and abandoned, we should be wholly incompetent to set an appropriate value upon the charms, the excellence, and the worth of those principles which have produced the finest traits in the character of the most virtuous. Biography is a telescope of life, through which we can see the extremes and excesses of the varied properties of the human heart. Wisdom and folly, refinement and vulgarity, love and hatred, tenderness and cruelty, happiness and misery, piety and infidelity, co-mingled with every other cardinal virtue or vice, are to be seen on the variegated pages of the history of human events, and are eminently deserving the attention of those who would learn to walk in the paths of peace. The brazen statue and the sculptured marble can commemorate the greatness of heroes, statesmen, philosophers, and bloodstained conquerors who have risen to the zenith of human glory and popularity under the influence of the mild sun of prosperity. But it is the faithful page of biography that transmits to future generations the poverty, pain, wrong, hunger, wretchedness, and torment, and every nameless misery that has been endured by those who have lived in obscurity, and groped their lonely way through a long series of unpropecious events, with but little help besides the light of nature. While the gilded monument displays in brightest colors the vanity of pomp and the emptiness of nominal greatness, the biographical page that lives in every line is giving lessons of fortitude in time of danger, patience in suffering, hope in distress, invention in necessity, and resignation to unavoidable evils. Here also may be learned pity for the bereaved, benevolence for the destitute, and compassion for the helpless, and at the same time all the sympathies of the soul will be naturally excited to sigh at the unfavorable result or to smile at the fortunate relief. In the great inexplicable chain which forms the circle of human events, each individual link is placed on a level with the others and performs an equal task. But as the world is partial, it is the situation that attracts the attention of mankind and excites the unfortunate vociferous eclat of elevation that raises the pampered parasite to such an immense height in the scale of personal vanity as generally to deprive him of respect before he can return to a state of equilibrium with his fellows or to the place once he started. Few great men have passed from the stage of action who have not left in the history of their lives indelible marks of ambition or folly which produced insurmountable reverses and rendered the whole a mere caricature that can be examined only with disgust and regret. Such pictures, however, are profitable for by others faults wise men correct their own. The following is a piece of biography that shows what changes may be affected in the animal and mental constitution of man, what trials may be surmounted, what cruelties perpetrated, and what pain endured when stern necessity holds the reins and drives the car of fate. As books of this kind are sought and read with avidity, especially by children, and are well calculated to excite their attention, inform their understanding, and improve them in the art of reading, the greatest care has been observed to render the style easy, the language comprehensive, and the description natural. Prolicity has been studiously avoided. The line of distinction between virtue and vice has been rendered distinctly visible, and chastity of expression and sentiment have received due attention. Strict fidelity has been observed in the composition. Consequently, no circumstance has been intentionally exaggerated by the paintings of fancy nor by fine flashes of rhetoric. Neither has the picture been rendered more dull than the original. Without the aid of fiction, what was received as matter of fact only has been recorded. It will be observed that the subject of this narrative has arrived at least to the advanced age of eighty years. That she is destitute of education, and that her journey of life throughout its texture has been interwoven with troubles, which ordinarily are calculated to impair the faculties of the mind, and it will be remembered that there are but few old people who can recollect with precision the circumstances of their lives, particularly those circumstances which transpired after middle age. If therefore any error shall be discovered in the narration in respect to time, it will be overlooked by the kind reader, or territorially placed to the narrator's account and not imputed to neglect or to the want of attention in the compiler. The appendix is principally taken from the words of Mrs. Jemisin's statements. Those parts which were not derived from her are deserving equal credit having been obtained from authentic sources. For the accommodation of the reader the work has been divided into chapters and a copious table of contents affixed. The introduction will facilitate the understanding of what follows, and, as it contains matter that could not be inserted with propriety in any other place, will be read with interest and satisfaction. Having finished my undertaking, the subsequent pages are cheerfully submitted to the perusal and approbation, or animate version, of a candid, generous and indulgent public. At the same time it is fondly hoped that the lessons of distress that are portrayed may have a direct tendency to increase our love of liberty, to enlarge our views of the blessings that are derived from our liberal institutions, and to excite in our breasts sentiments of devotion and gratitude to the great author and finisher of our happiness. The author, Pembroke, March 1st, 1824. End of Preface Introduction The peace of 1783 and the consequent cessation of Indian hostilities and barbarities returned to their friends those prisoners who had escaped the tomahawk, the gauntlet, and the savage fire after their having spent many years in captivity and restored harmony to society. The stories of Indian cruelties which were common in the new settlements and were calamitous realities previous to that propitious event slumbered in the minds that had been constantly agitated by them and were only roused occasionally to become the fearful topic of the fireside. It is presumed that at this time there are but few Native Americans that have arrived to middle age who cannot distinctly recollect of sitting in the chimney corner when children all contracted with fear and there listening to their parents or visitors while they related stories of Indian conquests and murders that would make their flaxen hair nearly stand erect and almost destroy the power of motion. At the close of the Revolutionary War all that part of the state of New York that lies west of Utica was uninhabited by white people and few indeed had ever passed beyond Fort Stanwyx except when engaged in war against the Indians who were numerous and occupied a number of large towns between the Mohawk River and Lake Erie. Some time elapsed after this event before the country about the lakes and on the Genesee River was visited saved by an occasional land speculator or by defaulters who wished by retreating to what in those days was deemed almost the end of the earth to escape the force of civil law. At length the richness and fertility of the soil excited emigration and here and there a family settled down and commenced improvements in the country which had recently been the property of the Aborigines. Those who settled near the Genesee River soon became acquainted with the white woman as Mrs. Jemisin is called whose history they anxiously sought both as a matter of interest and curiosity. Frankness characterized her conduct and without reserve she would readily gratify them by relating some of the most important periods of her life. Although her bosom companion was an ancient Indian warrior and notwithstanding her children and associates were all Indians yet it was found that she possessed an uncommon share of hospitality and that her friendship was well worth courting and preserving. Her house was the strangest home from her table the hungry were refreshed. She made the naked as comfortable as her means would admit of and in all her actions discovered so much natural goodness of heart that her admirers increased in proportion to the extension of her acquaintance and she became celebrated as the friend of the distressed. She was the protectress of the homeless fugitive and made welcome the weary wanderer. Many still lived to commemorate her benevolence towards them when prisoners during the war and to ascribe their deliverance to the mediation of the white woman. The settlements increased and the whole country around her was inhabited by a rich and respectable people principally from New England as much distinguished for their spirit of inquisitiveness as for their habits of industry and honesty who had all heard from one source and another a part of her life and detached pieces and had obtained an idea that the whole taken in connection would afford instruction and amusement. Many gentlemen of respectability felt anxious that her narrative might be laid before the public with a view not only to perpetuate the remembrance of the atrocities of the savages in former times but to preserve some historical facts which they supposed to be intimately connected with her life and which otherwise must be lost. Forty years had passed since the close of the Revolutionary War and almost seventy years had seen Mrs. Jemisin with the Indians when Daniel W. Bannister, Esquire at the instance of several gentlemen and prompted by his own ambition to add something to the accumulating fund of useful knowledge resolved in the autumn of 1823 to embrace that time while she was capable of recollecting and reciting the scenes through which she had passed to collect from herself and to publish to an accurate account of her life. I was employed to collect the materials and prepare the work for the press and accordingly went to the house of Mrs. Janet Whaley in the town of Castile, Genesee County, New York in company with the publisher who procured the interesting subject of the following narrative to come to that place a distance of four miles and there repeat the story of her eventful life. She came on foot in company with Mr. Thomas Clute whom she considers her protector and tarried almost three days which time was busily occupied in taking a sketch of her narrative as she recited it. Her appearance was well calculated to excite a great degree of sympathy in a stranger who had been partially informed of her origin when comparing her present situation with what it probably would have been had she been permitted to have remained with her friends and to have enjoyed the blessings of civilization. In stature she is very short and considerably under the middle size and stands tolerably erect with her head bent forward apparently from her having for a long time been accustomed to carrying heavy burdens in a strap placed across her forehead. Her complexion is very white for a woman of her age and although the wrinkles of four score years are deeply indented in her cheeks yet the crimson of youth is distinctly visible. Her eyes are light blue, a little faded by age and naturally brilliant and sparkling. Her sight is quite dim though she is able to perform her necessary labor without the assistance of glasses. Her cheekbones are high and rather prominent and her front teeth in the lower jaw are sound and good. When she looks up and is engaged in conversation her countenance is very expressive but from her long residence with the Indians she has acquired the habit of peeping from under eyebrows as they do with the head inclined downwards. Formally her hair was of a light chestnut brown it is now quite gray a little curled of middling length and tied in a bunch behind. She informed me that she had never worn a cap nor a comb. She speaks English plainly and distinctly with a little of the Irish emphasis and has the use afforded so well as to render herself intelligible on any subject with which she is acquainted. Her recollection and memory exceeded my expectation. It cannot be reasonably supposed that a person of her age has kept the events of seventy years and so complete a chain as to be able to assign to each its proper time and place. She, however, made her recital with as few obvious mistakes as might be found in that of a person of fifty. She walks with a quick step without a staff and I was informed by Mr. Clute that she could yet cross the stream on a log or pole as steadily as any other person. Her passions are easily excited. At a number of periods in her narration tears trickle down her grief-worn cheek and at the same time a rising sigh would stop her utterance. Industry is a virtue which she has uniformly practiced from the day of her adoption to the present. She pounce her samp, cooks for herself, gathers and chops wood, feeds her cattle and poultry and performs other laborious services. The last season she planted, tended and gathered corn. In short, she is always busy. Her dress at the time I saw her was made and worn after the Indian fashion and consisted of a shirt, short gown, petticoat, stockings, moccasins, a blanket and a bonnet. The shirt was of cotton and made at the top as I was informed, like a man's without collar or sleeves, was opened before and extended down about midway of the hips. The petticoat was a piece of broad cloth with the list at the top and bottom and the ends sewed together. This was tied on by a string that was passed over it and around the waist in such a manner as to let the bottom of the petticoat down halfway between the knee and the ankle and leave one fourth of a yard at the top to be turned down over the string, the bottom of the shift coming a little below and on the outside of the top of the fold so as to leave the list and two or three inches of the cloth uncovered. The stockings were of blue broad cloth, tied or pinned on, which reached from the knees into the mouth of the moccasins. Around her toes only she had some rags, and over these her buckskin moccasins. Her gown was of undress flannel colored brown. It was made in old Yankee style with long sleeves covered the top of the hips and was tied before in two places with strings of deerskin. Over all this she wore an Indian blanket. On her head she wore a piece of old brown woolen cloth made somewhat like a sun bonnet. Such was the dress that this woman was contented to wear, and habit had rendered it convenient and comfortable. She wore it not as a matter of necessity but from choice, for it will be seen in the sequel that her property is sufficient to enable her to dress in the best fashion and to allow her every comfort of life. Her house in which she lives is 20 by 28 feet, built of square timber with a shingled roof and a framed stoop. In the center of the house is a chimney of stones and sticks in which there are two fireplaces. She has a good framed barn 26 by 36 well filled and owns a fine stock of cattle and horses. Besides the buildings above mentioned, she owns a number of houses that are occupied by tenants who work her flats upon shares. Her dwelling is about 100 yards north of the Great Slide, a curiosity that will be described in its proper place on the west side of the Genesee River. Mrs. Jemison appeared sensible of her ignorance of the manners of the white people, and for that reason was not familiar, except with those with whom she was intimately acquainted. In fact she was, to appearance, so jealous of her rights, or that she should say something that would be injurious to herself or family, that if Mr. Clute had not been present, we should have been unable to have obtained her history. She, however, soon became free and unembarrassed in her conversation, and spoke with degree of mildness, candor, and simplicity that is calculated to remove all doubts as to the veracity of the speaker. The vices of the Indians, she appeared disposed not to aggravate, and seemed to take pride in extolling their virtues. A kind of family pride inclined her to withhold whatever would blot the character of her descendants, and perhaps induced her to keep back many things that would have been interesting. For the life of her last husband, we are indebted to her cousin, Mr. George Jemison, to whom she referred us for information on that subject generally. The thoughts of his deeds probably chilled her old heart, and made her dread to rehearse them, and at the same time she well knew they were no secret, for she had frequently heard him relate the whole, not only to her cousin, but to others. Before she left us she was very sociable, and she resumed her naturally pleasant countenance enlivened with a smile. Her neighbors speak of her as possessing one of the happiest tempers and disposition, and give her the name of never having done a centurable act to their knowledge. Her habits are those of the Indians. She sleeps on skins without a bedstead, sits upon the floor or a bench, and holds her victuals on her lap or in her hands. Her ideas of religion correspond in every respect with those of the great mass of the Seneca. She applauds virtue and despises vice. She believes in a future state in which the good will be happy and the bad miserable, and that the acquisition of that happiness depends primarily upon human volition and the consequent good deeds of the happy recipient of blessedness. The doctrines taught in the Christian religion she is a stranger to. Her daughters are said to be active and enterprising women, and her grandsons, who arrived to manhood, are considered able, decent, and respectable men in their tribe. Having in this cursory manner introduced the subject of the following pages, I proceed to the narration of a life that has been viewed with attention for a great number of years by a few, and which will be read by the public the mixed sensations of pleasure and pain with great interest, anxiety, and satisfaction. End of introduction. I have frequently heard the history of my ancestry. My recollection is too imperfect to enable me to trace it further back than my father and mother, whom I have often heard mention the families from whence they originated as having possessed wealth and honorable stations under the government of the country in which they resided. On the account of the great length of time that has elapsed since I was separated from my parents and friends, and having heard the story of their nativity only in the days of my childhood, I am not able to state positively which of the two countries, Ireland or Scotland, was the land of my parents' birth and education. It, however, is my impression that they were born and brought up in Ireland. My father's name was Thomas Jemison, and my mother's, before her marriage with him, was Jane Irwin. Their affection for each other was mutual, and of that happy kind, which tends directly to sweeten the cup of life, to render cannubial sorrows lighter, to assuage every discontentment, and to promote not only their own comfort, but that of all who come within the circle of their acquaintance. Of their happiness I recollect to have heard them speak, and the remembrance I yet retain of their mildness and perfect agreement in the government of their children, together with their mutual attention to our common education, manners, religious instruction, and wants, renders it a fact in my mind that they were ornaments to the married state, and examples of cannubial love worthy of imitation. After my remembrance they were strict observers of religious duties, for it was the daily practice of my father, morning and evening, to attend in his family to the worship of God. Resolved to leave the land of their nativity, they removed from their residence to a port in Ireland, where they lived but a short time before they set sail for this country, in the year 1742 or 3, on board the ship Mary William, bound to Philadelphia, in the state of Pennsylvania. The intestine divisions, civil wars, and ecclesiastical rigidity and domination that prevail those days were the causes of their leaving their mother country, and a home in the American wilderness under the mild and temperate government of the descendants of William Penn, where without fear they might worship God and perform their usual applications. In Europe my parents had two sons and one daughter, whose names were John, Thomas, and Betsy, with whom, after having put their effects on board, they embarked, leaving a large connection of relatives and friends under all those painful sensations, which are only felt when kindred souls give the parting hand and last farewell to those to whom they are endeared by every friendly tie. In the course of their voyage I was born to be the sport of fortune and almost an outcast to civil society, to stem the current of adversity through a long chain of vicissitudes, unsupported by the advice of tender parents or the hand of an affectionate friend, and even without the enjoyment from others of any of those tender sympathies that are adapted to the sweetening of society except such as naturally flow from uncultivated minds that have been calloused by ferocity. Accepting my birth nothing remarkable occurred to my parents on their passage and they were safely landed at Philadelphia. My father, being fond of rural life and having been bred to agricultural pursuits, soon left the city and removed his family to the then frontier settlements of Pennsylvania to attract of excellent land lying on Marsh Creek. At that place he cleared a large farm and for seven or eight years enjoyed the fruits of his industry. Peace attended their labors and they had nothing to alarm them, save the midnight howl of the prowling wolf or the terrifying shriek of the ferocious panther as they occasionally visited their improvements to take a lamb or a calf to satisfy their hunger. During this period my mother had two sons between whose ages there was a difference of about three years. The oldest was named Matthew and the other Robert. Health presided on every countenance and vigor and strength characterized every exertion. Our mansion was a little paradise. The morning of my childish happy days will ever stand fresh in my remembrance, notwithstanding the many severe trials through which I have passed in arriving at my present situation at so advanced an age. Even at this remote period the recollection of my pleasant home at my father's, of my parents, of my brother's and sister, and of the manner in which I was deprived of them all at once, affects me so powerfully that I am almost overwhelmed with grief that is seemingly insupportable. Frequently I dream of those happy days, but alas they are gone. They have left me to be carried through a long life dependent for the little pleasures of nearly 70 years upon the tender mercies of the Indians. In the spring of 1752 and through the succeeding seasons the stories of Indian barbarities inflicted upon the whites in those days frequently excited in my parents the most serious alarm for our safety. The next year the storm gathered faster, many murders were committed and many captives were exposed to meet death in its most frightful form by having their bodies stuck full of pine splinters which were immediately set on fire, while their tormentors exulting in their distress would rejoice at their agony. In 1754 an army for the protection of the settlers and to drive back the French and Indians was raised from the militia of the colonial governments and placed secondarily under the command of Colonel George Washington. In that army I had an uncle whose name was John Jemison who was killed at the battle at the Great Meadow or Fort Necessity. His wife had died some time before this and left a young child which my mother nursed in the most tender manner till its mother's sister took it away a few months after my uncle's death. The French and Indians after the surrender of Fort Necessity by Colonel Washington which happened the same season and soon after his victory over them at that place grew more and more terrible. The death of the whites and plundering and burning their property was apparently their only object but as yet we had not heard the death yell nor seen the smoke of a dwelling that had been lit by an Indians hand. The return of a New Year's Day found us unmolested and though we knew that the enemy was at no great distance from us my father concluded that he would continue to occupy his land another season. Expecting probably from the great exertions which the government was then making that as soon as the troops could commence their operations in the spring the enemy would be conquered and compelled to agree to a treaty of peace. In the preceding autumn my father either moved to another part of his farm or to another neighborhood a short distance from our former abode. I well recollect moving and that the barn that was on the place we moved to was built of logs though the house was a good one. The winter of 1754 to 5 was as mild as a common fall season and the spring presented a pleasant seed time and indicated a plenteous harvest. My father with the assistance of his oldest sons repaired his farm as usual and was daily preparing the soil for the reception of the seed. His cattle and sheep were numerous and according to the best idea of wealth that I can now form he was wealthy. But alas how transitory are all human affairs, how fleeting are riches, how brittle the invisible thread on which all earthly comforts are suspended. Peace in a moment can take an immeasurable flight health can lose its rosy cheeks and life will vanish like a vapor at the appearance of the sun. In one fatal day our prospects were all blessed and death by cruel hands inflicted upon almost the whole of the family. On a pleasant day in the spring of 1755 when my father was sowing flax seed and my brothers driving the teams I was sent to a neighbor's house a distance of perhaps a mile to procure a horse and return with it the next morning. I went as I was directed. I was out of the house in the beginning of the evening and saw a sheep wide spread approaching towards me in which I was caught as I have ever since believed and deprived of my senses. The family soon found me on the ground almost lifeless, as they said, took me in and made use of every remedy in their power for my recovery but without effect till daybreak when my senses returned and I soon found myself in good health so that I went home with the horse very early in the morning. The appearance of that sheet I have ever considered as a forerunner of the melancholy catastrophe that so soon afterwards happened to our family and my being caught in it, I believe, was ominous of my preservation from death at the time we were captured. End of chapter one. Chapter two of a narrative of the life of Mrs. Mary Jemisin. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Lynn Carroll. A narrative of the life of Mrs. Mary Jemisin by James E. Siever. Chapter two. My education had received as much attention from my parents as their situation in a new country would admit. I had been at school some where I learned to read in a book that was about half as large as a Bible and in the Bible I had read a little. I had also learned the catechism which I used frequently to repeat to my parents and every night before I went to bed I was obliged to stand up before my mother and repeat some words that I suppose was a prayer. My reading, catechism, and prayers I have long since forgotten though for a number of the first years that I lived with the Indians I repeated the prayers as often as I had an opportunity. After the Revolutionary War I remembered the names of some of the letters when I saw them but have never read a word since I was taken prisoner. It is but a few years since a missionary kindly gave me a Bible which I am very fond of hearing my neighbors read to me and should be pleased to learn to read it myself but my sight has been for a number of years so dim that I have not been able to distinguish one letter from another. As I before observed I got home with the horse very early in the morning where I found a man that lived in our neighborhood in his sister-in-law who had three children one son and two daughters. I soon learned that they had come there to live a short time but for what purpose I cannot say the woman's husband however was at that time in Washington's army fighting for his country and as her brother-in-law had a house she had lived with him in his absence their names I have forgotten immediately after I got home the man took the horse to go to his house after a bag of grain and took his gun in his hand for the purpose of killing game if he should chance to see any our family as usual was busily employed about their common business father was shaving an axe health at the side of the house mother was making preparations for breakfast my two oldest brothers were at work near the barn and the little ones with myself and the woman and her three children were in the house breakfast was not yet ready when we were alarmed by the discharge of a number of guns that seemed to be near mother and the women before mentioned almost fainted at the report and everyone trembled with fear on opening the door the man and horse lay dead near the house having just been shot by the Indians I was afterwards informed that the Indians discovered him at his own house with his gun and pursued him to fathers where they shot him as I have related they first secured my father and then rushed into the house and without the least resistance made prisoners of my mother Robert Matthew Betsy the woman and her three children and myself and then commenced plundering my two brothers Thomas and John being at the barn escaped and went to Virginia where my grandfather Erwin then led as I was informed by a Mr Fields who was at my house about the close of the Revolutionary War the party that took us consisted of six Indians and four Frenchmen who immediately commenced plundering as I just observed and took what they considered most valuable consisting principally of bread meal and meat having taken as much provision as they could carry they set out with their prisoners in great haste for fear of detection and soon entered the woods on our march that day an Indian went behind us with a whip with which he frequently lashed the children to make them keep up in this manner we traveled till dark without a mouthful of food or a drop of water although we had not eaten since the night before whenever the little children cried for water the Indians would make them drink urine or go thirsty at night they encamped in the woods without fire and without shelter where we were watched with the greatest vigilance extremely fatigued and very hungry we were compelled to lie upon the ground supperless and without a drop of water to satisfy the cravings of our appetites as in the daytime so the little ones were made to drink urine in the night if they cried for water fatigue alone brought us a little sleep for the refreshment of our weary limbs and at the dawn of day we were again started on our march in the same order that we had proceeded on the day before about sunrise we were halted and the Indians gave us a full breakfast of provision that they had brought from my father's house each of us being very hungry partook of this bounty of the Indians except father who was so much overcome with his situation so much exhausted by anxiety and grief that silent despair seemed fastened upon his countenance and he could not be prevailed upon to refresh his sinking nature by the use of a morsel of food i repast being finished we again resumed our march and before noon passed a small fort that i heard my father say was called fort canna gojiki that was the only time that i heard him speak from the time we were taken till we were finally separated the following night towards evening we arrived at the border of a dark and dismal swamp which was covered with small hemlocks or some other evergreen and other bushes into which we were conducted and having gone a short distance we stopped to encamp for the night here we had some bread and meat for supper but the dreariness of our situation together with the uncertainty under which we all labored as to our future destiny almost deprived us of the sense of hunger and destroyed our relish for food mother from the time we were taken had manifested a great degree of fortitude and encouraged us to support our troubles without complaining and by her conversation seemed to make the distance in time shorter and the way more smooth but father lost all his ambition in the beginning of our trouble and continued apparently lost to every care absorbed in melancholy here as before she insisted on the necessity of our eating and we obeyed her but it was done with heavy hearts as soon as i had finished my supper an indian took off my shoes and stockings and put a pair of moccasins on my feet which my mother observed and believing that they would spare my life even if they should destroy the other captives addressed me as near as i can remember in the following words my dear little mary i fear that the time has arrived when we must be parted forever your life my child i think will be spared but we shall probably be tomahawked here in this lonesome place by the indians oh how can i part with you my darling what will become of my sweet little mary oh how can i think of your being continued in captivity without a hope of your being rescued oh that death had snatched you from my embraces in your infancy the pain of parting then would have been pleasing to what it now is and i should have seen the end of your troubles alas my dear my heart bleeds at the thoughts of what awaits you but if you leave us remember my child your own name and the name of your father and mother be careful and not forget your english tongue if you shall have an opportunity to get away from the indians don't try to escape for if you do they will find and destroy you don't forget my little daughter the prayers that i have learned you say them often be a good child and god will bless you may god bless you my child and make you comfortable and happy during this time the indians stripped the shoes and stockings from the little boy that belonged to the woman who was taken with us and put moccasins on his feet as they had done before on mine i was crying an indian took the little boy and myself by the hand to lead us off from the company when my mother exclaimed don't cry mary don't cry my child god will bless you farewell farewell the indian led us some distance into the bushes or woods and there lay down with us to spend the night the recollection of parting with my tender mother kept me awake while the tears constantly flowed from my eyes a number of times in the night the little boy begged of me earnestly to run away with him and get clear of the indians but remembering the advice i had so lately received and knowing the dangers to which we should be exposed in traveling without a path and without a guide through a wilderness unknown to us i told him that i would not go and persuaded him to lie still till morning early the next morning the indians and frenchmen that we had left the night before came to us but our friends were left behind it is impossible for anyone to form a correct idea of what my feelings were at the site of those savages whom i supposed had murdered my parents and brothers sister and friends and left them in the swamp to be devoured by wild beasts but what could i do a poor little defenseless girl without the power or means of escaping without a home to go to even if i could be liberated without a knowledge of the direction or distance to my former place of residence and without a living friend to whom to fly for protection i felt a kind of horror anxiety and dread that to me seemed insupportable i durst not cry i durst not complain and to inquire of them the fate of my friends even if i could have mustered resolution was beyond my ability as i could not speak their language nor they understand mine my only relief was in silent stifled sobs my suspicions as to the fate of my parents proved too true for soon after i left them they were killed and scalped together with robert matthew betsey and the woman and her two children and mangled in the most shocking manner having given the little boy in myself some bread and meat per breakfast they led us on as fast as we could travel and one of them went behind and with a long staff picked up all the grass and weeds that we trailed down by going over them by taking that precaution they avoided detection for each weed was so nicely placed in its natural position that no one would have suspected that we had passed that way it is a custom of indians when scouting or on private expeditions to step carefully and where no impression of their feet can be left shunning wet or muddy ground they seldom take hold of a bush or limb and never break one and by observing those precautions and that of setting up the weeds and grass which they necessarily lob they completely elude the sagacity of their pursuers and escape that punishment which they are conscious they merit from the hand of justice after a hard day's march we encamped in a thicket where the indians made a shelter of bowels and then built a good fire to warm and dry our benumbed limbs and clothing for it had rained some through the day here we were again fed as before when the indians had finished their supper they took from their baggage a number of scalps and went about preparing them for the market or to keep without spoiling by straining them over small hoops which they prepared for that purpose and then drying and scraping them by the fire having put the scalps yet wet and bloody upon the hoops and stretched them to their full extent they held them to the fire till they were partly dried and then with their knives commenced scraping off the flesh and in that way they continued to work alternately drying and scraping them till they were dry and clean that being done they combed the hair in the neatest manner and then painted it and the edges of the scalps yet on the hoops red those scalps I knew at the time must have been taken from our family by the color of the hair my mother's hair was red and I could easily distinguish my fathers and the children's from each other that sight was most appalling yet I was obliged to endure it without complaining in the course of the night they made me to understand that they should not have killed the family if the whites had not pursued them Mr. Fields whom I have before mentioned informed me that at the time we were taken he lived in the vicinity of my father and that on hearing of our captivity the whole neighborhood turned out in pursuit of the enemy and to deliver us if possible but that their efforts were unavailing they however pursued us to the dark swamp where they found my father his family and companions stripped and mangled in the most inhuman manner that from thence the march of the cruel monsters could not be traced in any direction and that they returned to their homes with the melancholy tidings of our misfortunes supposing that we had all shared in the massacre the next morning we went on the Indian going behind us and setting up the weeds as on the day before at night we encamped on the ground in the open air without a shelter or fire in the morning we again set out early and traveled as on the two former days though the weather was extremely uncomfortable from the continual falling of rain and snow at night the snow fell fast and the Indians built a shelter of bows and a fire where we rested tolerably dry through that and the two succeeding nights when we stopped and before the fire was kindled I was so much fatigued from running and so far benumbed by the wet and cold that I expected that I must fail and die before I could get warm and comfortable the fire however soon restored the circulation and after I had taken my supper I felt so that I rested well through the night through the night on account of the storm we were two days at that place on one of those days a party consisting of six Indians who had been to the frontier settlements came to where we were and brought with them one prisoner a young white man who was very tired and dejected his name I have forgotten misery certainly loves company I was extremely glad to see him though I knew from his appearance that his situation was as deplorable as mine and that he could afford me no kind of assistance in the afternoon the Indians killed a deer which they dressed and then roasted it whole which made them a full meal we were each allowed a share of their venison and some bread so that we made a good meal also having spent three nights in two days at that place and the storm having ceased early in the morning the whole company consisting of 12 Indians four Frenchman the young man the little boy and myself moved on at a moderate pace without an Indian behind us to deceive our pursuers in the afternoon we came inside of Fort Pitt as it is now called where we were halted while the Indians performed some customs upon their prisoners which they deemed necessary that fort was then occupied by the French and Indians and was called Fort Duquesne it stood at the junction of the Monongahila which is said to signify in some of the Indian languages the falling in banks footnote navigator end footnote and the Allegheny footnote the word Allegheny was derived from an ancient race of Indians called the Talagawi the Delaware Indians instead of saying Allegheny say Allagawi our Allegheny western tour page 455 end footnote rivers where the Ohio river begins to take its name the word Ohio signifies bloody at the place where we halted the Indians combed the hair of the young man the boy and myself and then painted our faces and hair red in the finest Indian style we were then conducted into the fort where we received a little bread and were then shut up and left to tarry alone through the night end of chapter two chapter three of a narrative of the life of mrs. Mary Jemison this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org a narrative in the life of mrs. Mary Jemison by James E. Seaver chapter three the night was spent in gloomy forebodings what the result of our captivity would be it was out of our power to determine or even imagine at times we could almost realize the approach of our masters to butcher and scalp us again we could nearly see the pile of wood kindled on which we were to be roasted and then we would imagine ourselves at liberty alone and defenseless in the forest surrounded by wild beasts that were ready to devour us the anxiety of our minds drove sleep from our eyelids and it was with a dreadful hope and painful impatience that we waited for the morning to determine our fate the morning at length arrived and our masters came early to let us out of the house and gave the young man and the boy to the french who immediately took them away their fate i never learned as i have not seen nor heard of them since i was now left alone in the fort deprived of my former companions and of everything that was near and dear to me but life but it was not long before i was in some measure relieved by the appearance of two pleasant looking squas of the seneca tribe who came and examined me attentively for a short time and then went out after a few minutes absence they returned with my former masters who gave me to them to dispose of as they pleased the indians by whom i was taken were party of the shawnees if i remember right that lived when at home a long distance down the ohio my former indian masters and the two squas were soon ready to leave the fort and accordingly embarked the indians in a large canoe and the two squas and myself in a small one and went down the ohio when we set off an indian in the forward canoe took the scalps of my former friends strung them on a pole that he placed upon his shoulder and in that manner carried them standing in the stern of the canoe directly before us as we sailed down the river to the town where the two squas resided on our way we passed a shawnee town where i saw a number of heads arms legs and other fragments of the bodies of some white people who had just been burnt the parts that remained were hanging on a pole which was supported at each end by a crotch stuck in the ground and were roasted or burnt black as a coal the fire was yet burning and the whole appearances afforded a spectacle so shocking that even to this day my blood almost curdles in my veins when i think of them at night we arrived at a small seneca indian town at the mouth of a small river that is called by the indians in the seneca language shenanji footnote that town according to the geographical description given by mrs jemisin must have stood at the mouth of indian cross creek which is about 76 miles by water below pittsburgh or at the mouth of indian short creek 87 miles below pittsburgh where the town of warren now stands but at which of those places i'm unable to determine author and a footnote where the two squas to whom i belonged resided there we landed and the indians went on which was the last i ever saw of them having made fast to the shore the squas left me in the canoe while they went to their wigwam or house in the town and returned with a suit of indian clothing all new very clean and nice my clothes the whole and good when i was taken were now torn in pieces so that i was almost naked they first undressed me and threw my rags into the river then washed me clean and dressed me in the new suit they had just brought in complete indian style and then led me home and seated me in the center of their wigwam i had been in that situation but a few minutes before all the squas in the town came in to see me i was soon surrounded by them and they immediately set up a most dismal howling crying bitterly and wringing their hands in the agonies of grief for a deceased relative their tears flowed freely and they exhibited all the signs of real mourning at the commencement of this scene one of their number began in a voice somewhat between speaking and singing to recite some words in the following purport and continued the recitation till the ceremony was ended the company at the same time varying the appearance of their countenances gestures and tone of voice supposed to correspond with the sentiments expressed by their leader oh our brother alas he is dead he has gone he will never return friendless he died on the field of the slain where his bones are yet lying unburied oh who will not mourn his sad fate no tears dropped around him oh no no tears of his sisters were there he fell in his prime when his arm was most needed to keep us from danger alas he has gone and left us in sorrow his lost to bewail oh where is his spirit his spirit went naked and hungry at wanderers and thirsty and wounded at groans to return oh helpless and wretched our brother has gone no blanket nor food to nourish and warm him no candles to light him nor weapons of war oh none of those comfers had he but well we remember his deeds the deer he could take on the chase the panther shrunk back at the sight of his strength his enemies fell at his feet he was brave and courageous in war as the fawn was harmless his friendship was ardent his temper was gentle his pity was great oh our friend our companion is dead our brother your brother alas he has gone but why do we grieve for his loss in the strength of a warrior undaunted he left us to fight by the side of the chiefs his war whoop was shrill his rifle well aimed laid his enemies low his tomahawk drank of their blood and his knife flayed their scalps while yet covered with gore and why do we mourn though he fell on the field of the slain with glory he fell and his spirit went up to the land of his father's in war then why do we mourn with transports of joy they received him and fed him and clothed him and welcomed him there oh friends he is happy then dry up your tears his spirit has seen our distress and sent us a helper whom with pleasure we greet dicky wamas has come let us receive her with joy she is handsome and pleasant oh she is our sister and gladly we welcome her here in the place of our brother she stands in the tribe with care we will guard her from trouble and may she be happy till her spirit shall leave us in the course of that ceremony from mourning they became serene joy sparkled in their contenances and they seem to rejoice over me as over a long lost child i was made welcome amongst them as a sister to the two squas before mentioned and was called dicky wamas which being interpreted signifies a pretty girl a handsome girl or a pleasant good thing that is the name by which i've ever since been called by the indians i afterwards learned that the ceremony i at the time passed through was that of adoption the two squas had lost a brother in washington's war sometime in the year before and in consequence of his death went up to fort pit on the day on which i arrived there in order to receive a prisoner or an enemy's scalp to supply their loss it is a custom of the indians when one of their number is slain or taken prisoner in battle to give to the nearest relative to the dead or absent a prisoner if they have chance to take one and if not to give him the scalp of an enemy on the return of the indians from conquest which is always announced by peculiar shouting demonstrations of joy and the exhibition of some trophy of victory the mourners come forward and make their claims if they receive a prisoner it is at their option either to satiate their vengeance by taking his life in the most cruel manner they can conceive of or to receive and adopt him into the family in the place of him whom they have lost all the prisoners that are taken in battle and carried to the encampment or town by the indians are given to the bereaved families till their number is made good and unless the mourners have just received the news of their bereavement and are under the operation of a paroxysm of grief anger and revenge or unless the prisoner is very old sickly or homely they generally save him and treat him kindly but if their mental wound is fresh their loss so great that they deem it irreparable or if their prisoner or prisoners do not meet their approbation no torture let it be ever so cruel seems sufficient to make them satisfaction it is family and not national sacrifices among the indians that has given them an indelible stamp as barbarians and identified their character with the idea which is generally formed of unfeeling ferocity and the most abandoned cruelty it was my happy lot to be accepted for adoption and at the time of the ceremony i was received by the two squas to supply the place of their brother in the family and i was ever considered and treated by them as a real sister the same as though i have been born of their mother during my adoption i sat motionless nearly terrified to death at the appearance and actions of the company expecting every moment to feel their vengeance and suffer death on the spot i was however happily disappointed when at the close of the ceremony the company retired and my sisters went about employing every means for my consolation and comfort being now settled and provided with a home i was employed in nursing the children and doing light work about the house occasionally i was sent out with the indian hunters when they went but a short distance to help them carry their game my situation was easy i had no particular hardships to endure but still the recollection of my parents my brothers and sisters my home and my own captivity destroyed my happiness and made me constantly solitary lonesome and gloomy my sisters would not allow me to speak english in their hearing but remembering the charge that my dear mother gave me at the time i left her whenever i chanced to be alone i made a business of repeating my prayer catechism or something i had learned in order that i might not forget my own language by practicing in that way i retained it till i came to genesee flats where i soon became acquainted with english people with whom i have been almost daily in the habit of conversing my sisters were diligent in teaching me their language and to their great satisfaction i soon learned so that i could understand it readily and speak it fluently i was very fortunate in falling into their hands for they were kind good-natured women peaceable and mild in their dispositions temperate and decent in their habits and very tender and gentle towards me i have great reason to respect them though they have been dead a great number of years the town where they lived was pleasantly situated on the ohio at the mouth of the shenanji the land produced good corn the woods furnished plenty of game and the waters abounded with fish another river emptied itself into the ohio directly opposite the mouth of the shenanji we spent the summer at that place where we planted hode and harvested a large crop of corn of an excellent quality about the time of the corn harvest fort pit was taken from the french by the english footnote the above statement is apparently an error and is to be attributed solely to the treachery of the old lady's memory though she is confident that that event took place at the time above mentioned it is certain that fort pit was not evacuated by the french and given up to the english till sometime in november 1758 it is possible however that an armistice was agreed upon and that for time between the spring of 1755 and 1758 both nations visited that post without fear of molestation as the succeeding part of the narrative corresponds with the true historical chain of events the public will overlook this circumstance which appears unsupported by history author and a footnote the corn being harvested the indians took it on horses and in canoes and proceeded down the ohio occasionally stopping to hunt a few days till we arrived at the mouth of skyotel river where they established their winter quarters and continued hunting till the ensuing spring in the adjacent wilderness while at that place i went with the other children to assist the hunters to bring in their game the forests on the skyota were well stocked with elk deer and other large animals and the marshes contained large numbers of beaver muskrat etc which made excellent hunting for the indians who depended for their meat upon their success in taking elk and deer and for ammunition and clothing upon the beaver muskrat and other furs they could take in addition to their peltry the season for hunting being passed we all returned in the spring to the mouth of the river shenanji to the houses and fields we had left in the fall before there we again planted our corn squashes and beans on the fields that we occupied the preceding summer about planting time our indians all went up to fort pit to make peace with the british and took me with them footnote history is silent as to any treaty having been made between the english and french and indians at that time though it is possible that a truce was agreed upon and that the parties met for the purpose of concluding a treaty of peace and a footnote we landed on the opposite side of the river from the fort and encamped for the night early the next morning the indians took me over to the fort to see the white people that were there it was then that my heart bounded to be liberated from the indians and to be restored to my friends and my country the white people were surprised to see me with the indians and during the hardships of a savage life at so early in age and was so delicate a constitution as i appeared to possess they asked me my name where and when i was taken and appeared very much interested on my behalf they were continuing their inquiries when my sisters became alarmed believing that i should be taken from them hurried me into their canoe and recross the river took their bread out of the fire and fled with me without stopping till they arrived at the river shenanji so great was their fear of losing me or of my being given up in the treaty that they never once stopped rowing till they got home shortly after we left the shore opposite the fort as i was informed by one of my indian brothers the white people came over to take me back but after considerable inquiry and having made diligent search to find where i was hid they returned with heavy hearts although i had been with the indians something over a year and had become considerably habituated to their mode of living and attached to my sisters the sight of white people who could speak english inspired me with an unspeakable anxiety to go home with them and share in the blessings of civilization my sudden departure and escape from them seemed like a second captivity and for a long time i brooded the thoughts of my miserable situation with almost as much sorrow and dejection as i had done those of my first sufferings time the destroyer of every affection wore away my unpleasant feelings and i became as contented as before we tended our corn fields through the summer and after we had harvested the crop we again went down the river to the hunting ground on the skyota where we spent the winter as we had done the winter before early in the spring we sailed up the ohio river to a place that the indians call to footnote what is to i suppose was situated near the mouth of indian guyan dot 327 miles below pittsburgh and 73 above big skyota or at the mouth of swan creek 307 miles below pittsburgh end of footnote where one river emptied into the ohio on one side and another on the other at that place the indians built a town and we planted corn we lived three summers at weish to and spent each winter on the skyota the first summer of our living at weish to a party of delaware indians came up the river took up their residents and lived in common with us they brought five white prisoners with them who by their conversation made my situation much more agreeable as they could all speak english i have forgotten the names of all of them except one which was persilla ramsey she was a very handsome good nature girl and was married soon after she came to weish to to captain little billy's uncle who went with her on a visit to her friends in the states having tarried with them as long as she wished to she returned with her husband to canyatua where he died she after his death married a white man by the name of nettles and now lives with him if she is living on grand river upper canada not long after the delaware's came to live with us at weish to my sisters told me that i must go and live with one of them whose name was shinningi not daring to cross them or disobey their commands with a great degree of reluctance i went and shinningi and i were married according to indian custom shinningi was a noble man large in stature elegant in his appearance generous in his conduct courageous in war a friend to peace and a great lover of justice he supported a large degree of dignity far above his rank and merited and received the confidence and friendship of all the tribes with whom he was acquainted yet shinningi was an indian the idea of spending my days with him at first seemed perfectly irreconcilable to my feelings but his good nature generosity tenderness and friendship towards me soon gained my affection and strange as it may seem i loved him to me he was ever kind in sickness and always treated me with gentleness in fact he was an agreeable husband and a comfortable companion we lived happily together till the time of our final separation which happened two or three years after our marriage as i shall presently relate in the second summer of my living at weish to i had a child at the time that the kernels of corn first appeared on the cob when i was taken sick shinningi was absent and i was sent to a small shed on the bank of the river which was made of boughs where i was obliged to stay till my husband returned my two sisters who were my only companions attended me and on the second day of my confinement my child was born but it lived only two days it was a girl and notwithstanding the shortness of the time that i possessed it it was a great grief to me to lose it after the birth of my child i was very sick but was not allowed to go into the house for two weeks when to my great joy shinningi returned and i was taken in and as comfortably provided for as our situation would admit of my disease continued to increase for a number of days and i became so far reduced that my recovery was despaired of by my friends and i concluded that my troubles would soon be finished at length however my complaint took a favorable turn and by the time that the corn was ripe i was able to get about i continued to gain my health and in the fall i was able to go to our winter quarters on the skiota with the indians from that time nothing remarkable occurred to me until the fourth winter of my captivity when i had a son born while i was at skiota i had a quick recovery and my child was healthy to commemorate the name of my much lamented father i called my son thomas jemison end of chapter three read by mary ann spiegel on august 15th 2009 chapter four of a narrative of the life of mrs mary jemison this is a libervox recording all libervox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit libervox.org recording by mary ann spiegel a narrative of the life of mrs mary jemison by james e siever chapter four in the spring when thomas was three or four moons months old we returned from skiota to wish to and soon after set out to go to fort pit to dispose of our fur and skins that we had taken in the winter and procure some necessary articles for the use of our family i had then been with the indians for summers and for winters and had become so far accustomed to their mode of living habits and dispositions that my anxiety to get away to be set at liberty and to leave them had almost subsided with them was my home my family was there and there i had many friends to whom i was warmly attached in consideration of the favors affection and friendship with which they had uniformly treated me from the time of my adoption our labor was not severe and that of one year was exactly similar in almost every respect to that of the others without that endless variety that is to be observed in the common labor of the white people notwithstanding the indian women have all the fuel and bread to procure and the cooking to perform their task is probably not harder than that of white women who have those articles provided for them and their care certainly are not half as numerous nor as great in the summer season we planted tended and harvested our corn and generally had all our children with us but had no master to oversee or drive us so that we could work as leisurely as we pleased we had no plows on the ohio but performed the whole process of planting and hoeing with a small tool that resembled in some respects a hoe with a very short handle our cooking consisted in pounding our corn into stamp or hominy boiling the hominy making now and then a cake and baking it in the ashes and in boiling or roasting our venison as our cooking and eating utensils consisted of a hominy block and pestle a small kettle a knife or two and a few vessels of bark or wood it required but little time to keep them in order for use spinning weaving sewing stocking knitting and the like are arts which have never been practiced in the indian tribes generally after the revolutionary war i learned to sew so that i could make my own clothing after a poor fashion but the other domestic arts i have been wholly ignorant of the application of since my captivity in the season of hunting it was our business in addition to our cooking to bring home the game that was taken by the indians dress it and carefully preserve the edible meat and prepare or dress the skins our clothing was fastened together with strings of deerskin and tied on with the same in that manner we lived without any of those jealousies quarrels and revengeful battles between families and individuals which have been common in the indian tribes since the introduction of ardent spirits amongst them the use of ardent spirits amongst the indians and the attempts which have been made to civilize and christianize them by the white people has constantly made them worse and worse increased their vices and robbed them of many of their virtues and will ultimately produce their extermination i have seen in a number of instances the effects of education upon some of our indians who were taken when young from their families and placed at school before they had an opportunity to contract many indian habits and they're kept till they arrived at manhood but i have never seen one of those but what was an indian in every respect after he returned indians must and will be indians in spite of all the means that can be used for their cultivation in the sciences and arts one thing only marred my happiness while i lived with them in the ohio and that was the recollection that i had once had tender parents and a home that i loved aside from that consideration or if i have been taken in infancy i should have been contented in my situation notwithstanding all that has been said against the indians in consequence of their cruelties to their enemies cruelties that i have witnessed and have abundant proof of it is a fact that they are naturally kind tender and peaceable toward their friends and strictly honest and that those cruelties have been practiced only upon their enemies according to their idea of justice at the time we left what ish too it was impossible for me to suppress a sigh of regret on parting with those who had truly been my friends with those whom i have every reason to respect on account of a part of our family living at jennisha we thought it doubtful whether we should return directly from pittsburgh or go from thence on a visit to see them our company consisted of my husband my two indian brothers my little son and myself we embarked in a canoe that was large enough to contain ourselves and our effects and proceeded on our voyage up the river nothing remarkable occurred to us on our way till we arrived at the mouth of a creek which shenanji and my brother said was the outlet of sandusky lake where as they said two or three english traders of furs and skins had kept a trading house but a short time before though they were then absent we had passed the trading house but a short distance when we met three white men floating down the river with the appearance of having been recently murdered by the indians we supposed them to be the bodies of the traders whose store we had passed the same day shenanji being alarmed for fear of being apprehended as one of the murderers if he should go on resolved to put about immediately and we accordingly returned to where the traders had lived and there landed at the trading house we found a party of shawnee indians who had taken a young white man prisoner and had just begun to torture him for the sole purpose of gratifying their curiosity and exalting at his distress they at first made him stand up while they slowly paired his ears and split them into strings they then made a number of slight incisions in his face and then bound him upon the ground rolled him in the dirt and rubbed it in his wounds some of them at the same time whipping him with small rods the poor fellow cried for mercy and yelled most piteously the sight of his distress seemed too much for me to endure i begged at them to desist i entreated them with tears to release him at length they attended to my intercessions and set him at liberty he was shockingly disfigured bled profusely and appeared to be in great pain but as soon as he was liberated he made off in haste which was the last i saw of him we soon learned that the same party of shawnee's had but a few hours before massacred the three white traders whom we saw in the river and had plundered their store we however were not molested by them and after a short stay at that place moved up the creek about 40 miles to a shawnee town which the indians call gaga shaka which being interpreted signifies a mask or a false face the creek that we went up was called kanduski it was now summer and having terried a few days at gaga shaka we moved on up the creek to a place that was called yes kawana meaning in english open mouth as i have before observed the family to which i belonged was part of a tribe of senica indians who lived at that time at a place called jhanisha u from the name of the tribe that was situated on a river of the same name which is now called jennesy the word jhanisha signifies a shining clear or open place those of us who lived on the ohio had frequently received invitations from those at jhanisha u by one of my brothers who usually went and returned every season to come and live with them and my two sisters had been gone almost two years while we were at yish kawana my brother arrived there from jhanisha u and insisted so strenuously upon us going home as he called it with him that my two brothers concluded to go and to take me with them by this time the summer was gone and the time for harvesting corn had arrived my brothers for fear of the rainy season setting in early thought it best to set out immediately that we might have good traveling shenanji consented to have me go with my brothers but concluded to go down the river himself with some fur and skins which he had on hand spend the winter in hunting with his friends and come to me in the spring following that was accordingly agreed upon and he set out for weish to and my three brothers and myself with my little son on my back at the same time set out for jhanisha u we came on to upper sanduski to an indian town that we found deserted by its inhabitants in consequence of their having recently murdered some english traders who resided amongst them that town was owned and had been occupied by delaware indians who when they left it buried their provisions in the earth in order to preserve it from their enemies or to have a supply for themselves if they should chance to return my brothers understood the customs of the indians when they were obliged to fly from their enemies and suspecting that their corn at least must have been hid made diligent search and at length found a large quantity of it together with beans sugar and honey so carefully buried that it was completely dry and as good as when they left it as our stock of provisions was scanty we considered ourselves extremely fortunate in finding so seasonable a supply with so little trouble having caught two or three horses that we found there and furnished ourselves with a good store of food we traveled on till we came to the mouth of french creek where we hunted two days and from thence came on to kanawango creek where we were obliged to say seven or ten days in consequence of our horses having left us and straying into the woods the horses however were found and we again prepared to resume our journey during our stay at that place the rain fell fast and had raised the creek to such a height that it was seemingly impossible for us to cross it a number of times we ventured in but were compelled to return barely escaping with our lives at length we succeeded in swimming our horses and reaching the opposite shore though i but just escaped with my little boy from being drowned from sandusky the path that we traveled was crooked and obscure but was tolerably well understood by my oldest brother who had traveled at a number of times when going to and returning from the cherokee wars the fall by this time was considerably advanced and the rains attended with cold winds continued daily to increase the difficulties of traveling from kanawango we came to a place called by the indians and from that to unawangua which means an eddy not strong where the early frosts had destroyed the corn so that the indians were in danger of starving for the want of bread having rested ourselves two days at that place we came on to kanidia and stayed one day and then continued our march till we arrived at janishua janishua at that time was a large seneca town thickly inhabited lying on jennesy river opposite what is now called the free ferry adjoining fallbrook and about southwest of the present village of jennicio the county seat for the county of livingston in the state of new york those only who have traveled on foot the distance of five or six hundred miles through an almost pathless wilderness can form an idea of the fatigue and sufferings that i endured on that journey my clothing was thin and illy calculated to defend me from the continually drenching rains with which i was daily completely wet and at night with nothing but my wet blanket to cover me i had to sleep on the naked ground and generally without a shelter save such as nature had provided in addition to all that i had to carry my child then about nine months old every step of the journey on my back or in my arms and provide for his comfort and prevent his suffering as far as my poverty of means would admit such was the fatigue that i sometimes felt that i thought it impossible for me to go through and i would almost abandon the idea of even trying to proceed my brothers were attentive and at length as i have stated we reached our place of destination in good health and without having experienced a day's sickness from the time we left yishkawana we were kindly received by my indian mother and the other members of the family who appeared to make me welcome and my two sisters whom i had not seen in two years received me with every expression of love and friendship and that they really felt what they expressed i have never had the least reason to doubt the warmth of their feelings the kind reception which i met with and the continued favors that i received at their hands riveted my affection for them so strongly that i am constrained to believe that i love them as i should have loved my own sister had she lived and had i been brought up with her and of chapter four chapter five of the narrative of the life of mrs. mary jemisin this is a leber vox recording all leber vox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit leber vox.org a narrative of the life of mrs. mary jemisin by james e. sever chapter five when we arrived at jenisha the indians of that tribe were making active preparations for joining the french in order to assist them in retaking fort neaga as fort niagra was called in the seneca language from the british who had taken it from the french in the month preceding they marched off the next day after our arrival painted and a coup turned in all the habiliments of indian warfare determined on death or victory and joined the army in season to assist in accomplishing a plan that had been previously concerted for the destruction of a part of the british army the british feeling themselves secure in the possession of fort neaga and unwilling that their enemies should occupy any of the military posts in that quarter determined to take fort schloser line a few miles up the river from neaga which they expected to effect with but little loss accordingly a detachment of soldiers sufficiently numerous as was supposed was sent out to take it leaving a strong garrison in the fort and marched off while prepared to affect their object but on their way they were surrounded by the french and indians who lay in ambush to deceive them and were driven off the bank of the river into a place called the devil's hole together with their horses carriages artillery and everything pertaining to the army not a single man escaped being driven off and of the whole number one only was fortunate enough to escape with his life footnote for the particulars of that event see appendix number one our indians were absent but a few days and returned in triumph bringing with them two white prisoners and a number of oxen those were the first neat cattle that were ever brought to the genesee flats the next day after their return to genesha was set apart as a day of feasting and fulking at the expense of the lives of their two unfortunate prisoners on whom they proposed to glut their revenge and satisfy their love for retaliation upon their enemies my sister was anxious to attend the execution and to take me with her to witness the customs of the warriors as it was one of the highest kind of relics ever celebrated in their tribe and one that was not often attended with so much pomp and parade as it was expected that would be i felt a kind of anxiety to witness the scene having never attended an execution and yet i felt a kind of horrid dread that made my heart revolt and inclined me to step back rather than support the idea of advancing on the morning of the execution she made her intention of going to the frolic and taking me with her known to our mother who in the most feeling terms remonstrated against a step at once so rash and unbecoming the true dignity of our sex how my daughter said she addressing my sister how can you even think of attending the feast and seeing the unspeakable torments that those poor unfortunate prisoners must inevitably suffer from the hands of our warriors how can you stand and see them writhing in the warriors fire in all the agonies of a slow a lingering death how can you think of enduring the sound of their groanings and prayers to the great spirit for sudden deliverance from their enemies or from life and how can you think of conducting to that melancholy spot your poor sister decawamis meaning myself who has so lately been a prisoner who has lost her parents and brothers by the hands of the bloody warriors and who has felt all the horrors of the loss of her freedom in lonesome captivity oh how can you think of making her bleed at the wounds which now are but partially healed the recollection of her former troubles would deprive us of decawamis and she would depart to the fields of the blessed where fighting is ceased and the corn needs no tending where hunting is easy the forest delightful the summers are pleasant and the winters are mild oh think what's my daughter how soon you may have a brave brother made prisoner in battle and sacrificed to feast the ambition of the enemies of his kindran and leave us to mourn for the loss of a friend a son and a brother whose bow brought us venison and supplied us with blankets our task is quite easy at home and our business needs our attention with war we have nothing to do our husbands and brothers are proud to defend us and their hearts beat with ardor to meet our proud foes oh stay then my daughter let our warriors alone perform on their victims their customs of war this speech of our mother had the desired effect we stayed at home and attended to our domestic concerns the prisoners however were executed by having their heads taken off their bodies cut in pieces and shockingly mangled and then burnt to ashes they were burnt on the north side of fallbrook directly opposite the town which was on the south side sometime in the month of november 1759 i spent the winter comfortably and as agreeably as i could have expected in the absence of my kind husband spring at length appeared but shiniji was yet away summer came on but my husband had not found me fearful for boatings haunted my imagination yet i felt confident that his affection for me was so great that if he was alive he would follow me and i should again see him in the course of the summer however i received intelligence that soon after he left me at yishigawana he was taken sick and died at wish to this was a heavy and an unexpected blow i was now in my youthful days left a widow with one son and entirely dependent on myself for his and my support my mother and her family gave me all the consolation and their power and in a few months ne agree for rough and i became contented in a year or two after this according to my best recollection of the time the king of england offered a bounty to those who would bring in the prisoners that had been taken in the war to some military post where they might be redeemed and set at liberty john van size a dutchman who had frequently been at our place and was well acquainted with every prisoner at jeneshaw resolved to take me to nyagra that i might there receive my liberty and he the offered bounty i was notified of his intention but i was fully determined not to be redeemed at that time especially with his assistance i carefully watched his movements in order to avoid falling into his hands it so happened however that he saw me alone at work in a cornfield and thinking probably that he could secure me easily ran towards me in great haste i aspired him at some distance and while knowing the amount of his errand run from him with all the speed i was mistress of and never once stopped till i reached gardo footnote i have given this orthography because it corresponds with the popular pronunciation he gave up the chase and returned but i fearing that he might be lying and wait for me stay three days and three nights in an old cabin at gardo and then went back trembling at every step for fear of being apprehended i got home without difficulty and soon after the chiefs in council having learned the cause of my allotment gave orders that i should not be taken to any military post without my consent and that as it was my choice to stay i should live amongst them quietly and undisturbed but notwithstanding the will of the chiefs it was but a few days before the old king of our tribe told one of my indian brothers that i should be redeemed and he would take me to nyagra himself it replied to the old king my brother said that i should not be given up but that as it was my wish i should stay with the tribe as long as i was pleased to you upon this a serious quarrel ensued between them in which my brother frankly told him that sooner than i should be taken by force he would kill me with his own hands highly enraged at the old king my brother came to my sister's house where i resided and informed her of all that had passed respecting me and that if the old king should attempt to take me as he firmly believed he would he would immediately take my life and hazard the consequences he returned to the old king as soon as i came in my sister told me what she had just heard and what she expected without doubt would befall me full of pity and anxious for my preservation she then directed me to take my child and go into some high weeds at no great distance from the house and there hind myself and lay still to all was silent in the house for my brother she said would return in evening and let her know the final conclusion of the matter of which she promised to inform me in the following manner if i was to be killed she said she would bake a small cake and lay it at the door on the outside in a place that she then pointed out to me when all was silent in the house i was to creep softly to the door and if the cake could not be found in the place specified i was to go in but if the cake was there i was to take my child and go as fast as i possibly could to a large spring on the south side of samps creek a place that i had often seen and there wait till i should by some means hear from her alarm for my own safety i instantly followed her advice and went into the weeds where i lay in a state of the greatest anxiety till all was silent in the house when i crept to the door and there found to my greatest stress the little cake i knew my fate was fixed unless i could keep secreted till the storm was over and accordingly crept back to the weeds where my little Thomas lay took him on my back and laid my course for the spring as fast as my legs would carry me the Thomas was nearly three years old and very large and heavy i got to the spring early in the morning almost ever come with fatigue and at the same time fearing that i might be pursued and taken i felt my life in almost insupportable burden i sat down with my child at the spring and he and i made a breakfast of a little cake and water of the spring which i dipped and supped with the only implement which i possessed my hand in the morning after i fled as was expected the old king came to our house in search of me and to take me off but as i was not to be found he gave me up and went to Niagara with the prisoners he had already gotten to his possession as soon as the old king was fairly out of the way my sister told my brother where he could find me he immediately set out for the spring and found me about noon the first side of him made me tremble with the fear of death but when he came nearer so that i could discover his countenance tears of joy flowed down my cheeks and i felt such a kind of instant relief as no one can possibly experience unless when under the absolute sentence of death he receives an unlimited pardon we were both rejoiced at the event of the old king's project and after staying at the spring through the night set out together for home early in the morning when we got to our cornfield near the town my brother secreted me till he could go and ascertain how my case stood and finding that the old king was absent and that all was peaceable he returned to me and i went home joyfully not long after this my mother went to john's town on the mohawk river with five prisoners who were redeemed by sir william johnson and said at liberty when my son thomas was three or four years old i was married to an indian whose name was hiokatu commonly called gardo by whom i had four daughters and two sons i named my children principally after my relatives from whom i was pardoned by calling my girls jane nancy betsey and poly and the boys john and jesse jane died about 29 years ago in the month of august a little before the great council at big tree aged about 15 years my other daughters are yet living and have families end of chapter five chapter six of a narrative of the life of mrs mary jemison this is a libra vox recording all libra vox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit libra vox.org recording by magdalena cook a narrative of the life of mrs mary jemison by james e siever chapter six after the conclusion of the french war our tribe had nothing to trouble until the commencement of the revolution for 12 or 15 years the use of the implements of war was not known nor the war weep heard save on days of festivity when the achievements of former times were commemorated in a kind of mimic warfare in which the chiefs and warriors displayed their prowess and illustrated their former adroitness belaying the ambush gate surprising their enemies and performing many accurate maneuvers with a tom or hawk and scalping knife thereby preserving and handing to their children the theory of indian warfare during that period they also pertenaciously observed the religious rights of their progenitors by attending with the most scrupulous exactness and a great degree of enthusiasm to the sacrifices at particular times to a piece of anger of the evil deity or to excite the commiseration and friendship of the great good spirit whom they adored with reverence as the author governor supporter and disposer of every good thing of which they participated they also practiced in various athletic games such as running wrestling leaping and playing ball with a view that their bodies might be more supple or rather that they might not become innovated and that they might be enabled to make a proper selection of chiefs for the councils of the nation and leaders for war while the indians were thus engaged in their round of traditionary performances with the addition of hunting their women attended to agriculture their families and a few domestic concerns of small consequence and attended with but little labor no people can live more happy than the indians did in times of peace before the introduction of spiritual liquors amongst them their lives were a continual round of pleasures their wants were few and easily satisfied and their cares were only for today the bounds of the calculations for future comfort not extending to the incalculable uncertainties of tomorrow if peace ever dwelt with men it was in former times in the recesses from war amongst what are now termed barbarians the moral character of the indians was if i may be allowed the expression uncontaminated their fidelity was perfect and became proverbial they were strictly honest they despised deception and falsehood and chastity was held in high veneration and a violation of it was considered sacrilege they were tempera in their desires modra in their passions and candid and honourable in the expression of their sentiments on every subject of importance thus at peace amongst themselves and with the neighbouring whites though there were none at that time very near our indians lived quietly and peaceably at home till a little before the breaking out of the revolutionary war when they were sent for together with the chiefs and members of the six nations generally by the people of the states to go to the german flats and there hold a general council in order that the people of the states might ascertain in good season who they should esteem and treat as enemies and who as friends in the great war which would then upon the point of breaking out between them and the king of england our indians obeyed the call and the council was holding at which the pipe of peace was smoked and a treaty made in which the six nations solemnly agreed that if a war should eventually break out they would not take up arms on either side but that they would observe a strict neutrality with that the people of the states were satisfied as they had not asked their assistance nor did not wish it the indians returned to their homes well pleased that they could live on neutral ground surrounded by the dinner war without being engaged in it about a year passed off and we as usual were enjoying ourselves in the employments of peaceable times when a messenger arrived from the british commissioners requesting all the indians of our tribe to attend a general council which was soon to be held at oswego the council convened and being opened the british commissioners informed the chiefs that the object of calling a council of the six nations was to engage their assistance in subduing the rebels the people of the states who had risen up against the good king their master and were about to rob him of a great part of his possessions and wealth and added that they would amply reward them for all their services the chiefs then arose and informed the commissioners of the nature and extent of the treaty which they had entered into with the people of the states the year before and that they should not violate it by taking up the hatchet against them the commissioners continued their entreaties without success till they addressed the avarice by telling our people that the people of the states were few in number and easily subdued and that on the account of their disobedience to the king they justly merited all the punishment that it was possible for white men and indians to inflict upon them and added that the king was rich and powerful both in money and subjects that his run was as plenty as the water in the lake ontario that his men were as numerous as the sands upon the lake shore and that the indians if they would assist in the war and persevere in the friendship to the king till it was closed should never want for money or goods upon this the chiefs concluded a treaty with the British commissioners in which they agreed to take up arms against the rebels and continue in the service of his majesty till they were subdued in consideration of certain conditions which were stipulated in the treaty to be performed by the British government and its agents as soon as the treaty was finished the commissioners made a present to each indian of a suit of clothes a brass kettle a gun and tomahawk a sculpting knife a quantity of powder and lead a piece of gold and promised a bounty on every sculpt that should be brought in thus richly clad and equipped they returned home after an absence of about two weeks full of the fire of war and anxious to encounter their enemies many of the kettles which the indians received at that time are now in use on their genocide flats hired to commit depredations upon the whites who had given them no offence they waited impatiently to commence their labor till some time in the spring of 1776 when a convenient opportunity offered for them to make an attack at that time a party of our indians were at cortiga who shot a man that was looking after his horse for the sole purpose as i was informed by my indian brother who was present of commencing hostilities in may following our indians were in their first battle with the americans but at what place i am unable to determine while they were absent at that time my daughter nancy was born the same year at cherry valley our indians took a woman and her three daughters prisoners and brought them on leaving one at kananda gua one at honeyoy one at catarorgas and one the woman at little bedstown where i resided the woman told me that she and her daughters might have escaped but they expected the british army only and therefore made no effort her husband and sons got away sometime having elapsed they were redeemed at fort niagara by colonel butler who clothed them well and sent them home in the same expedition joseph smith was taken prisoner at or near cherry valley brought to jennesy and detained till after the revolutionary war he was then liberated and the indians made him a present in company with her ratio jones of six thousand acres of land lying in the present town of lee cester in the county of livingston one of the girls just mentioned was married to a british officer at fort niagara by the name of johnson who at the time she was taken took a gold ring from her finger without any compliments or ceremonies when he saw her at niagara he recognized her features restored the ring that he had so impolitely borrowed and courted and married her previous to the battle at fort stanwicks the british sent for the indians to come and see them whip the rebels and at the same time stated that they did not wish to have them fight but wanted to have them just sit down smoke their pipes and look on our indians went to a man but contrary to their expectation instead of smoking and looking on they were obliged to fight for their lives and in the end of the battle were completely beaten with a great loss and killed and wounded our indians alone had 36 killed and a great number wounded our town exhibited a scene of real sorrow and distress when our warriors returned and recounted their misfortunes and stated the real loss they had sustained in the engagement the morning was excessive and was expressed by the most awful yells shrieks and howlings and by inimitable gesticulations during the revolution my house was the home of kernels butler and brant whenever they chance to come into our neighborhood as they passed to and from fort niagara which was the seat of their military operations many and many a night i have pounded sam for them from sunset till sunrise and furnished them with necessary provisions and clean clothing for their journey end of chapter six