1 Birth of the Tribal Church

Native nations on the eastern seaboard were devastated by the fur trade. The presence of whites brought about deadlier warfare, diseases like measles and smallpox to which Indians had no immunity and, possibly the most damaging thing of all: firewater or alcohol. By the 1730s the Mohican nation, once numbering an estimated 10,000, were greatly diminished in population, and their old hunting and gathering economy could no longer support them, causing their people to scatter and live in smaller villages. While some of the Mohicans had been living as far west as the Ohio River valley since the 1600s, others had migrated a shorter distance to the Housatonic River, east of the Hudson River. In 1734 Konkapot and Umpachenee, the leaders of the two Mohican villages on the Housatonic, were approached by two white ministers with the opportunity of receiving a Christian mission. Although Konkapot was for the mission and Umpachenee was passively against it, they explained that it was the kind of decision that needed to be

2 decided in council. The council of the two villages on the Housatonic lasted four days in July of 1734. Although a number of plusses and minuses of accepting a Christian mission were no doubt discussed and debated in those four days, the winning argument of the council - paraphrased here into English - was what might be called an economic one: *S+ince my remembrance, there were ten Indians where there now is one. But the Christians greatly increase and multiply and spread over the land. Let us therefore leave our former courses and become Christians. The British themselves attributed their worldly successes to their God. If the British were the most powerful people maybe learning their religion would put an end to the Indians decline. And so the two villages decided to accept a Christian missionary and schoolteacher. By that time the Mohicans had already lost much of their culture. Without a written language, Mohican rituals and beliefs had been passed along orally from one generation to the next. As a result, the high death rates brought on by the fur trade were enough to largely derail the passing on of cultural information in a dramatically changed world. Now the Mohicans on the Housatonic held a variety

3 of religious beliefs, at least some of which could be traced back to their contact with the Dutch and later the British. The two ministers that had approached Konkapot and Umpachenee were part of the Boston-based Commissioners of Indian Affairs that did much of the legwork for a London-based philanthropic society known as The New England Company. The commissioners picked a twenty-four year-old Yale graduate named John Sergeant to be the first missionary on the Housatonic. Sergeant first arrived in October 1734 along with one of the commissioners, Rev. Nehemiah Bull. They met the Indians halfway between the two villages in what is now Great Barrington, Massachusetts. Sergeant gave a short talk on the Christian religion which was interpreted by Poohpoonuc, an Indian who had previously lived among whites. He was also known as Ebenezer. After interpreting Sergeants talk to his own people, Ebenezer Poopoonuc asked to be baptized. Calvinists did not take baptism lightly at that time; it wasnt performed on everybody who asked for it. However, Poopoonuc was able to convince Rev. Bull that he understood the major points of the Christian religion and was determined to pursue a Christian path. Poopoonuc was baptized by Rev. Bull.

4 Rev. Bull stayed among the Indians for a few more days and Sergeant stayed until December when his work as a tutor back at Yale required him to return. Just a few days before Sergeant left, some Dutch traders supplied some of the Housatonic Mohicans with enough rum for a three-day binge. During those three days, the traders used their influence to try and talk the Indians into changing their minds about the budding Christian mission. However, neither Konkapot nor Umpachenee participated in the binge and when Sergeant discussed the incident with them the three men agreed that a successful mission would prevent the traders from taking advantage of the Indians. Being regional leaders, Konkapot and Umpachenee knew that the council they held in 1734 would not be the last word on Christianity. If the mission was to continue, it would have to be approved by national leaders, including the chief sachem, Mtohksin. So Umpachenee hosted a national council of two hundred Mohicans in February 1735. The council featured a sermon by the Rev. Stephen Williams and more debate over the pros and cons of accepting a mission. Their verdict was passed along orally for nearly seventy years at which time Hendrick Aupaumut wrote that the council

5 decided the Christian gospel should be preached in one certain village and let every man and woman go to hear it and embrace it if they think best. Certainly there were still some who didnt welcome the new mission. A rumor was circulating that plans were being made to poison Konkapot and Umpachenee. Several Indians, including most of Umachenees family became very sick either during or soon after the council was held. Umpachenees brother-in-law and another man ultimately died from the sickness. Whether they were poisoned by those who resisted the mission or died of natural causes is not knowable, but both requested and received Christian burials (Frazier, 28-30). One measurement of approval for the mission was the attendance of forty-three Housatonic Mohicans at John Sergeants ordination ceremony in Deerfield. The event took place in August of 1735. After the sermon and the ceremonial laying on of hands the presiding minister turned to the Housatonics who were sitting together in a place of honor and, through an interpreter, asked them to indicate if

6 they would receive Sergeant as their missionary. All fortythree of them rose to their feet. Calvinist church leaders had long believed that Indians had to become civilized before they could become Christianized. Given this ethnocentric mindset and a track record of mixed results, a new arrangement in mission work was first proposed by Massachusetts Governor Jonathan Belcher in 1730. The idea was to create a mission town which included not only a missionary, a teacher, and the Indians themselves, but also tradesmen and their families to provide apprenticeships and promote civilized Christian living. John Sergeant was also in favor of this plan for an integrated Indian Town. Although Sergeant and others had good intentions, by opening the door to further white settlement, they were putting the community at risk of becoming a place where Indians could be taken advantage of; there will be more about that later. The most enthusiastic mission participants from its very start included Umpachenees wife who was baptized as Hannah and was eager to learn to read. Other leaders in the tribes acceptance of Christianity were Hannahs sister, and

7 Konkapots wife, who was baptized as Mary. Konkapot himself, baptized as John, was also, of course, one of the missions early leaders. Unfortunately, Hannah Umpachenee and Mary Konkapot died of tuberculosis in 1740 and 1741 respectively (Frazier, 53). The deaths of the two women were big setbacks, of course, but the mission continued to make progress. By 1737 John Sergeant was preaching his sermons in the Mohican language. In the Mohicans of Stockbridge, Patrick Frazier observed that in the missions early years many Indians came from near and far to listen to John Sergeant and witness the new Indian life (37). He added that while some came to listen for a while, others became permanent residents of the community. The town of Stockbridge was incorporated in 1739. Obviously, the fact that the Commissioners of Indian Affairs gave the mission town an English name reflected their ethnocentrism or racism. While we can imagine that the name itself was at least somewhat of an issue, the commissioners also set Stockbridge up to be laid out and governed as an English town. It wasnt enough for the

8 Indians to learn to read the Bible and learn to farm like Europeans, the commissioners felt that the process of civilizing the Indians should include imposing things like their local political system as well. Nevertheless, this didnt mean that the Mohican political system ceased to exist. One of the Mohicans that moved to Stockbridge in the 1740s was Ben Kokhkewaunaunt or King Ben, the chief sachem. This made Stockbridge the main council fire, or the capital city of the Mohican nation. In addition to of the activity of the mission, Stockbridge was now also a political or diplomatic center for the Mohicans and other Native nations (Frazier, 55). A large gathering of area tribes was held in January of 1740 in Stockbridge. They agreed that Indians should not get unnecessarily dragged into another war between the French and the British. Runners were then sent out with wampum belts and a message that a neutrality pact had been made. King Georges War was declared in 1744 and the Stockbridge Mohicans managed to stay out of it until somebody burned down a barn within the limits of the town in December of 1745. It prompted the tribe to send a war

9 belt to other villages, declaring war against the French. The French managed to burn a fort about forty miles from Stockbridge and take prisoners. However, Britain and France made peace before an operation could be organized to retaliate (Frazier, 70, 76-78). By 1744 the Stockbridge Mohicans were succeeding in making the transition to New England ways as the following quote from Patrick Frazier illustrates: Stockbridge had a gristmill, a sawmill, and the beginnings of new roads. Fruit trees were blooming, corn, beans, oats, and other grains were growing, cattle, sheep and hogs were grazing and rail fences were being built. Indians were becoming tithingmen, surveyors, constables and hog reeves Konkapot had a barn, its roof shingled in colonial fashion Several young women were learning to sew and make cloth shirts and other garments. Some Indians were able to read their Bibles and catechisms, and a few had learned to write legibly (69-70).

But all was not well in the mission town. It was gradually becoming something different than it was intended to be. The Indians were losing land on account of 1)

10 confusion (sloppy surveying and vague agreements which, when contested, always seemed to go to the favor of whites), 2) conflicts of interest (the commissioners and mission employees were given good pieces of land) and 3) out-and-out dishonesty. Ephraim Williams brought his family to town before it was even called Stockbridge. His daughter Abigails marriage to John Sergeant in 1739 appears to have put some distance between the minister and his congregation. But the real problem with Ephraim Williams and at least some of his family was that they were much more concerned about building up treasures on earth instead of building up spiritual treasures. The bulk of the landgrabbing and the worst times for the Indians at Stockbridge, Massachusetts, didnt get underway until 1759, however (Frazier and Miles). In the summer of 1749 John Sergeant became dreadfully sick. Despite the prayers and fasting of his Indian congregation, the thirty-nine year-old missionary died after suffering for almost three weeks. Although, some (or most) of his writings would not come off as politically correct today, but as a whole, the Indians appreciated his work and deeply mourned his death. In his career he had baptized 182 Indians

11 and although some of them had already died from diseases that were still prevalent, Sergeant had brought scattered and suffering Mohican remnants together. As Calvinism was taking hold in Stockbridge, other Mohican villages in the area had received Moravian missionaries. In April, 1750 the Stockbridge Mohicans sent a request to the village of Pachgatgoch (Wheeler, 293, note 2). The idea apparently was to replace the deceased John Sergeant with a Moravian missionary. But, of course, the New England Company in London and their Commissioners of Indian Affairs in Boston made sure that the Stockbridge mission kept its Calvinist affiliation. After a series of guest preachers, the renowned Puritan theologian Jonathan Edwards was finally tapped for the missionary post in 1751. The conventional wisdom on Edwards is that he was the stereotypical fire and brimstone preacher. The title of his most famous sermon, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God, would appear to back up that view. Historian Rachel Wheeler compared the sermons Jonathan Edwards delivered to whites with the sermons he preached to the Stockbridge Indians. She observed that his

12 sermons to the whites spoke of an arbitrary, indifferent, and wrathful God, while his sermons to the Indians were about the great desire of Christ to save them (p.208). Although Edwards did not learn the Mohican language well enough to preach in it, his biographer, George Marsden (393) noted that his sermons to the Indians translated well because they were practical and made use of narratives and plain, vivid metaphors. The other criticism Edwards has received is that he spent way too much time in his office writing. While this is still a valid criticism, some of the time in his office was spent writing letters on behalf of his Indian converts. After John Sergeant died there was something like a feud among the whites at Stockbridge. It pitted the Williams family against some of the people who tended to support the Indians and the goals of the mission. The larger Williams family was powerful in the colony of Massachusetts. They had been instrumental in getting Jonathan Edwards dismissed from his congregation prior to coming to Stockbridge. They tried unsuccessfully, of course to prevent him from being named as John Sergeants successor as missionary, and the conflict didnt let up after Edwards came to town. The second missionary at Stockbridge was up

13 against white settlers who were interested in promoting segregation and pursuing secular goals. That group was led by Ephraim Williams, his son Elijah, and Colonel Joseph Dwight, who civil officials managed to appoint as the Indian agent. Having people like John Sergeant, Jonathan Edwards and Timothy Woodbridge around to advocate for the Indians was one of two factors that prevented what Lion Miles calls the great land grab from getting underway until 1759. The other reason is that after the French and Indian War ended, western Massachusetts became safe from the attacks of the French and their Native allies, bringing a deluge of white settlers into the area (Miles, 50-56). Just as the mission town didnt put an end to measles or smallpox, it also didnt put an end to warfare. Stockbridge, Massachusetts happened to be strategically located for the British in their wars against the French. Stockbridge Mohican warriors saw some action in King Georges War in the late 1740s. They were a bigger part of the last of the wars between the then world powers. What we call the French and Indian War in America was the first global war. That war brought the refugee remnant of the Wapping nation 227 in all - to Stockbridge, Massachusetts.

14 It wasnt the first time that the Stockbridge Indians took nonMohicans into their community and it wouldnt be the last, either. Nevertheless, the amalgamated tribe continued to identify with the Mohican name. In the summer of 1754 a hunting party of Stockbridge Mohicans witnessed a large group of Indians burning buildings and killing cattle. They headed home immediately to warn their white neighbors. A few days later some French-allied Indians murdered some whites in and around Stockbridge. Area settlers then built a fortification around Rev. Edwards house. Edwards noted that some whites were foolishly suspecting the local Indians of the murders but he knew better (they were vengeance killings for the Abenakis). The French and Indian War was on (Frazier, 107-109). Two companies, made up of an estimated one hundred Mohicans served in the French and Indian War. Among them Jacob Cheeksaunkun, Jacob Naunaphtaunk, and a son of King Ben, Solomon Uhhaunauwaunmut ultimately rose to the rank of captain in the British army. In the Mohicans of Stockbridge, Patrick Frazier (125126) tells the remarkable story of one Stockbridge Mohican

15 warrior who, along with a Mohegan was taken prisoner near Quebec and sold into slavery. The two men were taken to Haiti where they were made to do hard labor. However, they met a friendly Spaniard who advised them to run up to the other side of the island - to the Dominican Republics port city of Monte Cristi. After two weeks of traveling in the bush, the two Indian made it to Monte Cristi where an English ship brought them back to the coast of Connecticut. Rev. Stephen West succeeded Jonathan Edwards, becoming the third missionary in 1759. Like Edwards, he started with the same hardline Calvinist or Puritan bent, but unlike his predecessor, West never had enough compassion to come to see the Indians in a different light. The focus remained on sin and unworthiness. While Wests term as missionary lasted about as long as John Sergeants, he baptized less than half as many Indians. It was one thing that he excommunicated several prominent Indians for drunkenness, adultery, and other acts. More tellingly, however, is that those who were banned from Wests church didnt get reinstated. West admitted that as more whites moved into town the Indians were being crowded out of their seats in church. He complained that they were using it

16 as an excuse to not attend worship services. Of course the Indians were only being polite, their real reason for not attending services had more to do with the ministers shortcomings than anything else. At some point West wondered if it was dishonest for him to accept the half of his salary that was paid by the New England Company on behalf of the Indians. Before he took action, however, the Commissioners of Indian Affairs in Boston dismissed him. Fortunately for West, however, the white residents of Stockbridge eventually agreed to pay his full salary (Frazier, 189-190). [Jacob Cheeksaunkun petitioned the town to allow Indians to sell their land+ John Sergeant Jr. had been too young to have any memory of his father. He grew up among the Indians and spoke Mohican well. He began as teacher of the mission school in 1767 or 1768 at the age of nineteen (Kellaway, and Frazier). The younger Sergeants beliefs were not considered orthodox enough for ordination as a Calvinist minister. However, given the wars, the diseases, the ever-smaller landholdings and continued problems with firewater, the

17 tribal church had hit a low point by 1773. [waiting for Literary Diary of Ezra Stiles.] Solomon Uhhaunawaunmut was elected chief sachem in 1771 after his father King Ben said to be 94 years old - resigned his post. Five years earlier, King Solomon as he was sometimes called, had sailed to England along with Jacob Cheeksaunkun, John Naunauphtaunk, and the Wapping chief Daniel Nimham to argue a land claim. The problem was that the land was unfairly taken by men who were part of the British judicial system that heard the case. Hopes of recovering about 200,000 acres in that claim was perhaps the Stockbridges biggest motivation for officially and completely siding with the thirteen colonies in the Revolutionary War. But there were also other reasons; one being that the tribe had lost many men fighting for the British in the previous war and never received the pay they were entitled to (1773 letter from T. Woodbridge to Governor Tyron /cited in Frazier?). So in the first two years of the Revolution the Stockbridges were the colonists only Native allies, something that King Solomon announced in an official statement to the Americans at the Treaty of Albany in 1775:

18 Wherever you go we will be by your side. Our bones shall lay with yours. We are determined never to be at peace with the Red coats while they are at variance with you. If we are conquered our Lands go with yours, but if we are victorious we hope you will help us to recover our just rights (quoted in Calloway, 1995, 94). Those were not idle words; Stockbridge Indians, including Solomons young son, Hendrick Aupaumut, fought bravely in every major campaign in the eastern theater of the American Revolution between 1775 and 1778, including battles such as Lexington, Bunker Hill, White Plains and Monmouth (Walling, 7). According to oral tradition it was right after the battle of White Plains when Hendrick Aupaumut was given a captains sword by General George Washington. From that point on he was often known simply as Captain Hendrick. In another battle, the British Lieutenant Simcoe recorded in his journal that the Stockbridge Indians fought most gallantly and pulled more than one of the cavalry from their horses (quoted in Walling, 20). Also a Hessian officer looking over the dead bodies on the field observed that the Indians strong, well-built and healthy bodies were strikingly distinguished among the Europeans and one could see by

19 their faces that they perished with resolution (Miles 1999, quotes Tustin, 145). The new United States government took over the land of tribes that had sided with the British with the justification that they had fought against the colonies during the war. The same government also claimed they would protect the land of those Indians who had been their allies. But it was not so for the Stockbridge Mohicans. With the possible exception of blankets that were given to the widows of veterans, the tribe was still waiting for some kind of compensation for their losses in 1785. The Indians would have been far better served if the missions ethnocentric goals of turning hunters and warriors into farmers had been pursued on a constant, steady basis. Instead, an economy in which the main ingredients included warfare and land sales proved to be unsustainable. In the period of over fifty years in the mission town the Stockbridges had learned some important things. Unfortunately, one of the things they learned was that white people didnt make good neighbors for Indians.

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