Captain Smith first saw the Susquehanna Indians, and he is the one explorer who has given us a fine account of the country he visited and the people he met.
Twelve months after Captain Smith’s visit to the head of the Chesapeake, Henry Hudson, in the “Half Moon,” sailed along the Atlantic Coast and discovered the existence of the Delaware Bay, on August 28, 1609.
But neither Captain John Smith nor Henry Hudson entered Pennsylvania. They approached or reached the open doorway, but it is not certain either came inside. The first actual visit of a white man was not made until six years after Hudson’s call at the Capes.
The first exploration of the Susquehanna River for its entire length was made in the fall, winter and spring of 1615–16 by Etienne (Stephen) Brulé, a Frenchman in the employ of Samuel Champlain, the first Governor of New France. He entered Pennsylvania via the North Branch the latter part of October, 1615.
A narrative of Brulé's explorations is given by John G. Shea and is to the effect that Brulé crossed from Lake Ontario to the headwaters of the Susquehanna, descended the North Branch, and furnished the Jesuit Fathers with the earliest information we have of the aborigines of that section.
The glowing description which Brulé gave of these Neuters led Father de la Roche Daillon to visit them. Brulé must have been among these Indians as early as 1610, and perhaps earlier. He was one of the first Europeans ever to visit the Huron country and acquire a knowledge of their language.
Brulé was a dauntless woodsman, interpreter and guide and seems to have possessed the requisite quantity of genuine bravado to have done the things with which he is credited.
September 8, 1615, when Champlain was preparing to join the Huron in their expedition against their ancient enemies, the Iroquois, Brulé set out with a party of twelve Huron from Upper Canada for the town of Carantouan on the Susquehanna, to obtain their co-operation against the common enemy. The Indians formed part of the confederacy known later as the Andastes.
Brulé, with his little band of Huron, crossed from Lake Ontario to the Susquehanna, defeated on the way a war-party of Iroquois and entered Carantouan in triumph.
This was that tribe’s principal town and was palisaded. From this town they could send out 800 warriors, which would indicate a total population of 4000 souls. Brulé obtained here a force of 500 Carantouan, and they set out to join Champlain and the Huron; but as they proceeded slowly, they reached the Iroquoian town only to find that Champlain had attacked it with his force, had failed, had himself been wounded, and had returned to Canada.