Detained in this castle by a heavy fall of rain which broke up the streams—the "January thaw" of 1635 in the Mohawk Valley—Van Curler resumed his journey on the 20th, and "after marching a mile" (Dutch), came to Canajohare Creek which he was obliged to ford. After crossing and walking "half a mile" (Dutch), he came to what he called the "Third Castle of the name of Sohanidisse," later written by him Rohanadisse, and by Van der Donck Schanatisse, suggesting the name of the hill on which it stood, which Van Curler described as "very high." It contained "thirty-two houses like the others"; was not palisaded. The very high hill, and the flat lands which he referred to, remain.
On the 21st, before reaching the second stream which he noted later as having crossed, he wrote that "half a mile" west of Canajohare Creek he came to a village of "nine houses of the name of Osquage," which gave name to the stream now known as the Otsquage, which he also called Okquage and Okwahohage, "Wolves"—a village of the Wolf tribe. On the 23d he forded the Otsquage, and after going "half a mile" (Dutch) west of that stream, came "to a village named Cawaoge." It had fourteen houses and stood "on a very high hill." On his return trip he wrote the name Nawaoga; on old maps it is Canawadage, and has since 1635 been known as the Nowadage or Fort Plain Creek. He did not cross this stream, but after stopping at the village for a short time moved on "by land," presumably inland either north or south, and "going another mile" came to the "Fourth Castle," which he called Tenotoge and Tenotohage, and Father Jogues called Te-ouonte-ogén, and also "the furthest castle." It was no doubt the principal castle of the Wolf tribe, strongly palisaded to defend the western approach to the seat of the nation, as was Onekagoncka to guard the east. It was, he wrote, composed of fifty-five houses like the others. It stood in a valley evidently, probably on the bank of the creek, as he wrote that the stream (Otsquaga) which he had crossed in the morning "ran past" the castle; that he saw on the opposite (east) "bank" of the stream "a good many houses filled with corn and beans," and also extensive flat lands. Further than this topographical description the location of the castle cannot be determined. [FN-10] Van Curler's miles to the castle from Onekagonka, as nearly as can be counted from his Journal, were about six Dutch or about twenty-one English, or as General Clark counted Dutch miles, about eighteen English. As Van Curler traveled "on the ice" for the most considerable part of the way from Onekagoncka, and followed necessarily the bend in the river and diverged at times from the shore line, exact computation of his miles cannot be made. General Clark located the castle at Spraker's Basin, thirteen miles by rail west of Aurie's Creek. Van Curler located it on the west side of Otsquage Creek. On Simeon DeWitt's map of survey of patents in 1790 (Doc. Hist. N. Y., i, 420), the direct line from the west side of the mouth of Otsquage Creek to the west side of the mouth of Aurie's Creek is fifteen and three-tenths miles; following the bend in the Mohawk, as Van Curler did, it is seventeen and one-half miles. Granting that the lithographic reproduction of the map may vary from the original, it nevertheless shows conclusively that Onekagoncka must have been located at or near Aurie's Creek, The suggestion that it was located on a hill on the east side of Schohare Creek is untenable, as is also the suggestion that it was at Klein, eight miles east of Schohare Creek. There may have been villages at a later date at the places suggested, but never one of the ancient castles. Counted from the east or from the west there is no location that meets Van Curler's miles, or Father Jogues' "leagues," so certainly as does Aurie's Creek. (See Oghracke.)
In addition to the locations of the ancient castles, Van Curler's notes supply interesting evidence of the strength of the Mohawks when the Dutch first met them, which was then at its highest known point in number and in the number of their settlements, namely: Two hundred and twenty-five "long houses" in castles and villages, without including villages on the lower Mohawk "where the ice drifted fast," which he passed without particular note, and those in villages or settlements which he did not see. Two hundred and twenty-five houses were capable of holding and no doubt did hold a very large number of people, packed as they were packed. Father Pierron reported, in 1669, after the French invasion of 1666, that he visited every week "six large villages, covering seven and one-half leagues distance," around Caughnawaga where he was stationed. In almost constant wars with the French, and with the Hurons and other Indian tribes as allies of the French, their number had dwindled to an estimate of eighty warriors in 1735. The story of their greatness and of their decay is of the deepest interest. No student of American history can dispense with its perusal and be well-informed in the events of the pioneer era.
[FN-1] Arent Van Curler, in 1635, in his "Journal of a Visit to the Seneca Country," wrote: "I was shown a parcel of flint-stones with which they make a fire when in the forest. These stones would do very well for flint-lock guns."
Roger Williams wrote of the Narraganset Indians in 1643: "I have seen a native go into the woods with his hatchet, carrying a basket of corn with him, and stones to strike a fire." Father Le June wrote, in 1634: "They strike together two metallic stones, just as we do with a piece of flint and iron or steel. . . . That is how they light their fire." The "Metallic stones" spoken of are presumed, by some writers, to have been iron pyrites, as they may have been in some cases, but the national emblem was the flint.
[FN-2] "Sankhicani, the Mohawk's, from Sankhican, a gun-lock." (Heckewelder.) The name appears first on the Carte Figurative of 1614-16, in application to the Indians of northern New Jersey (Delawares), who were, by some writers, called "The Fire-workers." They seem to have manufactured stone implements by the application of fire. Presumably they were "Fire-strikers" as well as the Mohawks. Certainly they were not Mohawks. Were the Mohawks the discoverers of the fire-striking properties of the flint?
[FN-3] State Historian Hastings writes me: "The map of which you inquire, appeared originally in a pamphlet published at Middleburgh, Holland, at the Hague, 1666. It was first reproduced by the late Hon. Henry C. Murphy in his translation of the 'Vertoogh van Nieu Nederland,' etc. His reproduction gives Canagere, as the name of the second castle, and Caneray as the name of the first, precisely as they appear in order in our reproduction in our Third Report."
[FN-4] Oneongoure is a form of the name in Colonial History. In the standard translation of Jesuit Relations it is Oneugiouré. Oneon is a clerical error. The letters u and ou represent a sound produced by the Indian in the throat without motion of the lips. Bruyas wrote it 8{sic ȣ?}; it is now read w-Onew. Adding an a, we have very nearly M. Cuoq's Ohnawah, "current," "swift river"; with suffix gowa, "great," the reference being to the great rapids near which the castle was located. The omission of the locative participle shows that it was not "at" or "on" the great rapids.
[FN-5] "Their three castles destroyed and themselves dispersed." (Col. Hist. N. Y., iv, 20, 22.) The castles referred to Caughnawaga, Canagora, and Tiononteogen. A castle on the south side of the Mohawk, said to have been about two miles inland, escaped. Presumably it was the village of the Beaver family, but we have nothing further concerning it. The attack was made on the night of Feb. 16, 1693. The warriors of the first two castles were absent, and the few old men and the women made little resistance. At the third, the warriors fought bravely but unsuccessfully. The three castles were burned; that at Caughnawaga was given to the flames on the morning of February 20, 1693.