Thus the Five Nations made peace with the French at Montreal. At the very same time, at Albany,16 they gave the English a title to the lake regions. In the year 1686, by Denonville's orders, Du Luth, with a party of coureurs de bois, established a French outpost on the strait (Detroit) between Lakes Huron and Erie,17 his object being to prevent the fur trade of the upper lakes passing down that way to the Iroquois country, and thence to the English market at Albany. The post was not maintained; but some years afterwards a more permanent occupation took place. Frontenac had died; but he left behind him men trained in his school, keen on a forward policy, on holding in the interests of France and in their own the passes of the West. Such a man was La Mothe Cadillac, who in 1694 had been sent to take command at Michillimackinac. He urged upon the French Government the importance of controlling the outlet from Lake Huron to Lake Erie, and, having obtained their consent, was the founder of the city of Detroit. He began the work in July, 1701, but before his expedition actually reached the place, the Five Nations took alarm, recognizing that Detroit, like Fort Frontenac, would limit their range and endanger their power.
16 The great meeting at Montreal was held on Aug. 4, 1701. The deed of cession referred to in the text was dated July 19, 1701.
17 See [above].
| The Iroquois cede their hunting-grounds to the King of England. |
They sent representatives of all their nations to Albany, and there, on July 19, 1701, ceded to the King of England their 'beaver hunting-ground,' retaining for themselves the right of free hunting. The deed was of the most formal character, attested by the totem marks of all the Five Nations.18 It is an interesting document, setting forth that the Iroquois had already subjected themselves and their lands 'on this side of Cataraqui (Ontario) lake wholly to the Crown of England,' and conveying to the King a wide area to the north of the lake, which the Five Nations claimed as their hunting-ground in right of conquest. The tract was estimated at 800 miles in length by 400 in breadth, extending on the north to Lake Superior, on the west to Chicago, and it specifically included Detroit,19 the French designs on which were stated as the reason for making the cession. A white man's hand must have drawn the deed. It gave away the Iroquois entirely. Hitherto they had stubbornly rejected any English claim to sovereignty. Brother the Governor of New York had been, but not father, and no allegiance had been offered to the King of England; but in the conveyance William III figured as 'the great lord and master' of the Five Nations, and on paper the acknowledgement of British sovereignty was complete.
18 A certified copy in manuscript sent home at the time may be seen at the Record Office, and a printed copy is included in the New York documents.
19 Spoken of in the deed in one place as 'Tiengsachrondio alias Fort de Tret.'
It was a piece of parchment only, and as such and no more the Iroquois probably regarded it; but it embodied a small element of fact. These hardheaded, hardhanded Indians were gradually being worn down by the white men on either side, owing such measure of independence as they still retained not so much to their own fighting strength as to the constant enmity between Great Britain and France. When war broke out again, after Queen Anne's accession, they remained for the most part neutral; what they had claimed and conveyed as their hunting-ground passed more and more under French control, while, as the result of Marlborough's victories on the other side of the Atlantic, their own land and its cantons was awarded to Great Britain in 1713 by the Treaty of Utrecht.20
20 Clause xv of the Treaty of Utrecht ran as follows: 'The subjects of France inhabiting Canada, and others, shall hereafter give no hinderance or molestation to the Five Nations or Cantons of Indians subject to the dominion of Great Britain nor to the other natives of America who are friends to the same.'