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James E. Seaver >> A Narrative of the Life of Mrs. Mary Jemison
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A NARRATIVE OF THE LIFE OF MRS. MARY JEMISON,
Who was taken by the Indians, in the year 1755, when only about twelve
years of age, and has continued to reside amongst them to the present time.
CONTAINING
An Account of the Murder of her Father and his Family; her sufferings; her
marriage to two Indians; her troubles with her Children; barbarities of
the Indians in the French and Revolutionary Wars; the life of her last
Husband, &c.; and many Historical Facts never before published.
_Carefully taken from her own words, Nov._ 29th, 1823.
TO WHICH IS ADDED,
An APPENDIX, containing an account of the tragedy at the Devil's Hole, in
1783, and of Sullivan's Expedition; the Traditions, Manners, Customs, &c.
of the Indians, as believed and practised at the present day, and since
Mrs. Jemison's captivity; together with some Anecdotes, and other
entertaining matter.
BY JAMES E. SEAVER.
PREFACE.
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 been 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, commingled 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 blood-stained 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 unpropitious 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 whence 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
effected 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. Prolixity 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 charitably
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. Jemison'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 animadversion 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_ 1, 1824.
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 Stanwix, 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.
Sometime elapsed after this event, before the country about the lakes and
on the Genesee river was visited, save 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. Jemison 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
stranger's 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 increases
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 live 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 in 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. Jemison with the Indians, when Daniel
W. Banister, Esq. 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. Jennet Whaley in the town
of Castile, Genesee co. N.Y. 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 fourscore 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 cheek bones 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 eye-brows as
they do with the head inclined downwards. Formerly her hair was of a light
chestnut brown--it is now quite grey, 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 of words 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 in 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 a 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 trickled 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 practised from the day of her
adoption to the present. She pounds her samp, cooks for herself, gathers
and chops wood, feeds her cattle and poultry, and performs other laborious
services. 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 open
before and extended down about midway of the hips.--The petticoat was a
piece of broadcloth 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
half way between the knee and 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 broadcloth, 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 undressed 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
deer skin. Over all this, she wore an Indian blanket. On her head she wore
a piece of old brown woollen 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 t
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 centre of the house is a
chimney of stones and sticks, in which there are two fire places. 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 one hundred rods 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 extoling
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 censurable act
to their knowledge.
Her habits, are those of the Indians--she sleeps on skins without a
bedstead, sits upon the floor or on 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 Senecas. 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 enterprizing 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, and with interest,
anxiety and satisfaction.
LIFE OF MARY JEMISON.
CHAPTER I.
Nativity of her Parents.--Their removal to America.--Her Birth.--Parents
settle in Pennsylvania.--Omen of her Captivity.
Although I may 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 Erwin. Their affection for each other was mutual, and
of that happy kind which tends directly to sweeten the cup of life; to
render connubial 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 connubial 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 prevailed 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 avocations.
In Europe my parents had two sons and one daughter, whose names were John,
Thomas and Betsey; with whom, after having put their effects on board,
they embarked, leaving a large connexion 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.
Excepting 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 a tract 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 brothers 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 seventy 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.
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