JAMES RENWICK, LL.D.

----------------------------------------

CHAPTER X.

----------------------------------------

Description of the Water Communications of the State of New-York. – Use made of them by the Indians. – Expedition of General Clinton on the Susquehanna. – Views of Lieutenant-Governor Colden. – Tour of Washington to Wood Creek. – His Predilections for the Route to the Chesapeake. – Clinton’s liberal Policy in relation to this Question.

----------------------------------------

The Atlantic coast of the United States is separated from the Valley of the Mississippi and the basins of the great lakes by a system of mountain chains. No less than five distinct ranges can be traced, and, in many places, a greater number of ridges are met with in passing from tide-water to the streams of the interior. This system of mountains extends from the frontiers of Canada to the State of Georgia. Its outer chain is made up of a number of short and separate ridges, extending north and south, and is therefore divided by valleys oblique to its general direction, which is northeast and southwest. Through these valleys a number of streams, of greater or less magnitude, make their way; but of these, the Hudson alone is navigable through the ridge for vessels of any magnitude. This river bursts through this rocky barrier in a channel nowhere less that 1000 yards in width, and deep enough for vessels of the largest size; but it does not cut any of the other ridges. The Susquehanna, on the other hand, rising in the State of New-York, and whose western branch has its head at no great distance from Lake Erie and from that of a principal branch of the Ohio, cuts through all the ridges of which we have spoken. No other river makes its way through the whole system; and thus the Valley of the Susquehanna might appear to be pointed out by nature as the proper channel for a navigable communication between the lakes and the Atlantic. This river is, however, so rapid in the lower part of its course, and its upper valley is separated by barriers of such height from the basin of Lake Ontario, that it could neither be navigated by an ascending trade, nor reached by the settlers of the more fertile parts of the State of New-York. On the other hand, the Mohawk, the most important branch of the Hudson, has its course in a valley that opens toward the west, and merges in the basin of Lake Ontario. Its greatest fall is immediately at its junction with the Hudson; and thence, with the exception of an insuperable rapid at the Little Falls, it was accessible to a navigation in small vessels, both in the ascending and descending direction, as far as the ancient Fort Stanwix, the site of the modern village of Rome.

In this vicinity is a swamp, whence, in times of flood, the waters run in opposite directions towards the Hudson and Lake Ontario. A short portage at this place led to Wood Creek, a deep and sluggish stream which falls into the Oneida Lake. The outlet of the Oneida Lake, after receiving the Onondago, unites with the Seneca outlet to form the Oswego River, and through the latter the navigation was practicable as far as Lake Ontario.

This navigation from Schenectady to Oswego was practised by European traders at a very early date. It is even probable that the Dutch, who at first limited their views to traffic, had reached Lake Ontario before the agricultural settlements of the Colony of New Netherlands were commenced. At any rate, the route was well known and practised by Dutch traders before the conquest by the British; and in 1810, the commissioners appointed to explore the country in reference to a canal navigation, found at the outlet of the river obvious traces of the Dutch trading-houses, separate and clearly distinct from the ruins of the fortifications with which the French and English had, in succession, occupied that important position. It appears, however, that in the disturbances which attended and followed the cession to England, the traders, deprived of support, yielded to the growing influence of the French.

The Seneca outlet, which, as we have seen, joins the Onondago at Three River Point, was practicable for boats into the lake whence it proceeds, and through the Cayuga outlet the lake of the same name could be reached. At the head of the Seneca and of Lake Cayuga were the most remote points of inland communication.

Lake Ontario, whose southern shore affords numerous good harbours, was not unsafe for boats which coasted along it to the Niagara River, where they were carried over the portage to Schlosser, and thence passed into Lake Erie.

A more southern line of communication was also practicable. Leaving the Mohawk at Fort Plain, boats were carried over a long portage to the Otsego Lake, whence they could descend the main branch of the Susquehanna to Chemung Point. Here, entering into the Tioga branch, they might ascend the sluggish stream of that river almost to its source, and to points at no great distance from the navigable waters of the Alleghany, an important branch of the Ohio.

The last mentioned navigation was applied to great advantage during the revolutionary war. The right wing of the army intended to act against the Indians was assembled on the Mohawk, whence it threatened the confederated nations on the front; but this was a mere feint; for, crossing to the Otsego Lake, it was embarked on the Susquehanna, and borne upon its current to a junction with the main body of the army at Chemung Point. Thence the united force moved upon the rear and flank of the strategic position occupied by the Tories and their savage allies. The important results of this brilliant military operation are too well known to be repeated here.

The communications of which we have spoken were used with great skill by the five confederated nations of Iroquois, in their wars with hostile tribes. By the Hudson their canoes descended, bearing forces which reduced to subjection the Lenni Lenape or Algonquin races, to the extreme end of Long Island. By Lake Ontario and the Saint Lawrence their war parties penetrated until they met the first French expedition on the Island of Montreal. On Lake Erie they defeated in a naval action, and almost exterminated, a cognate nation. The Susquehanna afforded them the means of replenishing the ranks of the expeditions they sent into Virginia, where an invading party of Mingoes founded the powerful Tuscarora nation. On the west the Alleghany was the channel by which a perpetual war was waged with the Indians of the Ohio.

In these expeditions a peculiar description of vessel was employed, the bark canoe. This was so light, that, although capable of carrying ten or twelve men, with their arms and provisions, it could be readily transported over the portages on the shoulders of two of them. The traders of European origin borrowed the mode of constructing these vessels from the Indians, but the Canadian French made a much more extensive and successful use of them than the British colonists. They were also employed in the military expeditions of the French; and, having obtained the command of Lake Ontario, on which they built armed vessels, they formed communications both for commercial and warlike purposes with the Ohio and the more western branches of the Mississippi. In this manner the British colonies were gradually surrounded by a chain of French posts, extending from Lake Champlain to the mouth of the Mississippi.

In the mean time, the merchants of Albany contented themselves with trading with such Indians as actually visited that place, or with selling to the French traders such goods of British manufacture as were absolutely necessary for the Indian market. The idea of a communication for the purposes of settlement, and of the commerce which would thus be created in the productions of agriculture, seems never to have occurred to any one; and no clear estimate of the advantages of a direct trade with the Indians of the State of New-York, by means of parties sent out for the purpose, was formed by mercantile men.

Lieutenant-Governor Colden seems to have been the first to perceive the danger to which the Province of New-York, and others even more remote from Canada, were exposed, in consequence of the influence which French traders and missionaries were acquiring over the Five Nations, hitherto firm friends, first of the Dutch, and subsequently of the English. He, in consequence, made diligent inquiries into the communications by water which existed in the western part of the present State of New-York, and, having obtained all the information then accessible, made a communication to Governor Burnet, in which he sets forth the dangers of the colonies, and proposes, as a mode of removing them, a direct trade from Albany with the Indians. In this memoir he points out the route from the Hudson by the portage to Schenectady, the Mohawk, Wood Creek, Oneida Lake, the Onondago and Oswego rivers, to Lake Ontario. He then states that a river coming from the country of the Senecas joins the Oswego, and extends to so great a distance as probably to approach Lake Erie. If in this opinion he was incorrect, it still shows the views of the true policy, which was to avoid the waters controlled by, or accessible to, a rival nation, and to seek for communications wholly within the jurisdiction of the colony.

This memoir of Colden was productive of important consequences. Under the influence of Burnet, the trade with the French was interdicted, and a chain of posts was established along the line of the Mohawk, the Oneida outlets, and Onondago River. Finally a fort was erected at Oswego itself, and occupied by a permanent garrison of troops, raised and supported by the colony. The benefits of the Indian trade were thus secured for the moment to the merchants of Albany, and the fortress of Oswego became an object of jealousy to the French.

At this time the articles of traffic were the supplies for a scanty population, deriving its subsistence from the chase on the one hand, and the valuable articles of furs on the other. These articles were of little bulk compared with the value set upon them in their respective markets; and the small canoes of bark, passing through shallow and rapid streams, and transported on the shoulders of men over rough portages, would not have been insufficient for the purpose. Colden seems therefore to have limited his views to this mode of communication, and could not have anticipated the time when the homes of the mighty tribes who had reduced to their sway so much of the present United States, and had alone been capable of resisting the science of European warfare, should be possessed by an agricultural population, become the seat of commerce in the luxuries of the most distant climes, and aspire to the triumphs of manufacturing industry. For the wants of a people exercising these three great branches of industry, the light and frail barks of the Indian traders are entirely inadequate; and, while we find in his memoir the first good account of the water communications of the state, we see in it no hint of the importance of improving them by artificial means, and of rendering them subservient to the wants of civilized life.

Sir Henry Moore seems to have been the first who extended his views beyond the trade with the Indians. In one of his speeches to the Legislature, he points out the practicability of improving the navigation of the rivers of the state by means of sluices (locks), as in the canal of Languedoc. It is to be remarked, that this communication was made at a time when the parent country was without canals, and that he was, in consequence, compelled to have recourse to the experience of France; and this is, perhaps, the first of the numerous instances in which Anglo-America has, in the project, if not in the completed invention, taken the lead of Britain. This project was, however, in advance both of the spirit of the age and the wants of the population. The settlers of the Mohawk and Schoharie valleys were too few in numbers to support such an enterprise by their trade, and the Little Falls of the former river were the farthest limit of agricultural industry. The prolific race of New-England had not yet crossed the Hudson in search of its land; and that the wilds occupied by the Five Nations should become the seat of a rich and industrious policy, was beyond the limit of reasonable anticipation.

Imperfect as were these navigations of which we have spoken, they were, notwithstanding, employed with fatal effect against us in the early part of the Revolutionary war. All the confederated nations except the Oneidas ranged themselves under the British banner, and from their central position alternately invaded the settlements on the Mohawk and on the Susquehanna. Their supplies of arms and clothing were derived from Canada by the way of Oswego, and by this channel the corps of St. Leger advanced, for the purpose of forcing his way through the Valley of the Mohawk to a junction with the army of Burgoyne.

That communications so dangerous in war might be applied to advantageous purposes in peace, was obvious; and Washington, who had watched with anxiety the operations of the British forces, no sooner found a respite from his military toils, than he proceeded along the Mohawk, and examined in person the practicability of forming a union between it and Wood Creek. He also viewed the portage between the Mohawk and the head of the Susquehanna; and it is clear that his survey was made in conformity with his favourite view of making the Chesapeake the great centre of the trade of the United States. That it was pointed out for this purpose by nature he firmly believed, and thus his broad views of the general benefit concurred with his local attachments to the region of his nativity. Should we look to natural circumstances alone, we should be inclined to think that he was right. The broad estuary of the Chesapeake, with its innumerable bays, presents an extent of navigable communication far greater than all the streams of which New-York is the appropriate port. Its shores were then far more fertile than any settled part of the northern or eastern states, and supported a greater population; and, in addition to the waters already navigable, the Valley of the Susquehanna presented the shortest practicable line of communication by artificial means between tide-water and streams whose sources interlocked with the tributaries of the St. Lawrence, while, through those of James River and the Kanhaway, the Ohio is approachable in the most direct line. It is probably fortunate for the City of New-York, that the state of the times was not suited to enterprises of internal improvement while Washington retained his paramount influence both in the councils of the general government and of his native state. It is also fortunate that the jealousy of the states of Pennsylvania and Maryland prevented, until recently, the execution of a canal in the lower part of the Valley of the Susquehanna; while, under false views of economy, the improvement of so much of its upper course as lies in Pennsylvania was retarded and opposed. Clinton, however, warmly as he desired the welfare of his native state, was governed by no exclusive sectional views, and carefully weighed the relative advantages of the routes by the Susquehanna and the Mohawk, with a view both to general and local interests. His papers contain memoranda on this subject, which show the attention he bestowed upon it. When, however, the State of Pennsylvania awoke to a sense of its true interests, Clinton furthered, by all the means in his power, the success of an application for facilities by which the artificial navigations of the State of New-York might be brought into connexion with those projected in the Valley of the Susquehanna. Not content with this, he accepted an invitation to visit Pennsylvania, to enforce by his eloquence, and the influence of his presence, the praiseworthy attempts of the patriotic citizens of that state in urging the Legislature to emulate the glories and benefits of the New-York canals.

----------------------------------------

Transcribed from the original text and html prepared by Bill Carr, last updated 12/10/99.