Nineteenth-Century Works

There are numerous nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century works that often provide useful information surrounded by untenable generali­zations. If you want to take the trouble to sift through for what is usable, look at Armbruster, Eugene L. The Indians of New England and New Netherland. New York: G. Quattlander, 1918. This is an effort to trace the origins of various Eastern Indians to their Southern origins and to show tribal divisions and territories. It is a slight, eleven-page pamphlet.

Barratt, Joseph. “Indian Proprietors of Mattesbeseck” The Address Delivered at the dedi­cation of the Indian Hill Cemetery Middletown: Charles H. Pelton, 1850. A four-page list of forty-eight Indians with identifying comments. Included are the Indians from whom the original purchase was made. This is an unusual piece of work. Samson Occom commented, “I am afraid the poor Indians will never stand a good chance with the English in their land controversies, because they are very poor .... Money is almighty now-a-days, and the Indians have no learning, no art, no cunning; the English have all. (p.223)

Canning, E. W. B. “The Aborigines of the Housatonic Valley.” Magazine of Ameri­can History 2(1878).

Ellis, George, et al. King Philip’s War: Based on the Archives.... New York: Grafton Press, 1906.

Eno, Joel N. “The Original Indian Land Owners in Connecticut.” Connecticut Magazine 10(1906)3. Locates the principal tribes; apparently wholly derived from DeForest.

Gold, T. S. “Fostering the Habit of Industry: The Anglicized Indian....” Connec­ticut Magazine 8(1903)2. Reminiscences about two nineteenth-century Indian families in Cornwall, those of Jerry Conell (Cogswell) and Rufus Bunker.

Hoyt, Epaphras. Antiquarian Researches: Comprising a History of the Indian Wars in the Country Bordering on the Connecticut River. Greenfield. Mass: A. Phelps, 1824.

Lewis, G. W.  History of the Pequot War and the Battle of Stonington. Bridgeport: City Steam Printing Co., 1893. Don’t bother.

Love, William DeLoss. Samson Occom and the Christian Indians of New England. Bos­ton : Pilgrim Press, 1899. Occom is listed in the “Biography” section, below.

Nonesuch, Mercy. “The Last of the Niantics.” Connecticut Magazine 8(1903)2. This is an interview with Ms. Nonesuch, who was born in a wigwam in 1822. She was married to a Mohegan, Henry Mauiews.

Orcutt, Samuel. The Indians of the Housatonic and Naugatuck Valleys. 1882; re­printed by John E. Edwards, Stamford, 1972. Based largely on George Henry Loskiel’s History of the Moravian Missions in North America (London: T. Allmon, 1838) and Orcutt’s own transcriptions of Indian deeds and treaties in the Con­necticut State Library, this is a very useful source of information.

Phyfe, R. Easton. “Indian Legends in Connecticut.” Connecticut Magazine 12(1908)1. Legends clearly labeled legends. Local history and romance— mostly romance.

Reichel, W. C. A Memorial of the Dedication of Monuments Erected by the Moravian His­torical Society To Mark the Sites of Ancient Missionary Stations in New York and Con­necticut. New York: C. B. Richardson, 1860. The Connecticut Indians involved were the Scatacooks at Kent.

Ruttenber, Edward M. History of the Indian Tribes of’ Hudson’s River Albany: J. Munsell, 1872. The Wappengers and Scatacooks occupied territory between the Hudson and the Housatonic.

Sylvester, Herbert Milton. Indian Wars of New England. Boston: W. B. Clarke, 1910. Three huge volumes jammed with information from forty-eight pub­lished sources. The author “does not claim to have discovered anything new after the lapse of centuries, but he has endeavored to give some shape to the disheveled data of numerous chroniclers.” (p. 8) The work is interesting prin­cipally for its representation of the views of the era in which it was written. “There seems to be little to be added to previous accounts of a people who ceased to exist a century and a half ago, and whose origin and history are invol­ved in obscure tradition prior to the advent of Waymouth and Champlain.

“The origin, especially, of the New England Indian is a matter wholly of con­jecture. His annihilation, however, is an historic fact. It is with the finals of his savage activities, in which the Levitical concept [of] an eye for an eye was ob­served to the letter, that the author is compelled, by the historic areas to be surveyed, to be content.” (p. 6).

Thresher, Calista P. “Homes and Haunts of the Pequots.” New England Magazine 25(1901-02)6:742-54. From Groton to the Mystic River; several photographs and descriptions of points of interest relating to the Pequots.

Townshend, Charles Henry. “The Quinnipiak Indians and their Reservations.” Papers of the NHCHS 6(1900):151-220. The reservation, established in 1638, covered the 1,200 acres east of New Haven. Here is the text of deeds and treaties, with maps. Comes down to the late nineteenth century, when there were twenty-five Indians in New Haven County. An important post-DeForest piece.

Trumbull, Benjamin. A Compendium of the Indian Wars in New England More Par­ticularly Such as the Colony of Connecticut have been Concerned and Active In. Edited by Frederick Berg Hartranft. Hartford: Edwin Valentine Mitchell, 1926. This is the first printing of a manuscript prepared by Trumbull in 1769 and presumably used in his History.