In my French-Canadian ancestry, one of the earliest dead ends is a Mohawk from Kahnawake.¹ Therefore, I am studying early Caughnawaga, its history, and its people.

General History

The Beginnings

Mohawk Christians were persuaded by their Jesuit missionaries to leave their homeland and settle near Montreal about 1667. The first village was established at La Prairie. Mostly Mohawks, with a few Oneidas and other Iroquoians, came to the village. In 1676, it was moved to Sault St. Louis and named Caughnawaga (older spelling) or Kahnawake (modern spelling), which means "at the rapids." It moved small distances again and again until 1716, when its present-day location was established. foe agricultural reasons The original grant of land for Kahnawake is reported to be 40,000 acres. Some story about post 17xx immigrants being "refugees" as opposed to "original" inhabitants - from where?

Geography and boundaries

• The Hudson river valley, an approximate eastern edge of the Mohawk section.
• The Mohawk river valley, which crosses the Iroquois lands and provides a waterway connection to the Hudson river.
• The Great Lakes, particularly lakes Erie and Ontario, which form something of a northwestern boundary to the Iroquois lands.
• Lake Champlain and the St. George? river valley, which provides a waterway link from Iroquois lands and the Hudson river valley to the St. Lawrence River and the French trading center at Montréal.

When did Europeans begin to settle along the Hudson river valley? When did they begin to go up the Mohawk river valley?

The Great Lakes Plain (west of the Mohawk river), the Allegheny Plateau (west of the Catskills), and the Champlain Valley (the waterway including Lake Champlain, north of the Hudson river) were still prehistoric Iroquois lands at the time of the American Revolution (1777), apart from a few French missionaries and coureurs de bois.

Population data

Immigrations

Kateri Tekakwitha

Life at Kahnawake

Parkman describes Kahnawake thus: "It had a chapel, fortifications, and storehouses; two Jesuits, an officer, and three chief traders. Of these last, two were maiden ladies, the Demoiselles Desauniers; and one of the Jesuits, their friend Father Tournois, was their partner in business." p. 889

In the 1700s, the Mohawks retained their traditional occupations of farming hunting, and fishing, with the men leaving for hunting trips in the wintertime. They also raised livestock introduced by Europeans: pigs, poultry, and horses. Traditional clan membership and matrilineal descent were preserved, but many people from other Indian groups were adopted into the clans.

Near the end of the 1700s, as the fur supply declined in the area, many Mohawk men joined the North West company as trappers, loggers, and canoeists.

In the 1800s, men at Kahnawake hunted less and less, as the expansion of Canada took away the wilderness, and farming moved into the economic forefront. In 1830, Kahnawake was made a reservation, and the Canadian government changed the matriarchial households into patriarchial households.

Follow this link for a discussion of the development of Christianity among the Iroquois, and particularly at Kahnawake.

Exoduses or Emigrations

• Between 1747 and 1755, Catholic Mohawks in search of better soil founded a settlement about 80 miles southwest of Montreal. Its Indian name is Akwesasne, which means "where the partridge drums"; the church is the mission of St. Regis.
• Near the end of the 1700s, in connection with the North West fur trade, a group of Kahnawakens established a settlement of about 250 people in Alberta and mixed with local Indians, notably the Cree.
• After the treaty ending the French and Indian War, 1763, many Caughnawagans left Sault St. Louis and settled in the Ohio river valley, near present-day Sandusky and Scioto rivers. Estimated population 200 in 1776.

Europeans

Descr of phenomenon, some links, etc. List of Europeans recorded as having gone to Caughnawaga and stayed. I'm also trying to compile a list of the early Caughnawaga settlers

Individual people

A large part of my focus is on Europeans who became American Indians at Caughnawaga. To treat this material, I am dividing up lists of early inhabitants of Kahnawake into 3 different groups:

• A list of English captives and other adoptees
• A list of French captives and other adoptees
• Iroquois who came to Caughnawaga
  Genealogical notes from Henri Béchard's book, The Original Caughnawaga Indians
  Genealogical notes from John Demos' book, The Unredeemed Captive