The Mohawk Valley was first settled by men escaping from feudalism. The manor-system, a surviving relic of the old days of lordship and villeinage, had long cursed England, Germany, and Holland, though first outgrown and thrown off in the latter country. It was from this system, almost as much as from Church laws, that the Pilgrim Fathers were glad to escape and find free labour as well as liberty of conscience in Holland,—the land where they “heard,” and found by experience, “that all men were

There is probably no good foundation for the local tradition, mentioned by Gen. J. Watts De Peyster, in his Life of Gen. John Johnson (Preface, p. ii, note), that the family name of William Johnson was originally “Jansen, and that the first who bore it and settled in Ireland was a Hollander, who, like many of his countrymen, went over afterward with William III. in 1690, won lands and established themselves in Ireland.” The subject is not mentioned in the Encyclopædia Britannica, and but slightl

The military nerves of the continent of North America lie in the water-ways bounding, traversing, or issuing from the State of New York. Its heart is the region between the Hudson and the Niagara. In these days of steam-traction, when transit is made at right angles to the rivers, and thus directly across the great natural channels of transportation, New York may be less the Empire State than in the days of canoes and bateaux. Yet even now its strategic importance is at once apparent. In the old

For the possession of the North American continent two nations, France and England, representing the two civilizations, Roman and Teutonic, which dominate respectively Southern and Northern Europe, contended. France, in America, embodied the Roman or more ancient type of civilization, in which government and order were represented by the priest and the soldier, while the people had little or nothing to do with the government, except to obey. External authority was everything; inward condition, l

When the conference opened, August 19, Dr. Cadwallader took the place of Governor Clinton, who was down with fever. The two delegates from Massachusetts, Mr. Nelles and Colonel Wendell, were also present, but none from Connecticut appeared. Colden’s speech was a bubble of rhetoric, fairly dazzling with the prismatics of a lively imagination. It rehearsed facts, fancies, and prophecies appropriate to the situation. The colossal but purely mythical preparations supposed to be made in Great Britain

To reorganize the demoralized militia of the northern counties, Governor Clinton in November offered the command of the entire frontier to Johnson, who after due consideration accepted. Besides having the confidence of the people, among whom he was personally popular, Johnson, being backed by the Executive Council, was able to do the work expected of him, and bring about much needed reform, especially in improving the quality of the officers and the general discipline. The able-bodied men of the

The Old French War , or the War of the Austrian Succession, was foolishly begun in Germany, and foolishly ended in Europe, Asia, and America. The peace which came without honour settled nothing as regarded the questions at issue in America. In reality this treaty guaranteed another American war. Louisburg was again handed over to the French in exchange for Madras. All prisoners in the three continents were to be released without ransom, and a return of all conquered territory and property was ag

By the movements in Western Pennsylvania, the war had already broken out, though the diplomatists on the transatlantic side had not yet said so. By the first week in May, the raids on the northern border began by the destruction of Hoosic, within ten miles of Fort Massachusetts. The half-naked or starving refugees reaching Albany furnished a vivid object-lesson of reality. Under Johnson’s vigilance and activity, the people in the forts, block-houses, and palisaded villages were kept on guard nig

The versatile Johnson, turning from military to civil duties, remained in New York during the whole of the month of January, 1756. The men then in control of the British government, with their usual obtuseness, sent another sailor to do the work of a statesman. Sir Charles Hardy, after appointing October 2 as a day of public thanksgiving for the victory at Lake George, celebrated it himself by starting on a visit to Albany. He proposed to effect such a resumption of active military operations as

It is hard for Americans to realize that the French and Indian War was more costly to Great Britain than was the War of the American Revolution. As matter of fact, the British Government sent a larger total of soldiers and sailors, and spent more blood and treasure in defending the colonies and in wresting North America from the French, than in endeavouring to coerce the revolted colonies. Though in the various attempts at the reduction of Canada, no large armies like those of Burgoyne or Cornwa

With the change of dominion in North America came a change in the ruler of Great Britain. King George II. died October, 1760; but this made no alteration in the relations of Sir William Johnson to the Crown. On the contrary, his sphere of influence was enlarged by his having charge of Indian affairs in Canada, and indeed in all the regions north of the St. Lawrence, in what is now called British America. In October, 1760, a new commission as Superintendent of Indian Affairs, valid during the kin

The last ten years of Johnson’s life were among the busiest of his career. War matters occupied but a portion of his time. His greater works were those of peace, his chief idea being the development in civilization of the region watered by the Mohawk and its tributaries. The story of his life now concerns itself with the location of settlers; the education of the Indians; the building of schools, churches, and colleges; the improvement of land and live-stock; the promotion of agriculture, and of

While the brown Lady Johnson, Mollie Brant, presided over the mansion, and her dusky brood attended the manor school, the daughters of Johnson and of Catharine Wisenberg were trained under the care of a governess who made them familiar with the social graces of London and the polite accomplishments and standard literature of England. Mary Brant, though not only an Indian, but a Mohawk Indian in spirit, was to her dying day, in the old English and Hebrew sense of the word, a virtuous woman. She h