hv_sansomj_letters_1796_023

Fort Schuyler, on the Mohawk, 6th. Mo. 20th. 1796 My dear Friends, My last if I recollect right, was dated this day week; yet, as I trusted it to an accidental opportunity, I think it very probably you will receive this first. It carried us to Hendrick Aupaumuts, at New Stockbridge, and left us under the good keeping of Lydia Quinney (for the Wife does not here assume the name of her Husband) one of the best Housewives, considering circumstances, that we have ever known, no offence I hope to Anybody. You may be sure we were not in haste to leave her; yet having appointed to meet the Oneidas on 3rd. day afternoon we set out, on foot, and in the rain, though it cleared up before we had travelled far, through thick woods, and marshy bottoms. Two miles brought us to a little remnant of the Tuscaroras, who fled here 80 or 100 years ago from the banks of the Patowmack, and, If I am right, have been ever since incor- porated with the ancient Five Nations, now six. The main body of them sided with the British in the late war, and are settled on the banks of Niagara. The few that remain under the patronage of the Oneidas, appear helpless and forlorn, almost without a Chief, and without a Counsellor. Two miles further we came across the scattered hamlets of the Oneidas, original Proprietors of this fertile spot, who I think at the Treaty of