Buffalo Creek Reservation

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Location of the Buffalo Creek Reservation (blue) in present-day Erie County; right of the state of New York

The Buffalo Creek Reservation was an Indian reservation in the west of the US state New York , which was granted to the Seneca people after the American War of Independence . The 202 km² reserve was located on Buffalo Creek, a tributary of the Buffalo River, in the center of what is now Erie County , and existed from 1797 to 1838.

At the time of its creation, the reserve comprised, among other things, a large part of today's urban area of Buffalo , the south of today's city of Cheektowaga and the area of ​​today's cities and towns Lackawanna , West Seneca , East Seneca and Elma .

History and present

prehistory

Buffalo Creek today

The Seneca had been resident in this region at least since the beaver wars, which were victorious for them in the 17th century. The Wenrohronon and the neutrals , with whom they had initially lived there in a tense relationship, soon merged into the very dominant Seneca. The agreement with the British, with whom the Seneca repeatedly concluded treaties (1677 Covenant Chain , 1768 Treaty of Fort Stanwix), proved to be more durable . The American patriots, on the other hand, cultivated a racist and anti-Indian rhetoric, which the Seneca used very much against them.

In the American War of Independence (1775–1783) the Seneca initially strived for neutrality, but fought from 1777 ( Battle of Oriskany ) under the Mohawk Joseph Brant and their own chief Cornplanter on the side of the loyalists and British. When the Sullivan expedition commissioned by Commander-in-Chief George Washington carried out a scorched earth operation in the settlement areas of the Seneca and other nations of the Iroquois League in the summer of 1779 , in which not only the villages but also the corn fields and gardens were destroyed, the starving survivors fled by the thousands to the British Fort Niagara . After the very hard winter of 1779/1780 they dispersed; about 2,000 Seneca followed their chief Sayenqueraghta (1707–1786) to Buffalo Creek and began to settle there.

The west of today's state of New York, including the land on Buffalo Creek, was initially under the control of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts as an Indian territory , but with the Phelps and Gorham Purchase (1788) came into the possession of the politicians and land speculators Oliver Phelps and Nathaniel Gorham . These immediately made agreements with the regional Indians ( 1st Treaty of Buffalo Creek , 1788), but fell behind with their partial payments in 1791, whereupon Massachusetts withdrew their rights to the land again. In the same year the very wealthy Robert Morris bought the land, but kept only a small part of it and sold the larger part in 1792/1793, including the region around Buffalo Creek, to the Holland Land Company , a syndicate of Dutch investors; this sale has since been referred to as the "Holland Purchase".

Foundation and history of the Buffalo Creek Reservation

The treaties that the Seneca and other nations of the Iroquois League concluded with the victorious Americans in the years that followed resulted in considerable territorial losses for the Indians. The last and most momentous contract in this series was the Treaty of Big Tree (1797), which left the Seneca with only four smaller reservations in addition to the relatively large Buffalo Creek Reservation , namely the Cattaraugus Reservation , the Allegany Reservation , the Tonawanda Reservation and the Oil Springs Reservation . The main beneficiary of this contract was the Holland Land Company . The Buffalo Creek Reservation also lost area when the Seneca sold part of their fertile farmland to the Ogden Land Company in 1826 ; Around 1,000 German Free Churches then settled on this land and called themselves “ Inspired ” or “Ebenezer”.

In 1830 the US Senate , supported by President Andrew Jackson , passed the Indian Removal Act , which aimed to expel all Indians from the states east of the Mississippi and to settle them in newly acquired territories in the American west. In the course of this expulsion policy , the New York Seneca were forced to sign the 2nd treaty of Buffalo Creek in 1838 , which obliged them to give up their entire reservation land within five years and emigrate to either Wisconsin or Indian territory (today: Oklahoma ). Because the Ogden Land Company , in whose interests the contract was concluded, did not subsequently acquire the land of all five reservations as agreed, but only the Buffalo Creek Reservation and the Tonawanda Reservation, the sale was renegotiated and in a third contract from Buffalo Creek regulated one more time in 1842. On the basis of this contract, the Seneca were able to keep the smaller four reservations, but the Buffalo Creek reservation was lost.

One of the best-known residents of the reservation was Mary Jemison (1742 / 1743-1833), who was kidnapped by the Seneca as a child of American settlers and who continued to live as Seneca.

present

The Seneca Buffalo Creek Casino

In 2005, the Seneca acquired a plot of land on the outskirts of downtown Buffalo , on a strip of land that had belonged to the Buffalo Creek Reservation until 1838, from Carl Paladino, CEO of Ellicott Development Co. , for just under $ 3.75 million . They built a casino there , which opened in a temporary building in 2007 and a permanent building in 2013. The owner is Seneca Gaming Corporation , which also operates similar facilities in Niagara Falls and Salamanca .

literature

  • Frank James Lankes: The Senecas on Buffalo Creek Reservation , West Seneca Historical Society, 1964

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Frank H. Severance (Ed.): Buffalo Historical Society Publications . tape 24 . Buffalo Historical Society, Buffalo 1920, p. 110 f . ( limited preview in Google Book search).
  2. ↑ Randi Minetor: Cursed in New York: Stories of the Damned in the Empire State . Globe Pequot, 2015, ISBN 978-1-4930-1376-0 ( limited preview in Google Book Search).
  3. ^ Ray Raphael: A People's History of the American Revolution: How Common People Shaped the Fight for Independence . New Press, New York 2001, pp. 246 f .
  4. ↑ 1759-1796 - Guardhouse of the Great Lakes. Archived from the original on August 24, 2006 ; accessed on January 9, 2017 .
  5. ^ Colin G. Calloway: Pen and Ink Witchcraft: Treaties and Treaty Making in American Indian History . Oxford University Press, Oxford, New York 2013, ISBN 978-0-19-991730-3 , pp. 39 ( limited preview in Google Book search).
  6. ^ The History of Buffalo: A Chronology - Buffalo, New York. Retrieved January 10, 2017 .
  7. ^ Lewis Cass Aldrich, George Stillwell: History of Ontario county, New York . Ed .: George S. Conover. D. Mason & Co., Syracuse, NY 1893, pp. 85 f . ( limited preview in Google Book search).
  8. ^ A b Robert W. Silsby: The Holland Land Company in Western New York . In: Adventures in Western New York History . tape 8 . Buffalo and Erie County Historical Society, 1961 ( nylearns.org - click Adventures in WNY History on the home page).
  9. ↑ William C. Sturtevant, Bruce G. Trigger (Ed.): Handbook of North American Indians . tape 15 . Smithsonian Institution, Washington 1978, p. 435 ( limited preview in Google Book search).
  10. ^ Frank J. Schieppati et al. a .: Phase IA Archaeological and Architectural Reconnaissance Survey for PIN 5044.01 Southtowns Connector / Buffalo Outer Harbor Project . Federal Highway Administration, 2005, pp. 29 ( limited preview in Google Book search).
  11. ^ Treaty with the Seneca, 1842. Retrieved January 10, 2017 .
  12. ^ Carl Paladino: The accidental candidate. Retrieved January 10, 2017 .
  13. ^ A b Seneca Gaming Corporation. Retrieved January 10, 2017 .
  14. ^ Seneca Buffalo Creek Casino. Retrieved January 10, 2017 .